Zine #2 and January 2025
Days 181 - 196.
I used my camera on 16 days throughout January. This is more or less the average number of days I’m shooting now. As priorities relentlessly shift around, I do sense a need to recentre and refocus, but I also feel that this is perfectly fine and normal.
I need to start working on the 2nd zine of this project, which I have tentatively called SLIFE. The name came about as I was musing about how this last year has felt.
“Eh, that’s just life I guess.” How typical of life’s wistful meanderings battered by unexpected propulsions. A sense of resignation, but also a faint note of comfort knowing that all is as it always has been. Threads of beauty peeking through.
SLIFE will be comprised of photos taken last year and I believe I may pivot from the shutter count thing (mostly due to the fact that there was some filename mishap in camera, so I’m no longer sure what the shutter count is) to an annual zine that corresponds to my age. I feel like I should have started with this structure. Luckily, it all seems to still line up. The first zine, A Cave Begets a Tree, and SLIFE will capture 30 and 31 respectively; this next year I turn 32, so the photos will be for the 3rd zine. Ideally, we will end with 10 zines by the time we hit 40.
Enough zine talk—I need to start working on it.
Entering 2025, I wanted to revisit how I integrate the medium of video into this project. I landed on trying to add more context to the photos, and picked up a DJI Osmo Pocket 3 to round out my everyday photography carry for 2025. You can learn more about it in this video:
It was admittedly difficult to create this January video—perhaps a month was too ambitious. I am also struggling to find any semblance of flow or routine, so I continue to fall behind in editing my photos, let alone video. I have found new love for the Insta360 Go 3, however, after picking up a new cold-shoe mount. The Osmo is still growing on me as I do not find vlogging to be a skillset that is readily available to me (basically I cannot easily take myself out of a moment to consider how it should be captured and I find it unnatural to speak to a camera out in public).
Despite the overall reluctance I had in putting together the video, however, I do find it valuable and meaningful to look back on the month’s photos. I am glad to have more of the context captured as well as it helps in reliving the moment.
I am not sure if I will continue to do this, but we’ll see.
And finally, some of my favourite photos from the month below. All taken on the Leica M-P 240 and Thypoch Simera 35mm f1.4.
