Avocation Part 3: Photography

Before digital

When it comes to photography, I tend to overwhelm myself quite easily. I always had a point and shoot camera around before digital was big. Most of my pictures were of people and places, friends and random strangers. In my attic there are bags of 4×6 pictures that never made it into books. I was gifted a digital camera and was moved into a new world. 

Buy all the gear

I took a digital class in undergrad and IMMEDIATELY became obsessed. We owned a point and shoot digital that was used for snap shots. After that class I bought my first DSLR. It was a Pentax K10D. I took that super heavy camera everywhere. Then I left it on a plane by mistake. After returning from my study abroad trip, I replace my K10D with a K20D. I tried to learn as much as possible but there was something that was getting in the way. I was buying every accessory possible and lenses I wasn’t using. 

• Bought four or five lenses
• All the filters
• A Wacom tablet
• A new focusing screen for the K10D
• So many camera bags
  
• Two tripods and a monopod
• A Pentax K1000 with two lenses
• Remote controls 
• Pentax auto 110 with two lenses

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Reality set in

The bag got so heavy that I stopped carrying my camera with me. I sold that camera and bought a Sony NEX-6 in January of 2013. The goal was to buy an interchangeable lens camera system that was portable. I didn’t love it like I loved my Pentax. After spending time learning that system, I didn’t want to start all over again. 

The Sony NEX-6 is my current camera and for years, I only used the kit lens. I eventually bought a 35mm prime in April 2017. There was the assumption that getting my fave focal length prime on an APS-C would help. Unfortunately, the obsession did not return. Its been five years. Two years ago when I had my son, I dusted everything off and realized that the technology on the phone in my pocket had surpassed my interchangeable lens camera.

Now 

I am not fast with this camera primarily because I don’t use it often enough. If I spend five to ten minutes setting everything up I can get some good photos out of the camera. My iPhone is always so close and gets the shot because I don’t have to check settings. Unless I shoot in auto the NEX-6 will never be as convent as my iPhone. My brain says why have all that camera if you are just going to shoot in auto!

Now there are things that my camera won’t do without downloading extra apps, that my phone does without even thinking. Like time lapse. Do I get a new camera or just use the phone that I am going to upgrade anyway? When you look at my photo library its getting harder to tell the difference between my 16 megapixel camera and my 12 megapixel iPhone. As I fight my camera more and more I don’t want to use it. There are situations were a camera is never going to compete with a phone. When you consider nuances in depth of field and specialties like astro or infrared photography, my smartphone just wouldn’t hold up. Now that being said huge leaps have been made in computational photography if you like the AI in your phone doing all of the work. You definitely loose the mechanical control of the process. I digress. 

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Feelings

There is nothing cooler than the feeling of when you create something awesome. When you nail the composition and hit the focus. That sense of pride when you look at the capture and say to yourself, I made this. My preferred subjects are nature, landscape and a little street photography. I take portraits of my son but thats about it. 

Final words

We haven’t even begun to discuss file management!! Its a mess. There is a box of hard drives next to my desk!

OK, soooooo there is a lot to this story that I skipped. It would take way too many words. I just know that the technical expertise combined with the creative freedom while composing makes photography very special.

After writing over 700 words about why I stopped taking pictures I think I now have some clarity.  I probably won’t update my camera unless it breaks. I just need to use it more, and where it gets too crazy,  I can always grab my iPhone.

My old flickr feed by_shante. Take a look.