What's in My Camera Bag

The first assignment in the book is to list what you have. So here is what is in my Camera bag.

My Camera

Samsung NX100

My Lenses

Samsung 20-50mm iFunction 3.5-5.6

Cannon EF 28-80mm 3.5-5.6

EOS - NX lens adapter

My Lighting

Samsung flash SEF15A

I have 1 battery, several memory cards but never have needed more than 1. We also bought a table top tripod a while back.

I like that I can use other camera lenses with my camera but there is one problem, they only function on manual. I have not gotten too good at focusing manually quickly. I cannot change the aperture with the canon lens. 

I would love to have a telephoto zoom lens (and a decent tripod). I think that would be incredible and would have been nice when we found the owl in the cactus on our property. But we still got an ok shot of the owl (meaning you were able to make out that it was an owl. :) 

I would also like a wider aperture, wide angle and fish eye. I think it would be fun to experiment with those. It is amazing how pricey lenses are, not to mention the cameras themselves! But an actual DSLR would be nice to get eventually but not practical unless you are a photographer because of the price. But who knows? My opinion may change. :)

I borrowed a book - Composition

Ok, so I picked up this book from the library. 

I want to improve my photography. I have wanted to do that for years. The summer before I started high school I remember walking through an Office Depot looking for desks. There was this awesome corner desk. It was huge, with frosted glass tabletops and brushed nickel accents. I loved it. My mom told me she could see me behind a desk like that when I was older. I imagined a desk like that for a photography business. 

Fast forward 4-5 years and I tried to take an ART class at the community college. I did poorly because I did not produce work that the teacher liked (I can not draw). She asked me how I planned to make a career in art if I couldn't draw. I told her I wanted to go into photography but I needed to take that entry level ART course in order to take it. The photography classes were not just for digital but for film as well. The teacher just scoffed at me, rolled her eyes and walked away. Yeah, way to make me feel confident!

The second time I tried to take the ART class I came down with pneumonia. The only classes I managed to finish were more necessary classes for my transfer to a university for a teaching degree. Needless to say, I didn't finish that ART class and didn't get into photography classes.

Now that I have finished college, had a couple kids, worked through feeling entirely discouraged because of a camera that did not have the functions I wanted, then feeling like I just couldn't do a decent job taking pictures, I have decided to give it another try.

That's where the book comes in. I managed to read through the first chapter yesterday and feel fairly motivated to work through the assignments at the end of the chapters in hopes that it helps to improve my photography skills. 

I hope to document this here to show growth and improvement, or at the very least to help keep me accountable. I know with the newborn and a toddler that it is going to be difficult to keep it going and all I am doing is adding one more thing to my already full plate of tasks and projects.

Hubby laughed when he saw the book. "My wife wants to be a photographer", he said. I looked at his joking face and seriously replied, "since as long as I can think back I have wanted to be one". I know that being a professional photographer isn't going to happen, but if I can feel good about the pictures I take then at least that is something...

So here is for round two of making this attempt through the 10 chapters of this book. My goal is to go through a chapter a week what I can when I can. I think that sounds decent enough... We will see how long I can check out this book for.

Happy Picture Taking. :)