2016 was another year of travel, but unlike previous years, my explorations were more international than domestic: for more than two months I made work in Belgium, Ethiopia, France, Ireland, Japan, Northern Ireland, and the United Arab Emirates.

I hadn't been to New Orleans in more than five years when I landed at Louis Armstrong on Tuesday, so I was anxious to get back out in the city.

When Yohei Morita and I visited Tōhoku, Japan in 2014, I was most affected by the areas decimated by the tsunami -- but it wasn't for the reasons one might imagine.

One of the unexpected experiences of my trip to Ethiopia's Tigray region was witnessing the daily conflict between local boys and gelada monkeys.

Six years ago, I started a project about two annual events in Belfast, Northern Ireland: the Loyalist bonfires of Eleventh Night and the Orange Order parades of The Twelfth.

While the British were voting to leave the European Union I was across the Channel in the refugee camp known as the "Jungle." Located in Calais, France, the informal camp is the last stop for immigrants hoping to enter England undetected via the Channel Tunnel.

From 2013 to 2015 I split my time between Cambridge, Massachusetts and Chicago. Rather than work on a major project in the Boston area, I mainly used my time there to write my dissertation and focus other projects, including organizing and editing my work for Affordable Housing in New York and the Telescope Houses of Buffalo, New York. Even so, I did produce a number of small photographic series.

After working on the Telescope Houses of Buffalo for the last three years, I happily showed the series in Buffalo for the first time last weekend at Dennis Maher's The Fargo House gallery. When I wasn't at the gallery, I continued shooting the project and supplemented my photographs of Buffalo with new images of neighborhood stores and Silo City.

I spent last weekend in the small Indiana cities that share the banks of the Ohio River with Louisville. Like many small towns along the river, the settlements have surprisingly long histories, with founding dates reaching back into the late 1700s. Over these some 200 years, the Ohio repeatedly left its imprint on the cities.

There must be more maps of Illinois displayed on Chicago's South and West Sides than anywhere else in the state. The hand-painted illustrations are rendered on store walls and windows with thick house paint, spray paint, and even airbrushing. Some maps are remarkably accurate, while others more closely resemble teeth, Africa, or even Castellane pasta.

2015 was another year of change. After splitting my time in Chicago and Cambridge over the last couple of years, it's time to add another city into the mix. Since August, I have been hopping between Chicago and Minneapolis, where I am now an assistant professor of sociology at St. Olaf College.

Last week I traveled through southern Norway and Sweden. Since it was my first visit to Scandinavia, I decided to get a broad sense of the place, rather than work on a specific project.

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• The Graham Foundation awarded David and collaborator Michael Carriere a grant for their book project, The City Creative: The Rise of Placemaking in Urban America.
• The Area, the documentary film David is directing with Scrappers Film Group, has been awarded one of ten spots in IFP's Documentary Labs.
• On April 8, David presented during the School of the Art Institute of Chicago's "Trash Talks: The Afterlives of Buildings."
• David will participate in the 2017 Chicago Architecture Biennial, which opens September 16, 2017 and runs through the beginning of 2018.
• The Isolated Building Studies were recently features in Topos Magazine and South Side Weekly.
• David gave two talks in the Hauts-de-France region during his residency. The first was at La Chambre d’Eau on January 20, second was at the École Supérieure d'Art et de Design de Valenciennes on the 24th. Read a little about the former in La Voix du Nord.
• On January 1st, David started the second phase of his residency in the North of France. Read about it in a short interview with the Centre Régional de la Photographie Nord Pas-de-Calais.
• Scrappers Film Group celebrated five years of filming The Area at Lost Arts in Chicago on Friday, December 9th. See the full event details on Facebook.
• Photographs from Chicago Housing Authority's Plan for Transformation were featured in The Intercept's investigation into corruption in the Chicago Police Department.
• David's work from Belfast, Northern Ireland is featured in the fall issue of Contexts magazine.
• "Reckoning with Vacancy," David's installation in the "BOLD: Alternative Scenarios for Chicago" exhibition at the Chicago Architecture Biennial, is included in Mas Context's current issue.
• Tanto Tempo Gallery in Kobe, Japan hosted David for a show, talk, and portfolio review. The events started on July 2 during the UTAKATDO Fair.
• David participated in a residency in Nord-Pas-de-Calais, France and Brussels, Belgium throughout June.
• On May 21, David presented selections from The Area at the Mobile Design Box in Milwaukee, Wisconsin.
• Telescope Houses of Buffalo opened at The Fargo House in Buffalo, NY on April 16. Read an interview about the project and exhibition in The Public.
• On March 24, David participated in Mas Context's "Photography and Place" panel discussion at Perkins+Will Chicago.
• David presented Almost There with co-director Dan Rybicky at St. Olaf College on March 9.
• Affordable Housing in New York was recently featured in The New York Times, Slate, and Co. Design.
• David created a new short film for House Housing, a project of the Temple Hoyne Buell Center for the Study of American Architecture at Columbia University.
• Aaron Wickenden and David discussed their contributions to the cinematography of Almost There after a screening of the film at the Gene Siskel Film Center in Chicago on December 12.
• David is participating in two exhibitions this fall. The first is BOLD: Alternative Scenarios for Chicago, part of the Chicago Architecture Biennial, while the second is David Schalliol: Selected in Boston. Both exhibitions will be on view until the beginning of winter.
• David Weinberg Gallery screened selections from The Area from 6-8pm on June 26. A discussion with David, community activist Deborah Payne, and a Shriver Center housing advocate followed. See photographs of the event on Facebook.
• Satellite Magazine featured David's environmental cinematography in Northwestern Indiana for Almost There. WGN Radio also interviewed David about the project.
• An exhibition of David's Belfast, Northern Ireland photographs opened March 11 at Art Works Projects in Chicago. The exhibition was recently featured on Worldview.
• Almost There, the Kartemquin/ITVS documentary film to which David contributed environmental cinematography, is currently touring film festivals and is getting great reviews.
• David presented about his work in The Area at the Place Hacking Sociology conference at the University of Liverpool.
• David will be discussing The Area at an event cosponsored by the Society of Architectural Historians and MAS Context on December 2.
• Selections from Isolated Building Studies will appear in the four-person show, This Particular Patch, opening December 6 at Perspective Gallery in Evanston, Illinois.
• Almost There will be making its world premiere at DOC NYC on November 15. See examples of David's work as the film's Environmental Cinematographer on the blog.
• David will be presenting at the Washington Park Arts Incubator in Chicago on August 7. DNAinfo interviewed David about the event.
• The City of Chicago awarded David a grant to support his feature-length documentary film project, The Area.
• The Graham Foundation awarded David a grant to support his feature-length documentary film project, The Area.
• David's documentary short film, "The Area," won a Lisagor Award from the Chicago Headline Club.
• The Museum of Contemporary Photography included David's Belfast, Northern Ireland project in its Midwest Photographers Project collection.
• David's Isolated Building Studies exhibition will open in the Belfast Photo Festival on August 4 and remain public through spring 2016.