Hi Guys,

After short Christmas absence on the blog we would like to wish you all Happy New Year and all the best in ‘twenty-ten’ hope you all are working hard on your resolutions and nobody gave up on them as of yet :)

The moment I’m writing first post, I’m still wondering what to say… People usually summarise previous year and make promises or plans for forthcoming one. I feel that the most important thing for us is to thank people involved in BigSmokeStudio. To all of you that helped make it happen, THANK YOU!

So what’s in there for us? In the next few weeks we will finish and publish projects we working on at the moment. We have also few upcoming projects, that we would like to share with you.

We hope that the New 2010 will be full of new ideas, photos, movies and fun. We also hope that you will keep coming back to check what BigSmokeStudio prepared for you.

This year we decided to make it serious. We did a bit of research online onto how to stuck to the resolutions. Those can be both troublesome and rewarding. Let’s admit this – we all make them, but few of us make a real commitments. The question stays and this being 13th of January already – most of us are already asking the question – How do you stick to your resolutions? This is the list somebody came up with, we decided to have some fun along the lines. This is first official ‘self-interview’ (I believe we can call it that).

Pete                                                Dave

Step 1

Be very specific about your resolution. Don’t say: “I want to lose weight.” Do say: “I want to lose 5 pounds a month so that I look hot in my new swimsuit on the fourth of July.” Make realistic, measurable goals and write them down.

Dave: I think I’ll let Peter answer this question first…. ;)

Pete: I think taking to the perspective we already started the company, the difficult part now is to find ourselves in the new reality of our photography business and start with more challenging projects heading our way. Steadily, we are still warming up I think and there is a lot of new things we need to learn. Having a good plan would be the best. We made our first step and thanks to all support we received we are managing things quite fine.  For coming months, according to the question – we both I guess want to lose weight :) as well as we need to  (sorry Dave but someone has to admit it eventually), as perfect as we are already  – we need to work more on becoming better models :). For me, personally these would be:

-Find some balance in work/home relationship.

-Get ‘The Beach’ project going asap.

-Manage to move further with BigSmokeStudio and becoming my own boss (and Dave’s as well :) let it decide my future.

-And most importantly – come April…this I would leave and not mention hope I will be able to share at some point.

Dave: Unfortunately ;) I have to agree with Peter this time. We’re here, now we have to keep this ball rollin :)  And yes, “I want to lose 5 pounds a month so that I look hot in my new swimsuit on the fourth of July.”

Step 2

Limit the number of resolutions you make. It’s better to do one thing well than several things poorly (or not at all).

Dave: Definitely that one with a swimsuit !

Pete: Tough on that one as well. 4 resolutions would be more than enough.

Step 3

Post your list in a visible place to serve as a reminder and encouragement to yourself. It will also allow other people to see your resolutions and provide support. If you want to keep your resolutions private, record them in a journal.

Dave:  I’m on the right track I bought a journal last week :)

Pete: I believe this blog would be a quite visible place to put it anyway. You can see it – you can discuss it but most importantly I think all can support it :) (by donating to our PayPal account :) Nothing there to hide except the last part for the time being.

Step 4

Enlist the support of your friends and family. If you’re lucky, they’ll have similar goals and you can work on your resolutions together. Encourage people to be helpful and supportive.

Dave: Hmmm….

Pete: Dave, first of all – I do encourage you to support me in these great goals of mine. These are partially your goals as well so I hope I will be able to kick you in a butt from time to time as well. The less the better. Thanks to everybody around – keep coming back, leaving comments and all – this is a great help for us I know for the fact – and would help us develop further. Thank you all so far.

Dave: I especially agree with “comments”, keep them posting guys. We would also like to hear what you like or don’t’ like about our work. Peter, you have my back up ;)

Step 5

Take action immediately. Make important appointments with a doctor, dietitian or counsellor. Sign up for a gym membership or buy any equipment you need.

Pete: I think I can guess what Dave is going to write here – especially about the second part. I am not planning on going on any shopping spree (yet). I could actually add this to one of my resolutions – to learn as much as I can about the equipment we have available and use it to full potential. I know we can come up with great ideas and this needs to be used – not new equipment. Though the new lens would be great. Dave what do you think?

Dave: Gym? Hmmm, 6 months and I’m going to look like Vin Diesel :) Lens?! I dunno what Peter is talking about.

Step 6

Practice new behaviors that encourage success. If you want to stop smoking, don’t hang out in smoke-filled bars or casinos. If you want to lose weight, don’t bring desserts, junk food, candy or ice cream into the house. Limit your exposure to people who are likely to encourage resolution-breaking. There’s a reason parolees aren’t allowed to hang out with known criminals–they’re a bad influence. Surround yourself with good ones.

Dave: Peter, I’m really sorry but we can’t be friends anymore! ;)

Pete: I sure hope that Dave isn’t known or not-known criminal as I’m ‘forced’ to hang out with him this year. This only brings good influence so hope that everything will be fine. As we both would like to succeed this coming year – I think we need to hang-out around people of success. This is quite a reasonable advice. Where would that be? Any sponsors? Any advice? :) heh yeah, well we have our plan. Let’s stick to that. We would be surrounding ourselves with you at more parties to come hopefully. Oh yeah and casino thing – this weekend is a Poker night, so I don’t know.

Step 7

Find a friend with a similar resolution to work with you. Working with another person or group to attain goals gives you a support system. You will also be more likely to stick to your plan if there are others helping you hold yourself accountable.

Dave: I would like to quote one sentence from ‘Night at the Roxbury’, “Man, you complete me” Haha :)

Pete: Dave, I think we need to find one more person to help us out in our support system. This is all going quite well and I can confirm what’s been said above – this does work. If you need to stick to some resolution – find a partner in crime. This does help. Thanks Dave one more time.

Step 8

Substitute a good habit for the bad one you want to break. If your goal is to eat less junk food, find a healthy food you love. If you want to spend more time with your family, establish a special time during the week when everyone is together.

Pete: A bit hard to come up with time for the family, especially when they are far away, but there is always time for that. There has to be. The bad habit would be spending most of the time at home by my desk, working in front of the screen, instead of really shooting outdoors. Hope this will change this year.

Dave: I would love to answer this question, but I don’t have any bad habits :)

That would be it – It must be noted that Dave answered those questions after Pete and this makes it unfair straight away:) The steps for how to keep to them we took from here :) You might want to write them down as well – you can always share it with us :)