These are my photo resolutions for 2026 – what are yours?

All right. This is it. New year, new photographer, new me.

I’m sure if you’ve been taking pictures for a while, you’ve said some variant of the above at the outset of most years. When a new year is stretching out before us, full of promise and uncertainty, it’s easy to start thinking of all the ways we plan to be a better photographer. And if you’re anything like me, they’ve generally fallen by the wayside by mid-February or so.

But I’m not giving up – and neither should you. I think the key is not being over-ambitious. Making promises to yourself that you can actually keep. So, in the spirit of accountability, here are the simple photo resolutions I’m making to myself for 2026. Share yours on our socials, and hopefully we’ll all be able to keep each other honest and on track.

1. Get closer

I spent some time reviewing my old pictures in the back half of 2025, and there was one thing that repeatedly jumped out at me. I live in London, so I tend to take a lot of urban and street-style images – and so many of them would have been improved by the photographer (me) taking just a few more steps towards the subject.

It’s easy to be shy as a photographer. To loiter safely on the other side of the street, trusting in a long-ish lens and perhaps a judicious crop to communicate to your viewer what it was you were seeing. But ultimately, I think, if you want to make great images with impact, you have to be braver than that.

I’m realistic here. I know I’m never going to have Vivian Maier levels of fearlessness, and that’s okay. But all the same, I’m challenging myself this year to always ask the question before hitting the shutter – could this image be improved by taking a few steps closer?

2. Carry the camera everywhere again

I used to do this, and I can’t account for why I stopped. No more excuses. I own plenty of small, pocketable cameras, and there’s absolutely no reason why I shouldn’t have one on me everywhere I go. The light in London so far this January has been, frankly, gorgeous, and even my walks to the shops have seen some breathtaking skies that deserve more than a middling, over-processed smartphone image.

This is an easy one. I’m not even pledging to get the camera out every day – just to have it with me. I’m never again going to have the excuse for not getting a shot be that I didn’t have a decent camera about my person.

3. Enter competitions every month

Competitions are a fantastic resource for creatives in all disciplines – and photography is no different. It’s not even just about the possibility of winning. A competition gives you all sorts of useful things. A deadline is massively handy for making you get out and shoot something. A competition theme can be a great way to get you thinking creatively down avenues you may not have previously considered. And seeing other people’s shortlisted work, when the results come out, can be hugely inspiring, and give you ideas for the future.

The photography world offers tons of competitions. At Wex we run a few competitions throughout the year in partnerships with various organisations, so keep up with us on Instagram if you don’t already to make sure you don’t miss them. Another great resource for photo competitions is Amateur Photographer (AP) magazine, which both runs its own annual series of amateur photography competitions, and keeps a regularly updated list of competitions to enter. Unfortunately, I write for AP quite frequently, so I can’t enter their competitions – but you can! And tell them I sent you!

4. Share my work – and uplift others

When I was doing my end-of-year portfolio review, it frankly depressed me how many images there were locked away in storage that I had simply never got around to sharing, posting or printing. Sure, I enjoy taking pictures for its own sake, and I’m not doing it to chase Instagram likes (if I were, I’d be even more depressed). But all the same, I think an important part of enjoying your work and your hobbies is sharing your successes with others.

However, this does come with an additional responsibility. I think if you’re going to share your own work, it’s also important to engage with other people’s. After all, nobody likes a relentless self-promoter. So, I’m going to spend more time sharing my own work, but I’m also going to make sure I spend time enjoying other people’s. Simple gestures like leaving a comment on images I admire, and sharing images that inspire me. These are all things I used to do, but have fallen by the wayside, so I’m going to get back to it, and make photography a richer and more community-led experience.

So, those are my commitments for 2026. What are yours? Let us know on the socials (Insta, Facebook, TikTok) – and maybe we’ll check in a few months down the line, and see how we’re all doing.

About the Author

Jon Stapley is a London-based freelance writer and journalist who covers photography, art and technology. When not writing about cameras, Jon is a keen photographer who captures the world using his Olympus XA2. His creativity extends to works of fiction and other creative writing, all of which can be found on his website www.jonstapley.com