(1) Take a new photo every day. This is not something where you can raid your archives or shoot several days in advance. The point is not continuity of subject matter, technique, or even the pursuit of quality. The point is to take and post a photo, any photo, period. I've posted everything from mountain landscapes to the contents of my refrigerator. There are no limits on the sort of photo to post. It should be noted, however, that while posting the photo each day is recommended, it's not a big deal if you are gone for a few days and post those days photos a bit late - just so long as each photo was taken on the right day.

(2) Make a brief "blog" entry about it. This project generally ends up being a visual blog of sorts. It is a very personal project, taking photos of "nothing special" moments of your day, and the photographer's notes about what the photo represents, what was going on, etc. are a big part of the process.

(3) Square crop. Always square crop A-ha, the one and only editing constraint! There is no logical explanation for the square cropping, except that I like it and it helps the layout look more like a traditional calendar.

(4) No fantasy-ish digital art stuff. This project borders on photojournalism, so let's keep it in the realm of the real. Real-ish, anyway. Experimenting with double exposures, long ghostly exposures, etc. is okay, because then you get to explain what you were doing all day. This doesn't actually exclude Expert Editing - things like multiple selves would be cool. Unicorns and fairies, though, notsomuch.

(5) Let go of the idea of that every photo has to be good or meaningful. It doesn't, and it doesn't. It just has to be from your day. This may be difficult to accept, but force yourself to do it anyway. It's freeing. Trust me. This isn't about quality or technique.

(6) This project gets personal! The photos are of your life. The "blog entries" that accompany them are about your life too. There will be days when you take a photo of the contents of your fridge or the pile of shoes by your door, and these moments have a strange way of getting you to open up about some details of your life that you might not be comfortable admitting to. Like, say, why the shoes aren't put away and the carpet needs vaccuuming (because I'm a horrible slob!) If this makes you uncomfortable, then this might not be the project for you. Or, conversely, maybe that's precisely why you should do it!

That's it! My 50 Days sites are down at the moment, so I'll work on getting them up and running again today.

First, I forgot to mention that most of the rules can be broken as it suits you, but 1 and 5 are important. Second, Fall 2006 is partially restored at the moment and will give you an idea of what I'm babbling on about in all these silly rules. The rest are forthcoming, but it's slow work.