Feel Good Friday - KIOO Project

Happy Feel Good Friday! It's a new year and no doubt you took some photos during this holiday season to document your experience and create a memory for your future self. Today we're going to talk about an organization that teaches photography to vulnerable children around the world.

The KIOO Project was founded by photographer Babita Patel after a trip to Haiti brought her in contact with children who had never seen photographs of themselves before. The mission, as stated on their website is a simple one, "to teach photography to children from communities with limited creative resources."

Right now KIOO Project offers workshops in Kenya, India and Haiti and their vision is "for every child to develop self-confidence by discovering who they are through photography."

You can hear and see how this is affecting the children by watching this video of students in Kenya or this video of students in Haiti. In their workshop in India, girls were taught about photography during the first week of the program. They then developed leadership and presentation skills by teaching photography the boys who came in the second week of the program.

If you like the work KIOO Project is doing you can support them by buying some of the student photos, straight up donating money, or liking their Facebook page and following them on Twitter @kiooproject.

Now get out there and do something with those photos of yours!

Feel Good Friday - Unwanted Project

The last few months of Feel Good Fridays have been focused on people so it's time to check in on our animal friends.

At first glance, they're not doing so well. Approximately 150,000 horses are sent to slaughter every year in the United States, which makes for a feel terrible Friday until you learn about Unwanted Project.

Started by photographer Christy Whitney, the mission is explained on the website: "Unwanted Project documents horses that were once 'unwanted' bi-products of irresponsible ownership and overbreeding from pharma organizations, meat producers, and the racing and horse show industries. We connect viewers with cause based fine art photography and finely crafted goods that educate the public, raise awareness about the plight of American horses and provide funding for horse rescues."

Her photographs of the horses and scarves made with prints of the photos are sold in her pAra Apothecary store. Not only do these items create a conversation around the issue, but a percentage of the sales is donated to various horse rescue organizations.

You can view the image gallery, like their Facebook page or follow Christy on Twitter @Christymwhitney.

I learned about Unwanted Project from this Daily Good article, which has a a lot more information than this feel good summary. I often go there for inspiration and if you're ready to up your feel good news from once a week to once a day, I would encourage to sign up on their mailing list by visiting their website.