Reflections on Photo-a-Day 2025

At the end of 2024, I felt like I was in a creative slump. The year had started out well, with a campaign for We Are Explorers doing a hike shoe review. But as the year progressed, I hardly spent any time on my business. I was intermittently sharing photos on the socials and kind of disillusioned with Instagram and the algorithms.

My job as an urban planner was consistently busy, there was a household to manage and I was training for my fourth ultra-marathon, so I guess life was pretty full. I missed photography though and decided to set myself a creative challenge - a good old photo-a-day (PAD) challenge for 2025.

This was not my first rodeo. I'd done a number of PADs between 2012-18 using the camera I always have with me - my phone. The sqaure format still ruled and Hipstamatic was popular. I now regret how heavily I used that app!

This new challenge was going to be different. The aim was to use my 'real' camera more - my mirrorless Olympus E-M5 III - paired with a new prime lens I received for my birthday in 2024.

The lens in question is the M.Zuiko Digital ED 12mm F2.0. Marketed as a high-speed, wide-angle lens that is ideal for shooting high-quality, dramatic landscapes and street scenes in low-light conditions.

Small but mighty!

Full set-up only 665g with camera strap

Some tech talk

Mirrorless cameras are based on a Micro Four Thirds (MFT) system. The 'four thirds' refers to both the size and aspect ratio (4:3) of the sensor. DSLRs generally have a 3:2 aspect ratio, like that of the traditional 35mm format. As the MFT sensor format is equivalent to a 2.0 crop factor when compared to a full frame 35mm camera, the field of view with a MFT lens is twice the focal length of a full frame lens.

In plain speak, my 12mm lens is the equivalent of a 24mm on a non-mirrorless camera. And it is small, light, fast and sharp!

The Challenge

My self-imposed rules were as follows:

• a photo every day with the 12mm lens

• portrait orientation

• no cropping (horizon straightening excluded, I'm not a heathen!)

• all other editing unlimited

• photos shared as a reel after each month

This OM package is so compact and light.

It was easy for me to take it with me everywhere, every day for the whole year.

The Results

You can take the girl out of research but you can't take the researcher out of the girl!

These are rough figures, but it's pretty clear that nature is my go-to subject matter. Followed by the built environment, which is not surprising considering my weekly day in the city and living in the suburbs. Not as many photos of my backup subjects, the cats :-)

Breaking down the natural world category further, landscapes and skies featured heavily.

There is some overlap in these categories as you will see. Below is a collection of shots where I felt the the sky was the main feature.

And those of a broader landscape...

I do also love capturing the smaller details. A little tricky with this wide angle lens, as I couldn't get too close to the subject. And trees, I cannot go past a good tree!

Probably not surprising for an urban planner that the built environment was the second most common subject matter. I will always have a soft spot for built heritage...

And what street art brings to urban interfaces.

Final Reflections

The challenge achieved the main aim of giving my creativity a much needed boost. I'm generally quite aware of my surroundings, but this amplified what I noticed as I sought different subjects to capture. It reminded me of the importance of being present.

From a skills perspective, the limitations of the prime lens forced me to consider how the shot was framed, including perspective and distance. A con of the challenge was that I didn't use the rest of my lenses very much at all last year. My other favourite of late has been the polar opposite of the 12mm, the 40-150mm f2.8 PRO. Not one to carry around every day!

A hefty 1.05kg!

During the winter months, I was regularly photographing at night so I appreciated the capabilities of the OM system in low light, as all photos were taken hand held. I enjoyed playing with light trails and ICM (intentional camera movement), see below.

Overall, I was fairly disciplined in taking photos daily. However, it did get harder as the year progressed and if work was busy. Finding new subject matter could also be challenging when I was time poor (still, the cats only featured a handful of times haha).

The editing is what I find to be the most time consuming aspect of digital photography. If I didn't keep on top of it, I'd find myself madly processing photos at the end of the month to create the reel.

It was quite nice to wake up January 1 without feeling the need to look for a photo though. Daily photo challenges are not something I would normally do back-to-back. This year, I want to focus on my enormous photo catalogue - curating and editing thousands of pics. It's overwhelming, but I need to just keep chipping away at it. There are many unshared gems in there!

Thank you to those that followed along with the challenge all year and engaged with the monthly fave photo voting in my stories. I really do appreciate it!

Below are the top choices for each month as voted by you.

The overall winner...

Colour coordination