Never feel your camera isn't good enough, many photos shot with cheap film & cheap digital cameras have been exhibited in an art shows, museums, etc. Some artist have even chosen these cameras for the specific images they take  For example, the image was taken with an Argus DC1500 digital camera, It takes 20 352X288 HiRes, 80 low res pictures, & eight and 2 second AVI clips. I had this camera some years ago, when I only had my DV Camcorder, I'll have to look through my garage, to see if I still have it as, I do like the lens flares I can get from it.

The lens flare isn't from a Photoshop effect, its an effect of having a cheap lens, & no lens hood. I think the lens flare adds to the photos. The only thing I did to the photo was to use  Brightness & Contrast adjustments to make the sky look less washed out.

Via modern computer operating systems, and the different information cameras provide our computers, the information we get about our digital photos has grown. For example,  The photo taken with the Argus 1500 only had the image's distentions, DPI (Dots Per Inch), Bit Depth, Resolution Unit, & Color Representation. The properties for the photo above tells you that, it was taken with a Konica Minolta Dimage Z2 Ver 1.02 It also tells you the photo was taken on 1/1/2004, & much much more, too long to list here, It even goes in to F-Stop, ISO Speed, & many other things that are important for recreating the style of a photos, or if you adjust the camera & want to go back to the original settings. By 2009, a different Digital camera I had increased its DPI to 96,  & by 2012 it jumped to 300DPI. These of course were lower end consumer models, not your high end Digital SLR cameras, whos DPI were probably much higher.

The great thing Digital photography has over film photography, which is also known as Analog photography is its immediacy. You can check if you got a picture, rather than a photo of your thumb, or a photo where the camera is tilted, or the lighting is not right, etc. With film you have to either go to a film developer, or go home & develop it yourself, which is a more detailed & expensive process than, storing the photos on your computer, or printing them at home or at a print shop.

At this point, my photography options are  limited to four digital photography options. My  DV Video Camera is a JVC GR-VDL 820U, which takes one Mega Pixel photos, including the one at the right. With low resolution cameras, you get low light sensitivity, so lighting is even more important than high resolution cameras. My other options are my Original Droid cell phone, which has an 5 Mega Pixel camera. Even though I no longer use this phone for calling people, its usefull as an MP3 player, and when at an event, it acts as a good backup camera. My current phone is a Droid Bionic, which has an 8 Mega Pixel camera. I do have a true digital photo camera, which is a Kodak Easy Share ZD8612 LS, with an 8.1 censor, 12x zoom, & image stabilization. I do plan to get a DSLR at some point, now that they are cheap enough an average person can afford one. I was at an event recently and, the batteries I brought for my Easy Share were low on power, so I was able to use the two cell phones to shoot photos of the event. I even have a battery pack that, Home Depot has unfortunately discontinued. This battery pack uses a single replaceable rechargeable battery, & has a micro USB port, so I can connect a converter to make it a standard USB port, so I can use my phone's cables, so I can charge one phone, while I use the other one. I bought two extra batteries, so once I charge the first phone, I can charge the second phone, if the battery pack's battery is drained.

As you can see, even an 8 Mega Pixel Droid Bionic can take great images. So, I encourage you to go out & use whatever you have, be it a cell phone, a low end digital camera, or a DSL.
Of course, those of you who use film should be encouraged to use what ever equipment you have. Believe it or not, there is a growing group of digital photography artists who shoot digital photos through the lenses of older film cameras, in order to get the unique look of these camera's lenses. Believe it or not, Nokia has just released a cell phone with a 41 mega pixel camera, it has too many features to list here. I'll review it at some point in the future.

I hope as this blog grows, that I can provide tutorials,  equipment reviews, and more. I still consider myself a knowledgeable armature, as there is still lot for me to learn. Maybe via the comments, we can all help educate one another.

Location, Location, Location, or use what your given.

As luck would have it, I was lucky enough to be born & raised in the San Francisco Bay Area. With it's many micro climates, the bay area is a place to experience different season all year long. Its also a place with several unique cities, all with a unique look, style, & atmosphere. I have also been lucky enough to have family who live 100 miles north of San Francisco in Lake County, so I was able to enjoy both city life & life in the mountains, due to spending summers in Lake County. I was born, raised, & have lived most of my life on the largest island inside the San Francisco Bay. My town is known as Alameda & currently has about 73,812 people, even though it's landmass is only 10.6 square miles. The funny thing is, there is 12.3 square miles of water which surround my town, & are considered city limits according to Wikipedia, make up a larger area than the island itself. I will share photos I have taken in my town & other parts of the Bay Area, along with some from Lake County. I will make a post for each specific location,event, etc, so as to make it easier to take in. Of course, not everyone lives in or near a major city, or has traveled to the mountains every summer. So, I say work with what life gives you. Some folks would love to find a small rural town in which to take photos or video, some love landscapes & nature, other the ocean, & of course some love city scapes or even all the of these. I say use what finds it's way in front of your lens, be it a traveling carnival that happens to come through town, fire works on the 4 of July, or anything that catches your eye/lens.

Don't put off taking those photos & videos of family, friends, vactions, & your life in general.

One of the best things about the digitization of photography and video as I stated before is, the immediacy of digital which enables you to insure a good result. The reason I have made this the first post after my introduction post is, I have experienced first hand the loss of people close to me,  the photos & videos I have of them are a window into the past, into triggering memories of us together. Even when a photo is of someone who is very ill & or dying from an illness or injury, in time these mementos can help us hold onto our memories of them, as with time our memories do fade. Sometimes, people suffer from something such as a stroke, ALS, or other health crisis which can rob them of physical & mental health over a period of time. We can also take photos & or video to help maintain our genealogy, family medical history, etc. We can create a family tree on a computer & insert photos & or videos with certain programs, so as to create an interactive family tree. Of course, simply using printed photos pasted onto a large family tree also works. Sometimes we have to get creative, we may have to use google earth & other sites, to find images of past vacation spots, of homes of relatives no longer with us, of schools too far to travel to. These images can also be incorporated into a family tree, of course if the family tree is on-line you may need copyright approval from whoever owns the photos & or videos. Adding newspaper clippings about family members, places you have lived or visited, etc, can also liven up a family tree. If the tree is digital, digital content you create or find on the web can likewise add to your family tree. I haven't built my digital family tree, but its a project I want to start.

Good luck

My experiance with photography, analog & digital.

As an amateur, & as someone quickly approaching 50, I am amazed at the transformation the digital age has brought to photography. I recall as a kid how, my family would take photos with cheap 110 film cameras, only to have to wait till we could have the film developed. 1 Hour film developers helped, but you never knew if you got the picture you wanted, until it was developed. To make things worse, a photo ruined by a finger in the way of the lens, bad lighting, etc, was often of something you couldn't retake, such as a birthday party, wedding, vacation, etc. When I got my first digital camera it was actually in the form of a digital video camera. I took thousands of photos with it, even though they were only 1 Mega Pixel in size. Sometime afterwards, I even purchased a sub mega pixel camera, to learn how different the resolution was. I was even able to get some cool lens flares from this cheap camera. I am due for an upgrade from my current 8 Mega Pixel camera, I'm hoping for a digital SLR, nor that their prices have become affordable for the average person. I have decided to share my experiences here, as I can go into more detail in a blog on photography than on a standard facebook page. I just discovered facebook pages, so I might carry over content to a facebook page of that type. I will cover my god & bad experiences, what books I have used to learn a thing or too, & a few equipment reviews on the gear I use.

May we all have many more great things to snap a photo or video of.