My very first post on my new photography sharing blog!
Here we are in 2015 - last year my life was headed in a completely different direction when I got sidetracked or derailed I guess you could say and my direction was turned toward growing my knowledge of photography. Particularly the new camera that I had just purchased.
I guess I should back up a bit to give you the entire story . . . . . although I had always liked taking pictures occasionally, my husband is truly the person who created the picture taking "monster" that exists today! He bought me my first "super cool digital camera," a Sony Mavica Cybershot that saved pictures to a cute little disc! I took loads of pictures with that camera until the accident, a hard lesson learned, that although you always want to have your camera there to capture those precious moments, taking your "super cool digital camera" to your sister's bachelorette party, which happened to be at a beer garden, is not a super cool idea! Beer and camera lenses do not mix at all. I sent the camera off for repairs and it was still usable but would have problems at times.
My second super cool digital camera was an 8 megapixel Sony Cybershot camera that I just retired last year, in fact, I actually still use it at times. It had features that I hoped to find when replacing it that the newer cameras just didn't have and it was a good solid built camera. When I pay a lot of money for something I want it to feel like it is worth the money I paid for it! One of the features was that the camera had a memory card slot and a compact flash card slot. This was great because when one card was full I just switched over to the second one and could continue taking pictures! My experience has been that most people have never heard of a compact flash card, so in case you haven't, basically it was a card that held a whole lotta pictures before the new memory cards that we now have that hold thousands of photos on one card. The compact flash card was not one of my first accessory purchases for my camera because brand new it cost $500. Thankfully, I didn't have to have the newest technology NOW and I waited and purchased mine later for much less than the original cost. The two card slots was the feature that I most wanted in a new camera until I got my new camera, got a new 64 gig memory card and found that I can fit 8,000 24 megapixel pictures on it! Once I discovered that, not having two card slots didn't seem likely nearly as big of an issue! This camera was great, it took beautiful pictures but it sometimes struggled with action shots and almost always struggled with low light situations.
I used that camera for 10 + years and got great pictures but I knew I wasn't using the camera to its full potential so I signed up for a one-day photography class to "learn how to use your camera". After attending the class, which by the way, I was the only Sony user in class and the only person who knew what a compact flash card was besides the teacher. After the class, heck, even during the class, I was completely lost. I didn't know what the heck aperture, shutter speed or iso were and I was scared to move any settings on my camera for fear that I would mess it up and I would not be able to get it back to taking good pictures. At this point, the camera had already started to fail some, again it was 10+ years old so I figured I had definitely gotten my monies worth from it. I would get a card reader error occasionally and it just blurred more than it ever had. I honestly think I wore it out. Knowing that the camera was probably dying and I would probably be getting a new one soon, I had already been researching new ones and was having a difficult time. I'd been using Sony for so many years and had always had very good luck with them. Although I had learned that they don't stand up very well to beer. . .I researched them all and I just couldn't decided if Sony was ahead of the times or behind the times. I decided to go ahead and take the one day class because I decided if nothing else if it helped me make up my mind on what camera to buy that was worth the money I spent for the class!
So, as the teacher went through the class and asked "who has Canon, who has Nikon, who has . . ." I was the only one left that hadn't raised my hand. When asked what I used I replied "I shoot with Sony and I'm not sure if they are ahead of the times or behind the times" to which the photography teacher replied "oh, they are definitely ahead of the times, alot of my professional photography friends shoot Sony and if I didn't have so much money already wrapped up in what I use I'd probably shoot Sony too." Decision made, I was on the way to my next Sony camera purchase. I may not have understood aperture, shutter speed or iso but I knew what my next camera was going to be!
After some urging and prompting from my husband, I am a huge tight wad and it usually takes quite a bit of prodding to get me to spend money. I believe he pushed me so much to get a new camera because he was tired of hearing me complain about the pictures my old camera was taking. He insisted that I get a new camera and that if I didn't he would order one for me. For fear that he would in fact order a new camera, not knowing what I had decided, on I thought I'd better get moving. I had already decided it would be the Sony A77. When I started trying to buy one I was actually having trouble finding one and after some inquiries I learned that a new model Sony A77 would be coming out soon. So I decided to wait for the new camera announcement. I even set my alarm to get up early on the day that Sony made the announcement! The online commercial for the Sony A77II was fabulous and completely sold me on the camera but I still didn't order one yet because I didn't want to spend the money! So I waited a while and eventually finally pre-ordered the new camera. Of course it was a pre-order and by the time I ordered there was a waiting list but once I finally got the camera I decided it was well worth the wait! It was my first dslr and I had no idea how to use it but I knew I was going to love it!
I had messaged a few photography friends to ask a few questions here and there and honestly just really didn't use the camera much because I didn't know how! I was lucky to be able to get the lens on the camera body and once I got it on I definitely couldn't figure out how to get it off the camera but I figured that was ok since it was the only lens I had at his point! Google and Pinterest became my best friend at this point until I finally decided to take a look at the old printed off the internet manual!
While attempting to slowly try to learn this camera the Photography Teacher from that Saturday Class posted in the photography Facebook group about a 4 week shooting workshop she would be offering. After going back and forth on whether I had time to attend I decided to go for it! At the first class I still had not used the camera much at all. The class was small in numbers and we would meet at a location, she would tell us what we were working on that day and then we would go take pictures and the teacher would come around and help us one on one. The first week was Aperture and F Stops which I still had no idea what that was and now had a camera that I had no idea how to work it and I was taking a class. . . . I decided I would go to the location, find out what the assignment was take a few pictures, go home and figure out how to do what we were supposed to do then go back and shoot pictures. I forgot about the one on one part . . .the teacher came around and I had to tell her I had no idea how to make my camera do what she was asking us to do, she helped me and that I would say is what started this Capturing Your Precious Moments Journey that I'm on. Once I started learning I wanted to learn more and I wanted to practice! For years I had loved capturing my families precious moments. And I have to say that Facebook has got to be the best tool for sharing photos with family and friends that I have ever found! Back in the day when I started with that very first camera, I saved photos to a family group on MyFamily.com for my family to be able to see. I've come a long way since then and I can't wait to see where I can go from here!
I love my new camera, I'm sure it still does things that I have no idea how to make it do, but I'm working on that and I hopefully will master it before I wear it out! One of my newest passions is the challenge of sports photography. I am hoping to get a fast zoom lens next to get up close for action shots!
I set up this blog to share photos that I take and information about those photos. They say every photo tells a story and I think it's nice to hear the story behind the photo!
So enjoy! I promise that the blog posts from here on out will not be this long!
Stacy
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