Below you will find pages that utilize the taxonomy term “Self-Portrait”
2020 Annual Self-Portrait
As I’ve done for the past few years now, a self-portrait at the end of the year to document how I looked this year. This year I went with both a split-tone shot and a black and white shot.
You Know It
Annual Self-Portrait (2020)
2019 Annual Self-Portrait
I thought last year’s description was perfect, so I’m going to repurpose it here. Yeah, yeah – even before Instagram was a thing my family was already making fun of me for taking self-portraits or for my 365 project of self-portraits 8 or so years ago. But for me this is part of my most primal photographic urge; even stronger than the urge to create art. It’s the urge to document my life and the life of those around me. And so I take these self-portraits at roughly the same time every year to be able to view them as a series documenting my aging. And so here is the one I took in 2019.
2018 Annual Self-Portrait
As I continue to work through my backlog of photos from last year (I’m finally done with 2018 after this post!), I come to my annual self-portrait. Yeah, yeah - even before Instagram was a thing my family was already making fun of me for taking self-portraits or for my 365 project of self-portraits 8 or so years ago. But for me this is part of my most primal photographic urge; even stronger than the urge to create art. It’s the urge to document my life and the life of those around me. And so I take these self-portraits at roughly the same time every year to be able to view them as a series documenting my aging. And so here is the one I took in 2018.
This was so much easier when it was just one baby! (4th Month Portrait)

I wanted to do this earlier - somewhere around 2 month portraits. I was re-energized to try the idea after seeing someone do a photo that made it look like their kid was bounding out of the crib with her stuffed animals. I did not take the Sam and Stella images from some other random image. They were right there where you see them. All I did was erase my body (or I’d be in here thrice). Still, if I were to do it again, I’d have Sam and Stella flying near me rather than against the wall. They end up too small and it lessens the impact of the shot. Well, there’s always next time. (And there’s always less edited shots!)
T-Shirts: The W's
Welcome to a new set of posts in which I take a look at the t-shirts I’ve accumulated and comment on why I have them and what they mean to me.

It was the 1990s. I was fully into my Christian revival and the USA was into swing music. I was at a concert to see my new, favorite ska band, Five Iron Frenzy.
I was there with friends from school/Church:
Perhaps Selfies aren't as bad as we think they are?
Whether or not you consider my 365 Project to be a year’s worth of selfies depends largely on whether you believe in the point of 365 projects. But I would say the selfie is more like the pictures you see on Facebook. Like others I viewed them with disdain. Then I came across an interesting article.
I know most people hate selfies. They groan and complain about them, from the duck lips to the filters. Why, just the word “selfie” can induce legendary amounts of eyerolling.
Disney Princess Culture Part 3: Transcending the Culture
I forgot what the term was called, but you know how it goes: you learn a new concept and suddenly see examples everywhere. (Or look into buying a new car only to discover that “everyone” is driving it) Once I jumped into the rabbit hole of Disney Princess Culture and our daughters, it seemed to be never-ending. I happened to come across a post in my feed reader in which a photographer was trying to figure out how to photograph her daughter for her 5 year old portraits:
5 Tips for a More Successful 365 Project
One of the biggest trends on flickr is to start a 365 Project. This usually means taking one self-portrait a day for an entire year. This project is often misunderstood by those outside of flickr, especially since they’re used to the selfie-culture of MySpace and Facebook. It’s not a vanity project. A 365 Project is about taking the adage about becoming a better writer through writing every day to photography. It also has a special bonus of teaching the photographer what it’s like to be the subject. Many of us photo-geeks are behind the camera way more often than we’re in front of it. Sometimes we struggle with how to communicate to our subjects how to achieve the vision we have in our head. By being both the photographer and the subject, we learn to appreciate both points of view.
Approximately a Year Later: Top 200 Photos #10
Back when I compiled the Top 200 Photos feature, this was #10:
and now it’s:
which was not in the top 20 before, so it has really gained a lot of views. That comes from the fact that it’s on Pixel-Peer as an example of that lens’ abilities.
Approximately a Year Later: Top 200 Photos #14
The original #15 photo was:
and now it’s:
which has fallen from #10. It may be one of the most dramatic changes in the lineup.
Approximately a Year Later: Top 200 Photos #18
The original Top 200 Photo in the #18th spot was:
and the current #18 photos is:
this photo has been on the rise ever since Bradley Manning’s trial started up.
Approximately a Year Later: Top 200 Photos #20
Since it took about a year for my Top 200 photos feature to run its course, I wanted to go back and see how things changed within the Top 20 in that year. When I posted the feature, this was #20:
Top 200 Photos: #84
Some more Photoshop fun for today’s Top 200 Photo
Another fun photo from when I was learning Photoshop. Note, it is not a mirror image, it’s a combination of two images.
Top 200 Photos: #116
Reflections and Self-Portraits in today’s Top 200 Photo.
Ever since I was young I was fascinated by visual depictions of infinity. It’s such a strange concept to get one’s mind around and I’m a visual person. So I’ve always loved looking into parallel mirrors. I also used to love hooking up a video camera to a TV and then filming the TV. The infinite scene there was so awesome to observe.
Top 200 Photos: #118
Today’s Top 200 Photo features me again.
I wanted to play around with ideas of censorship and division of photos into frames.
Top 200 Photos: #121
I’m featured in yet another Top 200 Photo.
I was just looking for a quick photo when I was trying to make sure to do one photo every day, but I wasn’t yet working on a 365 Project.
Top 200 Photos: #139
No #140 because it was already covered. As I write this, photo #140 has 416 views and photo #121 has 459 views. So they’re still close enough that just one view can cause a photo to jump 3 or more spots up.
Another boring night in Maryland. Another cool photo with the wife. I had been reading a book of famous photographers and there was this one guy who took photos of beautiful women, but always framed the shot so that he would be reflected in a mirror. So I decided to go with that. Danielle decided to play with kimonos Dan had brought back from his trip to Japan and put on some makeup so I could take photos. I think my favorite aspect of the photo is her half smile.
Top 200 Photos: #151
Today’s Top 200 Photo.
I was practicing my macro photography and I chose to try and photograph myself. And I decided to focus on my stubble because that seems to be a perpetual feature of mine. I was very happy with the comments I ended up getting.
Top 200 Photos: #178
I’m back with another Top 200 Photo entry.
For a while I was doing yoga at our local gym at work. It was quite a revelation. Media usually portrays it as a girly exercise that’s just a bunch of weird stretching poses. Yoga actually requires quite a bit of strength - especially in the “core” muscles. A lot of the poses left me feeling as tired as a weight training workout. I enjoyed it a lot and I only stopped going because my schedule changed and made it hard for me to attend. I’d definitely try it again if I could.
I can't believe it's almost over!
I’m writing this post two days before my 365 project ends. It will be published morning upon which I will take my last photo. I decided to end it with an eight-part story. You can start here and follow the photos in the set “The Dark Assignment” which should be open on the right. (Better than going directly to the set where you might end up seeing the end instead of following along) I’m not going to post my 365 retrospective now, that will come after I’m completely done. But I haven’t blogged about my 365 project since last October. So I wanted to share some of my favorite photos since then.
Photos Moving up The Ladder
Here are some photos that recently went up in views and I wanted to share. From Views 75 to Views 100: The Old Gun Factory - another view -bw by DJOtaku, on Flickr