I felt it was time to start yet another blog. This time I’ve decided that discussing my passion of photography is the perfect subject to keep interest high. In the past I had quite few websites related to photography, but none of them exist in a form that I can use for writing such as I plan to.
Who am I? A guy who has a degree in computer science. A guy who has been interested in photography since 2002. My first serious foray into photography was in the wonderful land of anime convention cosplay photography. The interest grew into all forms of the art and currently is a good part of my life.
As a person who has spent a good part of my life writing computer software and using computers in general, I feel that the opinion of photography that somehow whatever comes directly out of the camera is stylized idea of trying to hold onto the past of film cameras. My first SLR was a digital one (circa 2005 Pentax *ist DS), so I guess I could be considered a neo-photographer as I consider post processing no different than developing a print from film and a valid aspect of the art. A lot of what I like about photography reflects the duality of the technical and artistic sides of myself. I consider all aspects of photography as art in that the culmination of my efforts are rendered into a final work.
The world and tools are imperfect things and expecting to get magic out of any camera is putting too much faith in the design and programming of the engineers and machines that created the camera in the first place. The camera is a tool for my art and I of course try to use that tool to its fullest extent, but I think my eye and mind are the best tools possible. I generally have my camera set to produce images that are un-flashy, so I can form them into what I felt and feel is pleasing to my eye in post processing. Generally when I am doing photography, a large percentage of my mental effort is spent on composition of the scene and not camera settings, as I let the camera handle most settings at that point in time. So maybe I’m not cut out to be a professional making money at photography, but I throughly enjoy doing it and will continue to show my work to others.
So in this blog I plan on linking all of my opinion that I write on photography forums as well as anything I do related to photography such as my photos, general talk, and news I read about.
Currently, the majority of my photography is done with a Digital SLR camera. More specifically a Pentax DSLR.
Here is an old forum posting I made in 2005 about my first DSLR:
I’ve been reading about dslr cameras for a while and decided on the *ist DS. My main reasons for choosing the DS over the others were the viewfinder, overall look, large lens selection, that it takes standard batteries (already had a few sets of nimh), and the price I got it for (650 with kit lens).
I got the camera today and I like it. I was surprised at how heavy it was. Well maybe because my latest camera was a Fuji S5100… I like the overall size of the camera, which is not too large or small. I usually wear glasses, but the viewfinder still seems to look pretty good. I like the fact that it has solid access panels rather than rubber ones some cameras have.
Things I’m not too fond of:
The camera’s plastic and grip material feel too “hard”.The grip is my least liked aspect of the camera. It doesn’t seem to fit my hand too well. When I hold the camera with one hand the grip edge starts to push into the top most joint of my middle finger. So I kind of wish the grip was a little softer, rounder, or larger. I’m 6′ tall so my hands must be somewhat longer than the camera was designed for.
The camera will be going back the country of origin in 4 months as I plan on studying abroad in Nagasaki Japan for a semester.
I just recently sold that camera to a friend. It is still completely functional and should provide him many years of faithful service. As of the start of this blog, I am currently using a Pentax K-7, so a lot of what I write will have a Pentax spin to it for better or worse.