Photography for 2015

For the 2015 season, I’m trying to step up my photography skills.

To date, I’ve been running with a Sony Cyber-shot point and shoot, a Panasonic Lumix point and shoot and my Samsung Galaxy S4 phone. During the fall of 2014, I picked up a GoPro Hero 3+ and in November my Nikon D3200 DSLR with an 18-55mm lens and 55-200mm zoom lens.

I’ve already started using the Nikon for a few photo shoots while in Vancouver and back in Alberta on a hike through Edmonton’s River Valley.

I haven’t touched an SLR camera in many years (back when ISO was your old-fashioned film speed) and even then didn’t get much into the particulars of the settings (my interest was in darkroom developing).

It’s going to be a learning curve to get some professional shots out of this thing, and I’ll still be utilizing the point and shoots and camera on the phone depending on the situation and what I’m carrying at the time.

As I learn more, I’ll be posting tips and tricks on what I learn, along with a few of my various steps of experimentation. Hopefully the information is valuable to others learning how to get the most out of a DSLR camera and isn’t too primitive for those that already know what they’re doing!

canada goose caught in flight
Above, the Nikon DSLR will let me capture some ‘high-speed’ shots of birds in flights such as this Canada Goose I photographed while on a hike in Vancouver in late 2014.

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The zoom lens and some simple adjustments will let me capture more great shots with adjusted ‘depth of field’ focus like my photo of this crow demonstrates.

Bear with me as I expand upon my basic skills of photography and make an attempt at getting some almost “professional” level photographs while out on my many excursions.

If interested in the videos, jump over to my “video” section and see what I’ve done to date. The GoPro is another challenge as I’m primarily a user of Ubuntu Linux on my main computer – and GoPro doesn’t yet offer a Linux application for working with videos.

As always, I’m eager to see comments from my readers – feel free to provide any insight into what makes a better photo, or offer your comments on what I’ve already done. If you’re particularly skilled in photography and are interested in writing some posts for my blog. Let me know on the contact page!

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