2019 puts me solidly in my late 20’s. That big 2 and even bigger 7 loom in the horizon as a ticking bomb, highlighting all the ways I’ve deceived my over-ambitious child and teenage selves. Enough of that crap. This year I won’t be defined by others’ expectations; this year is all about me.
I will write…
The novel
In the depths of my laptop there’s a novel (fine, more than one). This novel began with a story that has been chasing me for four years now, and has tested my ability and my imagination. There’re barely 7 pages written as I go back and delete sentence after sentence. This year I finish it.
Freelance
Yup. I’ve burned too many bridges by not following dutiful mentors’ advice. Last December I met someone too fabulous to ignore, so I’m kicking myself awake and giving it a go. Brainstorming and pitching weekends, here I come.
The blog
You could have guessed this one. Blogging has been part of my life sporadically for many years now, and it’s about time I take it seriously. Not only does it force me to do something I care about after work, but it flexes my writing muscles. More importantly, I hope to create content that is meaningful to you.
Photography will be all about…
Editing
Presets for sale are all the rave now. Magazines and newspapers are fascinated by influencers creating and selling presets (what we’ve always known as filters) to curate social media feeds. Influencers in the travel community have inspired me to continue to learn. I’ve been using editing tools for a long time now, but never to good enough standards – like the two versions of the same photograph below.
This year I harness the creative process of editing. Parting from the base of good pictures, I’ll use the tools I have available to create something new.
Landscapes
My greatest photographic challenge is landscape photography. No matter how hard I try or which techniques and lenses I use, the result is hardly what I envisioned. Given that solo travelling is an important part of my life and of this blog, I need to get better at it. I want to be able to accurately show you the places I visit as much as I want to hone my craft. So, for the sake of your visual pleasure, this will be a big project for me.
Street photography
Boldness. Courage. Mystery. Detail. Everything I desperately want in my photography and somehow never seem to master. Travelling solo has taught me that it’s OK to be bold and take that picture, even if you don’t know your subject. For intimate portraits, I have learned to ask (and respect when they decline) or to immerse my subjects in their surroundings in a busy scenario (for example, in a crowd or in a touristic location). I want to go that step further and lose the fear that haunts me when practicing street photography.
Travel with Mer 