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02/06/2007 12:27:00 PM · #1 |
We all have a story to tell about why we wanted to become a photographer, so i feel it would be intereting to hear from you all and to share stories. It will also serve as a means to h elp us to get to know each other just that little better.
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My Story....
Well its really quite simple. I beleive that i can see things that other people simply cannot see and the only way i can show it to them it with a photograph.
when i was younger i lived in Canada and every other weekend we used to go to our log cabin in the Rocky mountains, but sadly, i have very few images to show my kids my experiences and i think thats a dying shame, so now i am going to try and take as many photos of my life as i can for the future and will be encouraging my children to do the same. |
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02/06/2007 12:30:57 PM · #2 |
My affair with photography has been a relatively short one, starting with my first digital compact in 2004 to take on my honeymoon. 800 snaps (300 of them of Roman Columns) and only 10 good shots later, I was hooked. It grew from there as I discovered websites (//www.dpchallenge.com & //www.ephotozine.com to name only two) and magazines all dedicated to my new found hobby, offering advice and the promise of making me better.
I̢۪ve learnt tricks and techniques to use both behind the lens and in the digital dark room that have only improved my skills and increased my passion.
After my first digital compact broke beyond repair, and being forced to beg and borrow the use of more creative compacts, I made the plunged into D-SLR heaven in June 2006 when I purchased my Nikon D50.
I love to attempt all styles of photography, but I have two very strong interests: Black & White and Landscapes and I enjoy combining both of these.
Message edited by author 2007-02-06 12:31:25.
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02/06/2007 12:32:44 PM · #3 |
| I needed an elective in high school. |
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02/06/2007 12:47:22 PM · #4 |
I was given a Kodak 110 when I was a kid and took lots of pix with that - or at least as much as my allowance would allow. I even had a Kodak disk camera back in the 80s! Remember those?
Some years later, in college where I was taking Advertising, I first laid hands on an SLR - a Pentax K-1000 - in photography class, which was part of the curriculum. Learned a great deal about photography but again, the expense of processing limited my picture taking. Nonetheless am very glad I kept my course textbook from back then - it's very basic but thorough.
Finally in 2003 I was given a Samsung Digimax for my birthday. YAY! I used up all 2.01 MPs in that little sucker. Many of the pix in my portfolio are from this camera. Then, this past November I was given a Canon Powershot A700. Love it, though every so often I still have to go back to the manual to remember how to do something. I shoot mostly on the manual setting because it makes you think more about your aperture, ISO etc. Eventually, when I win the lottery or something, I will get a DSLR.
Recently built myself a light tent and try to spend at least 30 minutes a day shooting various items with it.
And that's my story!
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02/06/2007 01:04:36 PM · #5 |
| I thought we (guys) all did it for the chicks? :-) |
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02/06/2007 01:07:50 PM · #6 |
| Cause I was crap at painting! - So frustrated so I took a camera and was able to produce exactly the compositions as I saw them. Got into my own darkroom printing etc - Next thing I tell my parents just as I am about to leave school is that I want to be a photographer - Well as any hard working parents would do they totally put the idea out of my head - I told them I needed to go to college etc - I even got a letter from my school telling them they would be wasting my talent (much thanks to my French teacher Mrs Smith - Who I still say she played an important part in the way my life went - Thank you) - Parents decided OK off you go and do school etc but I had to pay for everything which of course only made me more passionate about the pictures - A few years later - A bit of a struggle I am on a plane to LA from the UK. I am officially a full time pro. Not that you would know it from my DPC scores!!!!! |
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02/06/2007 01:30:06 PM · #7 |
I took up photography for three reasons:
My brother was travelling and used to come home with the most amazing photographs. This inspired me to want to do the same.
I also cannot paint or draw even though my mother is very artistic so I decided that I would compose and my camera would paint instead.
And the final reason was more something that has kept me obsessed with photography for many years and thats the ability to see the world in a totally different way, an artistic way, where I can look at most things and see something beautiful. For instance, I don't see the derelict building but rather the tiny yellow flower growing out of one of the cracks in the paving. It makes for a more positive existance, which makes for a much happier me!
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02/06/2007 01:42:21 PM · #8 |
My mother was always the photographer of the family, taking amazing shots with her 1952 Argus C3 (which she still maintains and uses occasionally to this day, although she prefers her "newfangled" Pentax K1000). Christmas of 1978, my mother had Santa slip a Kodak Ektra 1 into my stocking with half a dozen rolls of 110 film.
//www.subclub.org/subjpegs/ektra1.jpg
That little camera launched my on again, off again obsession that has lasted almost 30 years. In my early teen yeras, I graduated from the Ektra 1 to a crappy, Chinese-made rangefinder that I can't remember the name of (but that was cheap enough to buy with only a few weeks of allowance hording). That camera almost ruined my taste for photography altogether with what had to be the worst in-camera light metering and lowest contrast lens that was ever made. However, a late-teen "upgrade" to a used Canonet rangefinder brought me back into the fold. I still own the Canonet, and break it out now and again when I need to be reminded that good photography is not a function of the current gadget sitting on the camera store's shelf.
//www.canon.com/camera-museum/camera/1970-1975/l_product/1972_netg3-17.jpg
Since then I've been more or less active in the hobby as student life, then work life, and then student life again allowed, and have owned and loved/hated several different cameras. The advent of digital really brought me back to the hobby. Though I really liked to take pictures, and have recently begun to develop my own black and white negatives for scanning, I never learned the darkroom side of film photography. Being able to scan my slides or negative and then manipulate them "dry" on my computer opened up a whole new aspect of photography for me and rekindled my love for the hobby.
I've used a handful of digital cameras, but up until recently my "digital photography" has consisted of scanning film slides or negatives. Back in 2003 I bought a Canon G1, which I loved for landscape and night photography, but which was disappointing because of its shutter lag for dynamic subjects. Last summer I bought a Sony T9 for snapshots and was amazed at how far digital cameras had advanced. Shutter lag was essentially gone, and the picture quality had jumped up amazingly. I briefly flirted with a Fuji S9000, but quickly decided that it wasn't enough camera and have recently traded it in for a used 10d body that can match to my existing film lenses and couldn't be happier with it.
I think of photography as both an art and a craft, and enjoy both aspects of the process. I have trouble drawing a stick figure, but photography allows me to play with light and shadow, line and texture, form and mood, and I believe that it teaches me to see the world in new and different ways; to really "see" things rather than just look at them. I never call myself a photographer, because I know that I have a lot to learn and that I will probably never be as good at both the art and craft as those who I think of as photographers. But I love to take pictures and am looking forward to becoming part of the DPC community, learning and improving, and getting to know the rest of you as I go along.
Message edited by author 2007-02-06 14:10:20. |
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02/06/2007 01:44:03 PM · #9 |
After I moved to Colorado, I wanted a camera to take on my hikes so that I could send photos home to my worried parents to show them that I really wasn't living on the streets or starving or anything, and the whole thing just snowballed from there.
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02/06/2007 02:10:26 PM · #10 |
My Story:
I'm fairly new to photography. But I believe that as I am growing as a person, I am looking for more ways to express what I see. I live in South Africa, when I was growing up, I always used to wonder why I was born here and not in America or Europe, why Africa?
Today, I am extremely proud to live in Africa. I consider the entire continent my home. I am proudly African. Thus, I hope to use my photography to show the beauty of Africa, as I see it, to the world. I dream of one day being a good enough photographer that I can have my very own book published and distributed all over the world, showing the beauty of this very misunderstood continent to the world.
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02/06/2007 02:26:03 PM · #11 |
I just wanted to feed my starving babies!
Ok, not really, but that's the way I want it to read in my memoirs :P
I was a pretty serious amateur when I hooked up with an old-time pro who had the time and inclination to tutor me - and I had the drive and ambition to learn.
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02/06/2007 02:34:24 PM · #12 |
I̢۪m only a hobbyist, sorry.
DPC is an AWESOME place. I feel so lucky to have found you.
Alice I am.
Message edited by author 2007-02-08 13:31:02. |
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02/06/2007 03:32:26 PM · #13 |
I'm quite new to photography, started in December 05. The reason I got into photography because I had an opportunity to take a road trip around the US in Summer 05. All the beautiful sceneries across our great country inspired me to be a photographer. It was a shame because I didn't have a camera to capture all those magnificent landscapes and bustling city lives, we did bring along a small HP 3MP p&s camera for snapshot, but I wish I had my own. After the trip I enrolled in a photography class for beginners and from it I learned the basic of composition, lighting, shutter speed, aperture value and many more. About 5 months of researching for a digital camera and shooting assignments for the class with the family's Canon Rebel Ti film camera, I decided to go straight for a DSLR and got myself the Canon Rebel XT/350D. I'm very thankful for my family, my church and DPC for giving me countless opportunities to improve and learn my photography. With both work and school I wish I have more time when the opportunities arise.
Nathan |
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02/06/2007 03:35:42 PM · #14 |
Instant gratification.
Sure, I can draw. Yes, I can paint. However, oftentimes I find myself frustrated at the amount of time it takes to produce a painting or drawing. Photography offers me instant gratification. :) No more worrying and erasing and ripping the paper and starting over. No more paintings getting dropped on the carpet while wet and ruining both the carpet and the painting.
I still paint and draw now and then but it has become a joy rather than a chore. I miss the smell of paint thinner and oils but the smell of a hot battery is almost as good :) |
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02/06/2007 03:49:22 PM · #15 |
I've been thinking about this pretty heavily in the past few days. I'm writing a bio for my own website. Like Technoshroom, I needed an elective in highschool, and it snowballed.
I think though, that I've always needed an artistic outlet, I don't have the skill or patience to draw. I did architecture for a while, but that really only strengthened my need to continue to create. Photography as a hobby gives me an opportunity to get those things not everyone can see out to to masses, and if thousands or even one person gains something from it, awesome. If not, it was at least fun while I worked on it. |
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02/06/2007 05:01:06 PM · #16 |
Cameras and photography were a way of life in my family. My grandfathers were both into photography and loved to travel. I cannot begin to total up the hours we spent watching slide shows over the years. I had my first photography class with my father as the teacher in junior high school. He later went on to teach college photography at Metropolitan State College. My oldest, Amanda, jokes that she was the only 10 year old to get her pictures critiqued once she got them back from the grocery. Last September, I packed up my darkroom after deciding that I would never be using that old enlarger again. I can't say I miss the smell of the chemicals or hiding out in the dark for hours at a time.
It wasn't until my 2 youngest kids were born that I really got back into photography with a passion. Both children are adopted and I was require to send that agency monthly photos for the first year. Our birthparents were thrilled to have "professional" photos every month which I found to be highly motivating. Friends began asking me to photograph their kids after see my photos. Word of mouth is awesome! The last 3 years we've been focused on weddings but my goal is to get my children's photography moving in 07.
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