Photographer Vicky Brandt with her Photo A Day Lock Down Project. Photo / Rosalie Willis
Photographer Vicky Brandt with her Photo A Day Lock Down Project. Photo / Rosalie Willis
Vicky Brandt's love of photography started on a typical walk down to the beach.
Inspired like many before her by Kāpiti's stunning coastline, Vicky wanted to do better than taking photos on her smartphone.
"Photography is something I've been interested in but have never had the time, or just never got around to doing," Vicky said.
With the kids leaving home and Vicky enjoying her weekly walks along the beach on her day off, she decided to take her hobby a little more seriously.
"Since we've lived in Kāpiti, I started going for lots of walks around the beach and then I bought myself a good Huawei phone and started taking more and more photos."
Day 1 from Vicky Brandt's A Photo A Day Lock Down Project book.
In July last year, Vicky purchased her first DSLR camera and in September signed up for a photography course through the Photographic Institute.
Now, just over a year later, Vicky is completing the last modules of a Diploma in Professional Photography online from the Photographic Institute.
On top of that, she has completed a Photo A Day Lock Down Project, a book of stunning images taken each day through the course of New Zealand's lockdown.
Putting the skills she was learning into practice, "it was just a project to keep myself busy during lockdown", she said.
"It's been daunting, having to learn a lot of technical stuff about the camera, but it's been great.
"Taking a different image every day certainly filled my days during lockdown - I was banking on another one so I could make a second book."
Household items in and around Vicky's Paraparaumu home became her subjects.
The household piano, daisies from the garden, kitchen utensils, food, the family cat, leaves, glitter, incense candle smoke and of course toilet paper all feature in the book.
"I am very happy with how it came out, it took a long time to put together."
A few editing skills came in handy when completing the book's layout, but it had been more about trial and error, with multiple shots being taken before Vicky was happy with her final photo for each day.
It was all done on top of the assignments for the photography course.
With an eye for products and layout - having worked in gift shops - and with her current job in the homewares department at Mitre 10 involving a lot of merchandising, Vicky is interested in heading in that direction with her photography.
"The photography course is thorough and you can also go down the route of starting a business and doing modules related to that too.
"The course has made me try and figure out which road I want to go down and I've diversified into trying different things.
"It's hard to choose one way though.
"I've got a great role in the housewares department at Mitre 10 which includes a lot of merchandising, which is an avenue I would like to go down more – product photography and also food photography."
Printing locally at The Print Room Kapiti, the book is available for purchase, along with prints of the individual photos in a variety of sizes and styles on request.
Contact Vicky on vickybrandt11@gmail.com to purchase the book or prints.
