Have you ever stumbled across tourist pictures from your home country or city, and found it to picture something completely different than what you see? Often, vacationers’ images don’t seem to represent what you think of the given place, since all those cultural and intrinsic emotions aren’t captured in the sense you feel they should.
Discovering new places when travelling, I have always wondered how local people see their surroundings. Are we seeing, capturing and feeling the same things? As a newcomer to Melbourne, are my views of the city the same as those of the people that grew up here? Probably not.
Imagine if everyone went out and took pictures of what they see around them, in their own backyards, and from there build an image of what the world really looks like through the eyes of the people who live there?
Today, on 15 May, we all get the opportunity to show the world exactly how we see our surroundings. The initiative, called aday.org, seeks to compile photos from everyone – from cell-phone photographers to professionals – and collect them online, ‘creating a unique online experience where photographs will be shared, compared and explored.’
This project gives you the chance to save a little something of yourself for generations to come, and to put your take on daily life into the much bigger picture that it is part of.
All uploaded images from around the world will be displayed online for you and everyone to explore. Some of them will be selected for a book, ‘A Day In the World’, to be published in October 2012, others will be shown in exhibitions, either printed or digital. Even more importantly – every single one will be saved for future research and inspiration for all time.
Many inspiring people around the world are supporting the project, and encourage everybody to join, and thereby share their view of the world. Among these, Nobel Peace Prize Laureate, Desmond Tutu.
‘Take this unique opportunity with me, and thousands of others around the world, to create a priceless collection of images, to boost understanding and enhance research and education,’ he says.
Everyone participating in this project will be asked to reflect and photograph around three main categories: Home, Work and Connections. Each category hosts a series of subcategories that will touch on very concrete elements around you as well as on your perception of things.
To participate, go to the website and sign up. Grab your camera today and go out and capture your world as you think it should be seen! You have five days to upload your photos (22 May is the last day), and share what matters to you.
I’m going to get out there today and start shooting what Melbourne is to me, and once the images come up, I’ll spend a good long time watching the world.
Fire away!
Anne Nielsen is third-year Bachelor of Media Studies student at La Trobe University. She is currently on exchange from Aarhus University, Denmark, and is upstart’s deputy-editor. You can follow her on Twitter @AnneRyvang.
