One Second Every Day

The first time I heard someone say that the days are long, but the years are short, I’m not sure I believed them. I was probably weary from a sleepless night with my first baby who refused to sleep unless she was on top of me. I probably hadn’t showered in a few days, which left me smelling like body odor with a slight scent of spoiled milk. I was probably delirious because I hadn’t had a meaningful conversation with another adult in a long time. I most certainly was enjoying the days with my baby, but I couldn’t fully comprehend how quickly time would pass by.

Five years, three houses, and three kids later, the days are still so loooooooong.  I’m crazy busy raising up these precious little people I’m blessed to call my children. Some days I can barely make it to bedtime. My life can feel like an endless cycle of cooking, dishes, laundry and diapers, but I know there is so much more in between all of those chores and when I look back many years from now, it’s all of the in between things that I want to remember.

Right around the new year, I saw a video capturing one second a day of a photographer’s life and I knew I had to do it. I did a Project 365 photo project two years ago and while it was a challenge to keep up with the photos, I LOVE that I have so many amazing photos from that year that capture our life at the time.

I have zero experience taking video, but I’m always up for a good challenge. Luckily, Francesca Russell wrote a fantastic tutorial on document your life with one second videos. I’m using my DSLR for this, but you can even use your cell phone and an app called 1 Second Every Day: Video Diary for iPhone or Android that can to do the same thing.

My basic workflow for this project is to take video on my DSLR, upload it to Lightroom and make minor adjustments to color/tone, export it to iMovie to trim to one second, adjust the clip’s audio and add it to the rest of the videos.

I’m keeping a list of lessons learned as I learn how to use my camera to take video and hope to share those later. For now, I’m embracing the fact that I’m learning and it won’t be perfect, but it will capture some precious memories and that’s what matters the most.

And without further adieu, here is one second every day from January:

February 2017:

March 2017:

April 2017:

May 2017:

June 2017:

July 2017:

August 2017:

For more proof on how cool this idea is to gather the everyday moments of your life along with all of the big moments too, check out this awesome TED Talk.

Do you want to capture one second every day of your life on video? I would love to follow along with some other friends doing this so share a link in the comments or on our Facebook page.