Two years!

Please look LARGE to see the water textures

Two years! - So here I am – 730 Blips, no gaps, and it's a shock to me.

When I signed up to Blip on Jan 1st 2012, I thought 100 consecutive blips would be a major achievement, although my prime intention was to successfully complete a year. Wen I managed the first year, I had no intention of stopping, and haven't.

The great thing to me about the Blip community is that I have made so many new “virtual” friends – quite a few of you I have met (probably over 100), but I feel I know the rest of you almost as well. It is such a supportive community – one of enthusiasm and encouragement (and a good deal of banter too) – it makes it a truly great place to be. The camera you use is of no consequence – one of my first ever subs was to Helendc – who at that time just used her iphone – and I did, and still do – find her inspirational.

I think that's the thing that means so much to me here – not that I post a pic every day, but that I am surrounded by people who are enthusiastic and keen about pictures – from journals that record life, to artistic wonders. You all inspire me.

I feel so humbled that through my 730 entries, 834 of you have subscribed to my journal, and have viewed my efforts almost 510,000 times! I hope I have, in turn, inspired you, I try to explain techniques used as fully as I can, because only by sharing knowledge, can others develop and we then learn new things from them too.

I had a couple of ideas for my 730th Blip:

I had been looking at the Bruno Mars video "Just the way you are" and tried to get an old cassette to spell "730 Blips" but it just wouldn't behave, I also did this one of candle bags, with tea lights in it. But my fave was this one - which I used a water pistol / pump, balanced a ping pong ball on top and took loads of pictures trying to get the ball bouncing on the column of water. Eventually, and soaking wet, I succeeded with enough to create this pic. Lighting was flash at 1/17,000th sec, and the numbers were, of course added in PhotoShop. The rest is free of trickery though!

Will I ease off now? Not a chance - someone said to me the other day the only time I'll stop blipping is when they cart me off in a box!