Photo Walk

I understood it was new when I started using it, but I don't think I knew that it was only one week after it launched when I took my first Instagram shot on my iPhone on that fateful Wednesday, 13 October 2010 (Instagram was launched the week before on the 6th). It seemed to be the natural successor to my Project 365 at the time. Indeed it was, but it has been so much more.

Instagram has just celebrated their 150th million photo shared via its service. They are seeing Instagrammers sharing photos at the rate of 15 photos per second. They have also seen incredible growth since launching with more than 7 million users now.

For those uninitiated, Instagram is a free app in the Apple App Store (currently only for iOS devices) which allows you to share your stories via photos and words. It is Twitter meets Flickr in a sense. Like Twitter, you follow people and people can follow you. If a picture is worth a thousand words, then it is thousand more than what you can convey in a 140 character tweet on Twitter.

There's another worldwide Instragram meet up or "InstaMeet" taking place on Saturday, May 7th. This one will include a photowalk. As the name implies, these meet ups are everywhere across the globe. This InstaMeet is currently set to take place in 505 communities, that is almost twice as many as the last InstaMeet in March approximately this many days before it taking place.

If you follow me on Twitter @LouisTrapani (or Facebook), you will probably already know that I use Instagram a good deal even though I only post a fraction of what I take to Twitter (I try not to flood my Twitter feed with all the photos I post to Instagram. Perhaps that will change at some point, in the meantime, if you are not using Instagram itself (currently only available for the iOS) and following me there (username: LouisTrapani), you can catch most of my postings via my Posterous site). If you are not familiar with Instagram, see my post from October 2010 when Instagram had just launched, I was INSTAntly addicted: Insta-Addiction to Instagram.

Instagram is having a Worldwide InstaMeet on March 24, 2011. What is the Worldwide InstaMeet about? To quote Instagram's blog about it, "The goal of the Worldwide InstaMeet is simply to get together with other Instagrammers in your area."

If you read my previous post, Photo Walking 2010… Officially you will know that I took part once again in this year's Worldwide Photo Walk (WWPW). It took place on Saturday, the 24th of July 2010, the same day that YouTube was soliciting videos shot on that very day for their Life in a Day project. With the material sourced from these video submissions, director Kevin Macdonald will edit select footage to create a documentary movie executive produced by famed director Ridley Scott to be shown at the Sundance film festival in January.

After participating in last year's Worldwide Photo Walk (WWPW), I contemplated leading a walk myself this year. Before I knew it, it was July already (the month of the walk). When I checked to see what walks were available locally to me this year and saw that there were none, I immediately scrambled organizing a walk myself. Once I had the details worked out, I proceeded to submit my application to lead the walk prior to the posted deadline only for their website to erroneous tell me that applications were no longer being accepted past their deadline and therefore would not allow me to submit it. There was no recourse either.

Cali Lewis ( @CaliLewis ), host of GeekBrief.TV joined us the photo walk organized by John Pozadzides in Las Vegas during BlogWorld and New Media Expo 2009. Here we stopped at a 50's style diner within the Stratosphere.

Photo by Louis Trapani

Taken during the Worldwide Photo Walk 2009 at Jones Beach, NY. © 2009 Louis Trapani

On Saturday, the 18th of July 2009, I took part in the second annual Scott Kelby's Worldwide Photo Walk. It is an event where people all over the world come together at various locations worldwide to engage in a photo walk (shoot photography). It was only the night before that I found out about it after friend and fellow Mac user and podcaster, Steve Stanger tweeted about it. I was unaware of this organized effort across the world of groups coming together for a photo walk. I've gone on photo walks before... hell, most of the time I am shooting photography, I am on a photo walk of some manner.

Friendly's at Jones Beach at dusk. Taken during the Worldwide Photo Walk 2009 at Jones Beach, NY. © 2009 Louis Trapani

Outside of Friendly's at Jone's Beach at dusk. Taken during the Worldwide Photo Walk 2009 at Jones Beach, NY. © 2009 Louis Trapani

Friendly's at dusk 1. Taken during the Worldwide Photo Walk 2009 at Jones Beach, NY. © 2009 Louis Trapani

You can see the UK with these (not). Taken during the Worldwide Photo Walk 2009 at Jones Beach, NY. © 2009 Louis Trapani

A family walking together on sidewalk at Jones Beach. Taken during the Worldwide Photo Walk 2009 at Jones Beach, NY. © 2009 Louis Trapani

Flags at Jones Beach. Taken during the Worldwide Photo Walk 2009 at Jones Beach, NY. © 2009 Louis Trapani