MomShots

So a while back I started a personal challenge. I was going to take a photograph a day for seven days.  I had this plan that I was going to post my photos from all seven days.  I posted three days worth. 

After I started this challenge, I realized that I didn’t want to stop at Day Seven.  So instead of stopping at Day Seven, I just kept going.  I have no idea what day it is.  

Maybe I should count.  

It looks like I issued this personal challenge on May 17th.  Today was June 10th so that has been 24 days.  I missed a day here and there, maybe three days all together.  I missed today, in fact.  I got out my camera but only downloaded the images off of it.  I haven’t been feeling that well so I’ll take refuge in that excuse…

I really love this idea of taking Momshots daily.  It has really helped me become more familiar with my camera.  I think that is really important.   

I was just remembering back to Halloween, just 8 months ago…  I carved a pumpkin and tried to take a picture of it.  I was super frustrated because each photo I took came out really, really dark.  They were all too dark to be usable at all.  My husband was out of town for business that day.  I kept trying to call him to get his help but he was in the air flying from Chicago to Las Vegas and didn’t get my calls.  For some reason, I couldn’t use my Coolpix to take the picture.  

Now, just 8 months later, I totally wouldn’t have that problem.  I am MUCH more familiar with my camera and could just decide if I needed to increase or decrease my shutter speed or open the aperture, etc.  I am very excited by that progress.

So… Lately I have been experimenting with using the Aperture Priority mode.  I’ve also been experimenting with the focus brackets.  Plus just normal (for me anyway) things like being aware of the light and shadows, framing and backgrounds; these are all things I have been focusing on while I take my daily Momshots.

I am still making mistakes left and right but often I can look at the results and decide what I could have done to make it a better photo.  I think that is how we learn.

Here is a Momshot that I took this past weekend on a little camping excursion into the Uinta National Forest.  There are elements of it that are good and there are elements that are not.  I like the green background and especially love the flames from the fire.  They kind of have a ghosting type effect over the boys.  

One element that I really don’t like are the harsh shadows around their cute squinty eyes and necks.  If I would have waited until later in the evening than I probably could have gotten a similar shot but with more even lighting.  The problem with that is that I didn’t pose them for this shot; it was spontaneous.  I don’t know if I would have been able to get them in a similar position later in the day.  I guess that is just part of the Momshot dilemma; Spontaneity vs. Posing.  Or maybe it’s just a Jessica dilemma…   

So I had a little mishap with my camera. Well, not actually a mishap, more of an unknown problem. I looked through my view finder this evening and everything looked fuzzy. I didn’t have my glasses on and I was a bit tired so I rubbed my eyes, blinked really hard and looked again. Still fuzzy. Fuzzy is not good.

My next step was to get a second opinion. Were my eyes freaking out or was something really wrong with my camera? I couldn’t tell. So I brought the camera to my husband and asked him to look through the view finder and tell me what he saw. He also saw fuzziness. I felt a tiny bit of relief in knowing that it wasn’t my eyes but I was also getting concerned that my camera might be broken. We tried cleaning a few places here and there on the camera, to no avail; it was still fuzzy.

Then I remembered where the camera manual was and decided to look at that, just in case there might be something in it that would relate to the situation at hand. While perusing through the Quick Start guide, I spotted what I was looking for; a section called “How to Focus the View Finder.”

I was ecstatic! I found the answer to my little problem. And of course, it was an extremely simple answer. There is a little focusing lever just to the right of the view finder. All I needed to do was move it up or down until the image became crisp. So I ran downstairs and grabbed the camera to test out my little nugget of knowledge. Low and behold it worked! My camera is not broken. I just need to learn how to use it!!!

So the moral of this story is short and simple… Keep your user manual in a safe and accessible place so that you can refer back to it as needed. Take some time to read through it and you might be surprised by what new information you learn about your camera.

So while you’re busy chasing kids, cleaning up spilled apple juice, folding laundry and finding time to get to the gym, try to pick up your camera’s user manual and read through it with an eye for details you may not be aware of. Tonight I will be chopping potatoes for Potatoes au gratin while I will be reading my manual. I’m excited to learn more interesting facts about my camera!