The 1 Year Photography Project That’s Still Going After 13 Years

Wow, we’ve been featuring some pretty phenomenal photographers over the past few days. First there was the 8-year-old professional photographer who lives in Iraq. He will only take pictures of peaceful happy scenes, regardless of violence in his country. Then there was the photographer who left a pinhole camera outside for a whole year. He ended up with a 365-day exposure photo that will blow your mind. Today I’d like to share with you another extraordinary photographer who definitely deserves a place here on Bit Rebels.

His name is Jeff Harris, and he started a one-self-portrait-a-day project back in 1999, but he never stopped. If you do the math, you’ll realize that he’s taken a photo every day for 13 years, and as of today, he has over 4,748 photos which all tell a story about his life. He started this project because every January 1st, he would make a resolution to keep a diary or journal, but his inspiration always fizzled after a month or two. He thought if he could just take 5 minutes each day to snap a photograph, it might be something he could stick with, and he has sure done that!

According to Jeff, this project inspired him to do interesting things each day because he was always thinking about the photo he was going to take. During the 13 years, Jeff found out he had cancer (2008), and his camera was with him during the whole ordeal. Jeff’s left leg is now permanently paralyzed (he’s uses crutches everyday), yet his camera is still there, recording his life like a diary. He says that out of all the pictures each month, there are usually one or two that turn out really well. Those are the ones that motivate him to keep going. This is such a touching story, and if you’d like to read more about it, you can go to TIMELightbox. Thank you, Jeff, for being such a wonderful inspiration to so many people!

Via: [Visual News]