I’ve just completed a year long creative project. Every day for 1 year I took a self portrait and got a little creative; I had so much fun playing with photo manipulation and creating realistic images from fantasy concepts. I incorporated various photographs I’ve taken over the years of animals, landscapes and urban environments to recreate the images I imagined.

I’ve really enjoyed working on this 365 project over the year, thanks to everyone who followed the project and your encouragement and appreciation! Here are a few of my favourites (it was really hard to narrow them down!). To see the rest head to my 365 blog.

Day 10 – I created a LOT of tiny me images over the year, I haven’t shared many in this post, but if you check out the link above you’ll see lots! I love the small folk concept and the amazing images other artists have created really inspired me on this journey.

Day 33 – I’ve always found light globes really beautiful, when this one blew I knew I’d use it in an image. I bought a lot of elements together for this one. The water and splash came from Deviant Art, the rest came from other photographs of mine.
Day 45 – This one turned out pretty different than I expected. I was thinking of woodlands and then these hills just worked out better. Another Central Australia backdrop, and a magic wand!

Day 80 – An enchanted forest of paper cranes. I really enjoyed the challenge of depicting myself and other items in suspension – whether floating or flying.

Day 101 – There was some beautiful cloud and sunlight magic on a flight home from Melbourne.

Day 102 – Daydreaming in the clouds…

I was thinking two days in a row of being up in the clouds might be too much, but then I couldn’t get this idea out of my head.

Day 133 – Halloween inspired theme. I’ve always loved witches – this was really fun to create, and my cat Finbar came along for the ride.

Day 196 – This was a gorgeous sunset in the hills in Victoria on our way to visit my newborn niece. Sometimes it’s fun to be a giant!

Day 249 – This was really fun (and challenging!) A lot of layering and photo manipulation to create this creature. The wings were created from a swan’s foot!

Day 151 – I’d been re-reading Melissa Meyer’s Lunar Chronicles which has had me thinking of space. This image is made up from a number of photographs – my travel photos of the desert in Rajasthan, the Pinnacle Desert in Western Australia and a magical sunrise in Victoria.

Day 162 – This one was a little Harry Potter inspired with the winged keys.

Day 228 – I love working with wings. This amazing beach sunset was captured in Western Australia a few years back.

Day 237 – Magical Dreamscape

Day 238 – Another dreamy image with another paper boat (can you tell I loved incorporating origami into this project? :))

Day 241 – This was quite fun – made my first mermaid tail! I used a snake and a swan’s foot I photographed and manipulated the shape and colour. I’ve wanted to create a world inside an eye for a while.

Day 245 – Gorgeous Central Australian landscape and eagles, catching the moon.

Day 247 – Drowning, Searching, Reaching, Saving, Luring, Free

Day 259 – Bam! Down you go! Magical chess set with a view. This one was made up of a heap of images, gorgeous mountainous landscape from New Zealand, a magical sunset, grass from my backyard and the chess set.

Day 263 – Twilight in Wonderland – this started with a lot more colour but I kept heading towards a twilight or evening look.

Day 270 – When I was young I had a pretty active imagination, I used to wish I could somehow resize awesome doll clothes so that I could wear my favourites.

I recently came across this dress when going through someone’s doll house items – it’s the same as one of those fantasy dresses I once played with, complete with it’s glow in the dark stars.

Day 275 – I had wanted to try a magical book portal for a while. I bought these gorgeous old fabric bound books at a garage sale, so I figured it was time to try that image!

Day 281 – This was a little fun and addictive – may have spent a little longer than intended on the drawing of the building.

Day 338 – Tea is always awesome – especially from a pretty tea set!

Day 346 – 1st day of Winter – dreaming of a hot bath. I think at this point I wanted to include as much magic and tea cups as possible into the rest of the project.

Day 355 – I think this is possibly my favourite image from the project. This was a concept I was thinking about for a while, awesome teacup skirt!

Day 362 – This was a concept I was thinking about for a while, as the project came to an end I was trying to complete a checklist in my head of all the ideas I’d been having over the year. Love these teacups I got from my grandmother.

Day 363 – Magical flying carpet. I’ve been thinking about how to pull this off for a while, getting the carpet to look realistic in flight mode. I ended up using a smaller bedside carpet and using 2 chairs, a bulldog clip and a peg to get it in the right position. The gorgeous background is a shot I took in Pushkar, India at sunset.

Day 264 – The Wishing Chair – I loved Enid Blyton’s books when I was little. I’d been meaning to include the Wishing Chair or Magic Faraway Tree in this project!

Day 365 – The last day of my 365 challenge! A teapot house is another concept to check off on my list. Stunning New Zealand landscape, one of my favourite teapots and another Blue Mountains mushroom, both featured in a number of my 365 images!

You made it to the end! Thanks 😀