Week 52/52 : Everything has changed, and yet I am more me than I’ve ever been

I made it! I almost didn’t think I would, but I couldn’t bear the thought of not finishing this project. I’ve been doing this for 9 years now (since 2009) and I’ve never not finished, so I wasn’t about to start now.

On that note, however, I would like to announce that this is my last year doing the 52-week project. I first started doing 52-weeks as a way to motivate myself to take photos and learn more about photography, back when I had my first DSLR and I was still experimenting with it (Canon Rebel XTi whooo!). This project forced me to step out of my comfort zone and try new things. I learned how to play with lights and shadows, how to utilize my environment, to be resourceful, and discovered the wonderful world of photomanipulations. I met a lot of inspiring people through this project, mostly on Flickr (shoutout to my Pink Tuesdays, Flickr Adiks and Filipina Flickrites friends!) During the first few years I had a lot of free time, and I was able to upload regularly every week. I was even able to shoot and edit 52-week portraits for my sister (which I really miss doing). However, these past few years I’ve discovered a lot of other things I want to try that is non-photography related, and I haven’t devoted as much time to this project as I would have liked. You may have noticed that my uploads have increased significantly during the past few days. That’s because I fell so far behind on this project that I had to practically post one portrait a day just to catch up. The 52-week project has been an incredible journey and 90% of the time I loved what I was doing, but it does take a lot of effort and there were moments when this project caused me great stress (mostly when I ran out of ideas for portraits). 2017 was an amazing year, packed with so many adventures and memories, and it seems like a great time to say goodbye to this project. I have a feeling 2018 is going to be even busier and filled with more adventures and responsibilies, but I welcome the challenge.

For those who are rejoicing about the fact that they won’t be seeing my face plastered on their FB feed from now on, I’m sorry to disappoint you but you’ll still be seeing a lot of me :p I’m not going to stop taking photos, especially not self portraits, I just won’t force myself to upload once a week (which I haven’t been doing anyway). I’m not sure what I’ll do yet. Maybe I’ll just post my portraits on Instagram, or maybe I’ll create a separate album on FB for them if I end up shooting a lot. Who knows. But I’ll definitely still be uploading them.

To end this, I would like to thank everyone who has helped me with all my past 52-week projects (alam nyo na sino kayo) Thank you for the support, critiques, and encouragement. Thank you to everyone who I managed to persuade to take my photo (I know I can be a bit of a control freak sometimes – I’m sorry if I made you take the shot over and over again :p). And thank you to everyone who shared this unforgettable journey with me 🙂

Thanks Kurt for the photo!

(Quote in the title is by Iain Thomas)

Week 51/52 : Keep your face always toward the sunshine – and shadows will fall behind you

We visited the Natural History Museum earlier today. In one of the exhibit halls I found these huge windows. The sun was positioned low and we ended up with these great shadows. I figured it would be a nice place to shoot a self portrait. We had to be quick about it since there were lots of people at the museum today. Fortunately we were able to get a shot without anyone in the background.

Thanks Ezra for the photo! And for taking us to the museum! 🙂

(Quote in title is by Walt Whitman)

Week 50/52 : The things that make me different are the things that make me

I had a quick shoot with Kurt on Christmas morning right before our guests started arriving for our lunch party. I really wanted a photo wearing this outfit because my sister made the top from scratch. Between the two of us, I used to be the one who was more adept at sewing, but after she got married she had a lot of free time as a housewife so she managed to pick up some intermediate skills that I haven’t quite reached yet. I’m so proud of her 😀 She probably would have ended up making more outfits but eventually she decided she wanted to work again so she barely has time to sew these days.

Once again this photo was shot using my cousin’s Leica. It’s an amazing camera, although I haven’t quite mastered it yet. Which explains why this shot is overexposed. I tried to save it in post processing but you can still see some of the parts that was blown out. Also it didn’t help that the sun was a bit harsh that day, which made the lighting tricky to work with. Still, I really like how this turned out.

Thanks Kurt for the photo! More shoots to come!

(Quote in the title is by AA Milne)

Week 49/52 : Be a rainbow in someone’s cloud

Kurt took me back to Universal City Walk the other day and we had fun looking at the shops there. One of the places we stopped at was this candy store. I loved all the bright colors inside so I figured I might as well take a self portrait. It was pretty crowded inside so getting a decent photo was a little difficult, but I do like how this turned out.

Thanks for the photo Kurt!

Quote in title is by Maya Angelou

Week 48/52 : Tsong and Tsonggo

If you spend a lot of time on youtube you might have heard of Wil Dasovich. He’s a Phil-Am vlogger who recently found out that he has cancer. But the good news is that he’s almost done with his treatment and things are looking up 🙂 I’ve been watching his vlogs for a while now, and when #Wilodia came to existence I became an even bigger fan. I’ve been a fan of Alodia since 2007, so I guess it’s only natural that I would be excited to learn that two people I support found happiness in one another.

What does this have to do with this photo? The hat I’m wearing in this shot is actually Wil’s merch. He sells it on his website tsongandtsonggo.com (hence the title). This was so hard to get a hold of because they sell out in minutes the moment he puts them up! I had to keep refreshing my browser because it crashed constantly due to the large amount of people accessing his site after he announced on Instagram that a new batch has been released. But I persevered and managed to get my hands on one, hooray!

Week 47/52 : Feliz Navidad

MERRY CHRISTMAS! (It’s still Christmas Day here in California, so I made it, yay!)

I present to you my very first self portrait taken by a Leica O_O My cousin bought a Leica M10 recently and he gave me permission to play around with it. He even left it here at my aunt’s house since he knows I’ll be staying here and he wants me to make the most of it. I’ve taken a few photos with it and I love them all.

This photo was taken by my cousin (though not the same one who owns the camera) last night. I love the bokeh and the holiday feels of the shot, so I figured I’d use it as my Christmas self portrait 🙂

Before the day ends I would like to greet everyone a very Merry Christmas. May your holidays be full of peace and love.

“I bring you a gospel of great joy, which shall be to all the people. For unto you is born this day in the city of David a Saviour, who is Christ the Lord.”
-Luke 2:10-11

Week 46/52 : In dreams we enter a world that’s entirely our own

Ezra and Kurt took me to the Wizarding World of Harry Potter the other day. They have a year-pass to Universal Studios so they visit quite often. I’ve always wanted to see the place for myself so I was very happy that they decided to bring me there. Ezra even dressed me up as a Gryffindor so I could pretend that I belonged in that world. Unfortunately I wasn’t able to take any self portraits for my 52-week project while I was there since it was too crowded. I still wanted an HP-themed self portrait to commemorate the event, so I asked my mom to take some shots of me back home and whipped up this quick photomanipulation. It’s been a while since I last did one of these, so please forgive me if it isn’t perfect XD

Background stock : https://lindowyn-stock.deviantart.com/art/OMG-SNOW-EEEEE-71430524

(Title came from a quote from Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban)

Week 45/52 : Too cold outside for angels to fly

The girls and I had our annual Christmas party at Brinks’s house earlier this month. Once again her parents went all out with the decorations. They had a bunch of these fairy lights up in the garden so Brinks and I decided to shoot a few photos with her 50mm to get some cool bokeh effect. We would have taken more but it started to rain XD

Thank you Brinky for this shot! And thank you for lending me your sweater 🙂

(Quote is from the lyrics of A-Team by Ed Sheeran)

Week 44/52 : Icy

A quick shoot I did in my room. We’ve only got 4 weeks left in the year and I’ve still got 8 photos to go. I’ve been shooting more often than usual to try to catch up. I’ve still got about 3 photos lined up after this so I’m pretty confident that I’ll be able to finish on time 🙂

The wig was a gift from kinakapatid. Not sure how you would say that in english … god-brother? god-sibling? Basically he’s my godmother’s son. He went to Japan few months ago, right before my birthday and he got me this as a pasalubong/birthday present. Thanks Otsok!

As for the contacts, I bought them around the same time I got the wig, but I haven’t been wearing them out as much because they’re way to intense for daily wear. I thought they would look more natural when I bought them (since I’ve bought contacts from that brand before, just in a different color and I really liked it), but I guess I was wrong. But they do look nice in photos 😀

Week 43/52 : Even if you are on the right track, you’ll get run over if you just sit there

The last of my self portraits taken in Korea last October. There are only 9 days left in the year, which means I should be posting a self portrait every day if I want to finish on time, eek!

Amie took this photo of me during our rail bike tour, before we headed off to Nami Island. After we finished half the rail bike course, we were asked to take a 5-minute break, which gave us some time to take photos. I really love how this turned out, and all the autumn colors in the background 🙂

(Quote in the title is by Will Rogers)