Well, around this time the past 3 years, I have published a yearly round up of my photographic journey. The 2009, 2008 and 2007 articles have all proven to be popular, so I hope 2010 can keep the tradition going. I am going to go from Jan 09 to Dec 09 this time round, just to make it easier for myself. 🙂

It seems that each previous year I have tried to pin a theme to my photography. 1st year was a real learning experience. The 2nd year seems to have been a year of experimentation. The 3rd year I gained a better understanding of light. Year 2009 saw me take a different approach. I made a conscious effort to shoot less, but of a higher quality than previous years. Looking back, that may have been a mistake, as I didn’t have the same interest level last year as the previous ones. I think a better idea for a hack like myself is to adopt the “What the duck” approach. That approach had served we well for 3 years.

On a trip down to Albury, I spotted this tree near Yass and took a shot that I was worried wouldn’t work because off all the negative space. Turns out people liked it because of exactly that. Even better, on the drive home I saw a great rainbow, and managed to get it captured on the digital sensor.

I was still in love with film photography, but combined with the new ethos of less is more, I didn’t use it as much as I would have liked. I still had a load of different cameras in the stables, and tried to get them out as often as possible. Here are a couple, including one taken by someone else!

Olympus Trip 35.

The norb!

I even managed to take the Yashica 635 TLR down to the beach!

I think I should do that more often. That is one of my favourite photos from 2009.

I even tried my hand at gig photography, with limited success.

That had to have some digital shenanigans to get it to look ok.

January ended with Monty (RIP) starring in a photographers nightmare.

More on that on the blog here. Poor Monty.

February rolled around and I splashed out a cool $35 bucks for this little piece of plastic wonder.

What a great investment.

When it turns out shots like that, you can understand why I liked to carry it where ever I went. Makes photography as easy as taking a breath, and the results can be fantastic. They can also be god awful.

The 5D and macro lens took a trip out to the vege patch and I spotted a blue lady beetle.

Not an every day sight, that’s for sure. I haven’t seen one since.

March rolled around, and with the days shortening, and the weather cooling, it was back to the local boat ramp for seagull shots.

An early rise nearly always means beautiful colours, and this morning didn’t disappoint.

The end of March saw me drive down to Melbourne for a day at the GP. God almighty, thos fences really stuff up the photos of the cars, but things on your side of the fence can still work out AOK.

More fun with the Yashica TLR and B&W film.

April usually involves two big events for me. The Sydney Royal Easter Show and ANZAC Day. Here are some shots from both events.

That final shot ended up a full page photo on the front of the local paper. Score one for norbs.

May was a very quiet month. I really took the whole “shoot less, more quality” thing to far. Here is the best from May.

June and I finally hunted down an affordable Polaroid camera. With film costs going through the roof, I probably bought at the worse time. But I love the results you get.

The Yashica TLR also had a few trips out in June.

It was also the time when the good bride saved one from the big trash can in the sky. I didn’t like the look of this at first.

The bride told me to keep it, and I am glad I listened.

July was the start of a rather ambitious project for me. The 52 week project. One self portrait, every week, for one whole year! It didn’t start with the best photo I have ever taken.

It was also the month I got the new push bike. Things were about to change. I was a whopping 105kgs, as heavy as I had ever been.

Hopefully that would help. It did, and still is, at the expense of photo time.

I also had a crack at time lapse photography.

August, and time to experiment. The full story is here. Pretty much me and two young kids having some fun making a camera obscura.

It really was worth the effort.

The International Space Station was making a dash across the sky one night, and I managed to grab a shot of it hurtling by. It is not until you see it flying by at speed that you really sit back and think what a treat it must be to be in that floating tin can in space.

If you would have said to me I would do a nude self portrait, I would have probably punched you in the head then walked off shaking my head. Well, I did actually do one. And before you say it, I was nude at the time!

I think the whole internet breathed a collective sigh of relief when I posted it. “Thank ye gods for the crop” was a popular exclamation.

September was very quiet at the beginning, but then I got a hair cut, got all strobisty on the world and went on my road trip.

It was 30 odd degrees before I took off on the trip, so I was hardly expecting this.

It snowed a couple of times.

Here is the GPS track of the trip.

And a couple of my favourite photos from the road trip.

The whole trip can be seen here.

October 28th, a day before my 42nd birthday, the 5D decides to throw a tantrum and the mirror falls off.

Happy Birthday Mr Norbury! Bugger.

With the 5D in camera hospital, out came the film again.

By the time the camera was back, we had just got a new dog. Introducing Millie Norbury.

The little helmet cam was taken out into the surf and I managed to grab the most popular photo of the year.

Sleeping with the fishes.

I also managed to grab some video footage of wild dolphins.

My mum turned 60 in early November, and I didn’t have the 5D back from camera hospital, but I managed to fluke a shot on film that I liked.

December was a very lean month. Some cycling.

And a few self portraits for the 52 week project.

And that pretty much rounds out 2009. I don’t think I took enough photos last year. And that showed in the amount of quality images taken. The big lesson from 2009 is to get out there and shoot more often. Cycling has certainly cut into my photography time, but I should still be able to do both and get some good photos.

Thanks for looking and I hope you found it interesting. Another instalment in 2011.