Inspiring photography project ideas: creative self portraits

Want to shoot more portraits but can't find any willing subjects? Dominick Reed pushed his creativity to the limit with a self-portrait project with a difference...

Shooting self-portraits is a great way to practice your portrait photography skills, allowing you to be really creative without worrying about another person. Arming himself with an impressive dressing-up box and a little bit of creative photo manipulation, the only limit to a project like Dominick's is your imagination. What started as a photo a day has transformed into something with its very own 'character', stories and cult internet following. Here's how he got started...

Dominick Reed's project can equally be described as a photo a day project and creative self portrait project. At the start of 2010, Dominick set out to take one photo a day for a year in a bid to improve his photography skills. But as if committing to shooting a photo every day wasn't enough, Dominick has now stretched his plans until at least the end of 2011. Creating a character from his self-portraits (the curiously named Mr Flibble), each image tells a story. I'd seen a few of my friends do similar things and always laughed at how lucky I was not to be doing the same - it looked like a horrendous time sink and a real burden on your life.  But when it came around to the start of 2010 I figured I'd start my own to "improve".  I can honestly say, that if you're serious about improving anything, then there's no better project to do than a forced daily activity.  I chose photography, but I've seen a person who was laughably bad at drawing become an oil painting artist in a year, simply by forcing themselves to practice.  I also convinced myself that the project would leave me with a documented year of my life that I could look back at when I'm old and crinkly. Well, inspiration is clearly the hard part.  It would be terribly easy to take a quick shot of my dinner plate or some other random thing to satisfy the daily photo requirement, but it's not quite in the spirit of self-improvement.  Frequently, I'll stand in front of the camera with a few randomly chosen props, take some photos and see what happens.  What typically occurs is I'll review those first few shots and it'll spark an idea that'll then make me get the appropriate props to make that idea really happen.  There's nothing like starting to take a picture to give you the inspiration for a different picture.