I’m participating in a few personal projects this year, primarily to push my own boundaries in both shooting and processing.  It is so easy to feel down upon my own art, simply by looking at others art.  It’s a strange thing really, because I’ll be joyful about what I’ve shot one second, then think it is trash the next.

The goal this year is to really push myself outside of that thought.  I want to shoot more for me, more for my kids.  I want do document the people, places, and memories of our lives in a way that is organic, and not lead by other trends in composition and processing.  Basically, I’m looking to make me happy.  Photography is a wonderful and life-long hobby.  Anyone can do it, and everyone sees things differently.  If you are a photographer, I hope you’ll share this process, and start thinking about every shot you make as art, rather than a photo.  Your eye is as unique as mine, and even starting with the same camera and lens, using the same tools, we’ll come up with totally different pieces of art.

This project is a group project, so please step on over to check out the work of a friend of mine Beth, a New Hampshire Family Photographer.  She does great family and newborn photography.  All of us are getting out of our comfort zones.  The assignment is to shoot something as “fine art”.  That is a tough one, because art is subjective overall, but the definition of fine art doesn’t lend easily to photography.  I think my friends have stepped up to this challenge.

My photo this month is an interesting perspective of the Cathedral Church of Saint John the Divine in New York, New York.  The project was just completed after 100 years of construction.  The place is magnificent.  A camera and lens simply cannot do the building justice as it is massive in size and minute in the details.  Everything is simply gorgeous and tons of artists have poured their lives into the project.  Make it a stop on your bucket list if you hit NYC. You’ll be glad you did.  I shot this lens with my Nikon D300 and 50MM 1.4G lens.  The image was processed in Adobe Lightroom3, then a texture added in Photoshop CS4.