Friday 31/01/03 by Chan McCoy

At the Irish Rover to celebrate the Chinese New Year along with various Thai friends of Chan. I didn't think I was going to make it in time as I'd just done a day trip up to Hot with Fon in order to visit her mother. The kid in the picture was drunk on red wine Spy Coolers!

Thursday 30/01/03 by Dave Leggatt

Back in Chiang Mai again, and we're taking a songthaew up to the Immigration office up at the airport so that Dave can renew his visa. I discovered the damage to my camera when I tried to load in a new film, so Dave has kindly loaned his camera whilst mine is in for repairs.

Wednesday 29/01/03 by Dave Leggatt

We've now travelled down to a village called Don Chai where Sean has a house with his Thai wife, Nong. It is something of a tradition for us to undertake a long trek in the afternoon sunshine whilst we're staying there, so this is Sean and I out in the beautiful surrounding countryside.

Tuesday 28/01/03 by Chan McCoy

So here I am at the Irish Rover bookshop with Dave and the owner, John McCoy, another expat I've known since 1999. John lives above and runs the shop with his wife, Chan and young son, Gerard. When not at home in Thailand he's off teaching English in Saudi Arabia.

Monday 27/01/03 by Pattama "Nai" Chalrunchida

Catching up with my emails at T&T Information, a travel-cum-tour-cum-internet shop which is run by my friend Nai. I also met Nai back in 1999 and it was she who taught me to speak the Thai language.

Sunday 26/01/03 by Phil Newton

Relaxing in my room at Veerachai Court reading the Chiang Mai Weekly News. The camera was perched precariously on a towel rail and promptly fell onto the floor breaking the film-loading mechanism, although I wasn't to discover this problem until a few days later...

Saturday 25/01/03 by Dave Leggatt

This was taken outside one of the small music stalls located in the area of shops around Worowat market, a few minutes walk from Veerachai Court.

Friday 24/01/03 by Phil Newton

My first night back in my second home, so here I am the next day still in bed with my Thai girlfriend Fon. She's originally from Doi Tao further North, but currently lives and works here in Chiang Mai where there are much better opportunities for her.

Thursday 23/01/03 by Sean Bunzick

Dave finally has the opportunity to get in front of the camera rather than behind it as we've now met up with our American friend Sean from Cape Cod who I first met in Thailand in 1999. We're outside Veerachai Court our regular choice of accomodation whilst staying in Chiang Mai.

Wednesday 22/01/03 by Dave Leggatt

This picture was taken on the Sarasin Bridge as we were walking down to Lumphini Park to kill some time before we caught the night train up to Chiang Mai in Northern Thailand.

Tuesday 21/01/03 by Dave Leggatt

We're at SF Cinema City located up on the 6th floor of the huge, sprawling MBK shopping mall at Siam Square. Yes, it does look as if I'm urinating against the Terminator 3 display, but actually I'm just watching the trailer for the first time, honest.

Monday 20/01/03 by Dave Leggatt

Waiting for the Skytrain at Siam Station en route to visit Wat Arun on the far side of the Chao Phraya river.

Sunday 19/01/03 by Dave Leggatt

Finally 24 hours later (factoring in the new time zone) I've arrived in Bangkok. My best friend Dave meets me at Don Muang airport and we're now at Asoke Place just off Sukhumvit Road waiting to check in to our rooms overlooking Soi Cowboy.

Saturday 18/01/03 by Unknown Scottish Bloke

I'm flying over Munich on Emirates flight EK16 to Dubai, bound eventually to Bangkok, Thailand. The couple beside me were kind enough to do the honours with my picture, but again I realise that trying to explain my project to strangers is just more trouble than its worth.

Friday 17/01/03 by Bev Parke

I think I need a holiday, quick!

Thursday 16/01/03 by Debbie Page

You see, what did I just tell you? Lunch courtesy of the Waggon and Horses, our local and oft-frequented watering hole.

Wednesday 15/01/03 by Dominic Plucknett

Yes, there's going to be a lot of unexciting photos exactly like this one, bearing in mind I spend 5 days a week stuck at this desk...

Tuesday 14/01/03 by Bev Parke

And here we have the amazing Debbie, the Box Office's longest serving, longest suffering member of staff.

Monday 13/01/03 by Dominic Plucknett

The day our smart new telephone system was installed. With me is Jim, another friend and colleague, the guy who I'd had my original conversation with - about art, photography and the movie Smoke - which inspired this whole project.

Sunday 12/01/03 by Phil Newton

At home in the kitchen. I've been renting this property in Freshfield Road since May 2002. My landlord Nick is now married and living in London, so I have the place to myself most of the time.

Saturday 11/01/03 by Steve Bennett

Out in the back office where the two Steves, Cotton and Bennett work. It must be a Saturday as I'm perched by the radio studying the team line ups for the day's football matches. We're doing The Daily Telegraph's Fantasy Football game and it rules our lives!

Friday 10/01/03 by Gary Jackman

Caught amongst the piles of videos behind the scenes at HD2, a second hand video / DVD / CD / computer game emporium which my friend Gary runs in Kemptown.

Thursday 09/01/03 by Debbie Page

Debbie decides to liven things up by getting me to stand on the front counter. Our General Manager walks past and doesn't bat an eyelid.

Wednesday 08/01/03 by Bev Parke

Changing the posters advertising our forthcoming shows. Ken Dodd... Rose Royce, Odyssey & The Real Thing... Ross Noble... at last, some quality humour from a fellow Northumbrian.

Tuesday 07/01/03 by Steve Cotton

Looks like I had my hair cut before coming to work today. The picture on my monitor reads, "Thailand - just 14 hrs away," a reminder of where I'm going to be headed in ten days time.

Monday 06/01/03 by Jim Turner

So that's Bev serving at the counter whilst I'm answering the phones.

Sunday 05/01/03 by Chrissy Huffman

Taken at Steve & Chrissy's flat in Brighton. Steve is one of the friends who I'd discussed this project with in December and encouraged me to go for it. He is also a keen photographer.

Saturday 04/01/03 by Debbie Page

Working on the front counter.

Friday 03/01/03 by Jim Turner

So this is my desk in the Box Office at Brighton Dome where I spend most of my working week. My colleagues in the office seem amused by my crazy idea and are happy to lend their support - I'm going to need it.

Thursday 02/01/03 by Maureen

This is one of my favourite photos from the whole project. I got caught in Asda and had to ask Maureen - working for Schwartz, the spice company - to take my picture. Trying to explain my idea to strangers proves difficult. Make mental note to try to avoid supermarkets at 3pm.

Wednesday 01/01/03 by Phil Newton

Recovering from New Year's Eve at home. I'm not confident that I'm going to see this project through to the end of the year, but I decide to make a start and see what happens. My Fuji Fotonex APS camera has a self-timer which will be handy for days like this when I'm on my own.

Three

Follow me in my quest to have my photograph taken at 3pm every day during 2003.

Three was part of Brighton Festival Fringe 1 - 23 May 2004.

"A unique picture diary" - The Argus

Intro

This all started back in December 2002 when I was sat at work having a conversation about modern art with Jim. We argued that pretty much anything can be considered art nowadays, so long as you're able to bullshit enough about it. This got me thinking. I'd long hardboured ideas of doing a photography based project but didn't know quite where to begin. I'd seen the movie Smoke years earlier in which Harvey Keitel's character takes the same picture outside his shop at the same time every morning. This quirky idea had lodged in my brain ever since. With a new year fast approaching this seemed the ideal opportunity to start such a project, as I liked the idea of working on something for an entire year. It was time to define some rules.

There was just no way that I was going to be in the same place at the same time every day, so I needed to think of something different. I liked the idea of having these photographs at the same time every day, but soon decided if it was only me snapping away in my own little world then it wouldn't really add up to anything at all. I needed another constant - me. By putting myself into each photograph I would be documenting a whole year in my life, and by allowing the people around me to take these pictures there would be scope for many different interpretations - or so I hoped. The time of 3pm was chosen as this was a fairly sensible time of day to work with - too early and I might be asleep, too late and I knew I'd encounter too many problems. Plus, in the middle of the afternoon I'd more often than not be stuck at work. What better way to capture the year in the life of my workplace at the same time? So with the blessing of my boss I was ready to go.

The equipment I used was a Fuji Fotonex 200 APS camera which I've owned for many years now. I wanted to prove that you can do something like this very cheaply, so there was absolutely no point in splashing out on a brand new camera, especially with there being no guarantees that I'd even complete the project. Developing too was done as cheaply as possible, using mail order companies - until Truprint ruined that idea - and later, local high street retailers. The picture quality was never of paramount importance, for this project the idea itself was king.

The Rules

1. All photographs should be 6 x 4 horizontal shots.
2. All photographs should include me somewhere in them.
3. All photographs should be taken at 3pm.

Credits

Special thanks to the following:

Chris Collier at Nomark Ltd
Andrew Southon Photography
Brighton Dome Box Office
Holly Payton at Brighton Festival Fringe
Frankie Taggart at The Argus

And a BIG thank you to all the friends, colleagues and complete strangers who took photographs for me.