I’m loving my camera & the stuff I’m learning so I thought I’d pass along the 411 on my gear. Sure, I had a point & shoot camera for years but in May of ’09 I purchased my first dSLR camera and absolutely loved it from the first click of the shutter. I got it used on ebay – I decided to go that route for a couple of reasons: 1) I wanted to find a good deal so I waited (not quite patiently) for it and 2) I wasn’t sure if it was something I would stick with so having it brand new wasn’t a priority
My camera is a Nikon D40 dSLR. It’s a great camera especially if you’re interested in moving up from a point & shoot and it’s reasonably priced. For the moment I’ve got 4 lenses: Nikkor 18-55mm (AKA the kit lens) but have no need for it now because I just purchased my first real ‘fast glass’ lens the Nikkor 17-55 f2.8. It is amazing. Great in low light and beautiful DOF. Lens #3: Nikkor 55-200mm perfect for softball & soccer games and those “stealth mode” shots when I don’t want my subjects to know I’m snapping away. And lens #4: Nikkor 50mm f/1.4g which I absolutely adore. It’s my ‘nifty fifty’ and am loving this lens. I had an f/1.8 that was a manual focus but this one does autofocus on my camera body and a difference it makes! Beautiful bokeh and DOF – a great lens all around.
and don’t think for a minute that I paid full price for any of my gear. I’m too much of a bargain hunter. Since I’m not a pro, I felt I didn’t have to have shiny new equipment. and that’s a-okay. Well, all except my 50mm – it’s new and oh so shiny.
I use Photoshop Elements 8 for editing. It has more features than I could possibly use or need right now. And I recently purchased Lightroom 3 (a really good deal I just couldn’t pass up) but haven’t opened it yet. I’ve heard it’s great for organizing photos and heaven knows I need all the help I can get.
Dec 2010: Squee!!! I got my Lola for Christmas! My little camera is so happy in this bag. It’s red, it’s cute, it’s lovely.
Nov 2011: Furthering my photography skills with Clickin Moms Best Darn Beginner Course Ever (formerly known as Rock Your Camera). Learning how to shoot in manual mode. Yep… getting off the green square and out of aperture-priority mode. There’s a reason it was called RYC: it rocks!
Here are some of my favorite photogs – excellent sources for tutorials & inspiration:
- i heart faces - weekly photo challenges, tutorials, interviews, giveaways
- the pioneer woman - photos, food, home life, all around good stuff
- the coffeeshop blog - free pse actions, editing and action tutorials
- life with my 3 boybarians - photog & host of Sweet Shot Tuesday and monthly #photochat Twitter party
- kent weakley - photog, photo tutorials & online classes, co-hosts monthly #photochat Twitter party
- shutter sisters - community of women with a passion for photography
- love that shot - photog community, tutorials, etc
- everyday elements - pse actions, tutorials, workshops
- secret agent mama - local photog (love her photos!)
- clickin moms - photog community, tutorials, classes, etc
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