Making Things More Difficult - Not Necessary

I come from a long line of people that make things more difficult than they have to be. I also have produced a line that seems to do the same thing. Case in point: my oldest daughter had trouble with math in school because she didn't think it could be THAT easy so she looked for the deeper meaning. My youngest tends to 2nd guess herself (according to someone who can view these things more objectively than me)...again she makes things more difficult and also doesn't think her judgement of what's what is sufficient. Which brings me to my new camera....

Huh? You say 'how can that bring you to anything'? Well because it's MY blog and I can progress it anyway I like. So there.

I wrote a post awhile back entitled My Next Camera about the Olympus SP-550 UZ because I really like Olympus and truly thought that would be my next camera. It wasn't. For Christmas I bought myself a Nikon D300. The reviews on the new camera are outstanding. It was far more camera than I'll ever need and I'm almost embarrassed to write this review of my own, but I must. Add to that the fact that the camera and the lens I bought costs more than the first new car my husband and me owned and the embarrassment only intensifies!

You see the D300 is overkill for me. I'm a point-and-shoot gal. I like Olympus scenes. I need a LOT of hand holding when it comes to exposure settings so I just cop out and use the "P" mode more often than not. Sure, I get some lousy shots when conditions aren't "right", but THAT'S what I need to learn to do.....just compensate for the extreme and let the ordinary alone.

I'm really trying to learn about aperture and shutter speeds and exposure and all the rest of that stuff. I read a lot at dpreview.com and that makes for problems for me too. You see those guys know this shit! And I've bought books and those people know this shit too. So I was making it all harder than it needed to be without even realizing it. I'm never going to be a pro photographer, but I just thought if I was going to have such a swell instrument I should learn how to use it in the manual mode.

Today it dawned on me that it's my frigging camera and I can shoot anyway I like. I'm my most demanding critic when it comes to something I made and I'm the only one I have to please. The D300's program mode is fan-tab-u-lous! It is by far the best camera I've ever owned. I have NO excuse for not taking and making great photos!

If beauty is in the eye of the beholder, then so is photography. If I think something is good then so be it. The key, for me, is to make LOTS of photos under all sorts of lighting conditions and see what turns out. I got so bogged down in the "doing it right" or "like the pros" that I made myself very discouraged. Not good. I've put tons of photos up on my Picasa Web Albums including the new D300 shots. Some of them are just awful, but I'm deeply into the learning part so keep your raspberries to yourself, please.

It's a wonderful camera. I'm really glad I bought it for me. I just wish my kids would let me take more photos of them to help me learn. Sigh.

My Backyard Bird Photos - Best Ever!

This is the male red-shouldered hawk. His mate is below. Red-shouldered hawks mate for life. Too bad you can't say that about most humans!



This is as good at it gets! It's as if they posed just for me and then the next day they went back to keeping their distance. These are just two of the ones I took. These and all the rest of the pictures are in my photo gallery at http://ediegoodwin.smugmug.com/. Enjoy!

While I was watching her through my kitchen window I used my laptop to search for information about them and was delighted to learn such things as:
By the time they are five days old, nestling Red-shouldered Hawks can shoot their feces over the edge of their nest. Bird poop on the ground is a sign of an active nest.

Their enemies are Great Horned Owls, raccoons and man who clears the land and is destroying their natural habitats and causing them to come and sit on my fence! Their idea of McDonalds is to dine on small mammals, small birds, reptiles, amphibians, large insects, and crayfish. I wish they'd eat some of the young squirrels that are living in my yard! Say what you will, squirrels are still rodents or just RATS with a better tail! Why on earth anyone would feed and encourage them is beyond me!

Spring has sprung! Er....we didn't even have a proper winter, but I'm not complaining about the lack of ice in the greater Gulf Coast area!

My Next Camera - SP-550 UZ

My kids tease me about how many cameras I have and darn if I'm not going to get another one! It's the SP-550 UZ and it's awesome sounding.

Far and wide, the world's most powerful ultra zoom. Capture the moment, and capture the action, with the world's most powerful ultra zoom — the 7.1 megapixel SP-550 UZ. Its new 18x wide-angle super-telephoto zoom lens gets you closer to your subject than any other compact digital camera on the market. Dual Image Stabilization eliminates blur. And with high-speed sequential shooting and new Pre-Capture technology, you'll capture anything that moves. Even shoot in low light without a flash, thanks to Bright Capture Technology, and it's easy to preview, shoot and share with the large 2.5" high-resolution LCD.

15FPS & PRE-CAPTURE.
With a burst rate of up to 15fps, you can freeze moments in time to get the shot you want. And the new Pre-Capture technology works as soon as the focus is locked, it automatically archives five frames in the camera's buffer memory prior to the shutter release. You'll capture the perfect shot even if your reaction time is slow.

Its got an electronic viewfinder - that's important to me. I hate the cameras that you view with the LCD screen. It just doesn't seem right to NOT have a viewfinder to look through. I've been peering through viewfinders since my Kodak Brownie days and I don't like to change. It's far easier for me to frame the shot I want with a viewfinder too.

Shooting Modes 30 Shooting Modes: Auto, Program Auto, Aperture Priority, Shutter Priority, Manual, My Modes, GUIDE, Scene Presets (Portrait, Landscape, Landscape & Portrait, Night Scene, Night & Portrait, Sport, Indoor, Candle, Self-Portrait, Available Light Portrait, Sunset, Fireworks, Cuisine, Documents, Auction, Shoot & Select1, Shoot & Select2, Beach, Snow, Underwater Wide1, Underwater Wide2, Underwater Macro), Movie.

I think the movie mode is pretty lame since you can't use the k-kewl zoom capabilities and it's got other severe limitations, but that's not a bigee with me anyway. I'd got a couple of "movie cameras" if I feel the need to record movement. I like the idea of the "Self-Portrait" because I like to take pictures of ME! I never say no and I'm always available for a photo shoot. (It's a wonder my ego fits inside the viewfinder, huh?).

The next best part is that the power supply is a lovely 4 AA Batteries! My one big gripe about my "best" camera is that its got priority power and I've got to make sure and charge it before hand or run the risk of being you-know-what out of luck.

Here's the other cool parts:

Size 4.6” W x 3.1” H x 3.1” D (116mm x 78.5mm x 78mm)
Weight 12.9oz. (365g) without batteries and media card

I like it that it uses the x-D PictureCard too since I've got a couple of 1 meggers.

The retail of this brand new puppy is $499.99, but I won't pay that. I'll do some comparison shopping for the best price. This camera will join my bevy of other Olympus beauties...

Olympus Camedia D-340R 1.2 Megapixel Non-Zoom
Olympus Camedia D-490Zoom 1.9 Megapixel 3x Zoom
Olympus Camedia C-740 UltraZoom 3.2 Megapixel 10x Zoom
Olympus E-500 (Evolt) with 8.0 Megapixel 3x Zoom
Olympus FE-140 with 6.0 Megapixel

DPReview has a review on it here, but they don't like Olympus as a rule. In fact a lot of the "experts" don't encourage people to buy Olympus and that's a shame in my humble opinion. I'm not a camera whiz, for sure, I mostly stick to Point and Shoot mode, but Olympus makes great cameras with features that *I* want. Plus I like it that I can use the same picture media cards in almost all the cameras.

Check out one of the best if not THE best sites for Everything You Ever Wanted To Know About Olympus cameras!

My Olympus Christmas

I just gave myself my Christmas present early…..it’s an Olympus Evolt E-500 digital DSL camera and it’s a pip! It’s got way more megapixels (8!) than I’ll ever need and the capacity to allow me to expand creatively as my technique skills increase. The auto actually is auto and the auto focus is astounding…I honestly don’t think I could do it any better manually. I’ll need to learn the nuance of how to focus on tricky stuff….like a bug inside a window screen when I want the bug as the focus and not the individual wires, but that will come in time. At least NOW I don’t feel so frustrated trying to become a pro overnight like I had to when I had a Cannon Rebel last year. That sucker was so complicated that I ended up selling it off the first chance I got to recoup my dough.

I bought the camera with the two lens kit at Digitally Unique for only $831.00 drive-out …taxes and shipping included. I say “only” because the manufacturer suggested is $899.99.

The folks on the forums say that Olympus cameras are the best kept secrets in the photography world and I have to agree with that. This is the 4th one I’ve owned and they just get better and better for my needs. I read all I could find about this camera on Digital Photography Review and it sounded too good to be true, but after having it for only a few days I was sold. Here's another site of interest to see examples of this and other great cameras.


This was taken in my very own backyard using the camera's macro mode.

Oh, and one other thing that I think is vital - this camera, complete with the long lens and batteries and strap weighs practically nothing! It's not going to be a chore to lug it along wherever I go. True, it won't fit in my purse, but it would if I got a bigger one!

Now all I have to do is convince my family to let me photograph them. They get all weirded out if every hair isn't in place and they don't look Sunday-meetin' prime, but I know from the pictures I have of my daddy and my husband (both of whom are gone now...daddy 33 years TODAY and John 9 years in Dec.), you treasure any image that was captured in time. You'll never be the same as you are right this minute and the people that love you want to have mementoes to treasure when you can't pose any longer. So, come on, be a sport and say "CHEESE", please!