A Decade of Digital.
It was over 10 years ago on December 25, 1998 that I got my first digital camera. It was a Fujifilm DX-7 camera that my parents had gotten for me for Christmas.
This camera definitely pre-dates a lot of features you look for in a digital camera. First of all, it only outputs pictures with a resolution of 640 x 480, therefore pre-dating the word “megapixel” in its set of features. Also there was no USB connectivity. Instead it used the serial port of the olden days. It also used the SmartMedia Card for storage; it came with a 16MB card, which I did not replace or supplement with a bigger card because memory was so expensive back then!
It was a rather cool gadget to have, especially since I had taken so many pictures with disposable film cameras living in Japan and checking out all that living there had to offer. By today’s standards, it would be a bulky, weak camera, but for 1998, it was definitely awesome. In all honesty, I didn’t even know digital cameras actually existed when I got it. It was rather amazing concept to grasp while actually owning the device. As you can figure out, I was not an early adopter of technology back then.
The Fujifilm digital camera had a good run of about 8 years, but I unfortunately didn’t take a whole lot of pictures. It certainly wasn’t compact enough to take everywhere and needing to use alkaline batteries, it would be without juice much of the time. At some point, it would only work with AC power, and so it was mostly used to take pictures inside of the house. I have a set on Flickr that you can check out:
My second digital camera had an even shorter life of usefulness. I bought a Canon A510 in 2005 from a job I had at the time. I did hope to take lots of pictures. I remember installing and configuring Gallery onto my website with the intention of putting tons of pictures, but that idea didn’t quite work. For one thing, the camera was not as compact enough for me to carry around all the time. Also, at the time, I was also NOT encouraged to take pictures, to put it mildly. The camera still works to this very day, but since it needed batteries, I was never motivated to continue using it. I have since donated it to the day job.
In the here and now, I have three digital cameras. It all started when I got my iPhone in July 2007, where I found the concept of taking fairly decent pictures and emailing them from the device an absolutely marvelous idea. Then wanting to take better quality pictures, I bought another point and shoot, making sure that it was compact enough and that it did not rely on alkaline batteries. I have been very satisfied with my Canon PowerShot SD1100IS. And then recently this past November, after obtaining some funds from my work with Company X, I decided to splurge on my latest toy, a Canon Rebel XSi aka Canon 450D. I just got this camera and have yet to fully learn how to use it. Hunny has gotten me started, but I definitely need more practice.
Though I have had a digital camera for ten years, it was only when I met my boyfriend that I actually found the motivation to capture a lot of digital photos. For practical reasons, he carries a camera with him everywhere he goes and makes great use of it as a means of “post remembering” things. But also, he has a good eye for taking “good photographs” having taking photography film courses before. As a photo hobbyist, not only does he rock out with his point and shoot, but he also has a digital SLR camera.
So in the past year and half, I have aspired to do as he does: to take pictures to remember things but also to do it as a hobby. The first part is easy, especially having an iPhone or my handy Canon SD1100IS. 2008 has definitely been the year of sniping away in taking pictures of anything and everything. I am hoping that 2009 will be the year where I can actually say that I do photography as a hobby. Now with my first DSLR camera, I am hoping to take some fun and awesome shots. I am even enrolling in a photography class at the Outreach College at UH Manoa to expose myself to the routine of taking “good pictures.”
In the spirit of my newfound hobby, I have created visually aspiraling as a photo blog. Though I have a Flickr account (of which I’m a HUGE fan), I wanted to reserve pictures I am especially proud of for this new blog. So far, it’s mostly filled with pictures that my boyfriend took with my new Rebel, but hopefully 2009 will be contain my own pictures.
I can only imagine how many pictures I’ll have for this next decade.
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Comments (3)
Ooo… fancy fancy with the photo bloggy thing
. Indeed you’ll get some pictures on there too. I think the first BIG lesson I learned with the SLR is “backgrounds, backgrounds, backgrounds” (not to sound like Ballmer or anything 
). Backgrounds have to do with: a. framing (jen taught me about this), b. pleasant and not distracting from the subject (changing the angle of the shot to… remove an electric pole from the shot, or taking shots from the ground to have sky as the background kinda stuff), c. “cropping” out backgrounds (taking ‘tight’ photos of a subject as to remove the background from the picture), d. blurring the background (taking it out of focus to bring attention to the subject; DoF), e. “removing” the background with flash DoF. And I learned all that stuff in that order. Note, this does not apply to landscapes. Basically the lesson here was not letting a background take away from a picture. This one idea has taken me from P&S (a and b) to DSLR (c, d, and soon, e) to that “hobbyist” level. And that’s not even to say I’m great at it… your hunny’s a lot better at finding good things to shoot and how to shoot them than I am. But if there’s ONE tip I’ll pass on to future DSLR users around the world, it’s learn how to make a background work for your picture, not against it. Awesome post by the way, and I look forward to seeing your stunning photos 
.
A photo blog! Fantastic! I’m looking forward to that. Oh, and to answer your question on my post, I am setting up a new blog site for the non-photo stuff. I’ll get that address to you soon!
this was my first digital camera.. fuji finepix A101.. http://ecx.images-amazon.com/images/I/41JJEC9MZML._SL500_AA280_.jpg
with a whopping 1.3 megapixels!! ;D
look forward to seeing more pics from you
keep shooting food porn, too, okay? 