An Introduction
I feel there is beauty in our daily lives us that we often ignore. Painted doors, statues, store fronts we ignore because we see them often. We think to ourselves that capturing them in a photo would be foolish; photos are to capture special events or scenes from travels. I have to disagree. While I take many photos of family dinners, school open houses, and public squares in Europe, I find the most happiness in photographing the items others tend to walk past.
That’s not to say I actually know what I’m doing. My photo-taking ability is only a step above cutting off peoples’ heads in group shots. I’m intelligent enough to know that you cannot teach someone how to properly compose a photo. You can point a photographer in the right direction with the rules of thirds or by showing example after example of well-composed photos but, in the end, it comes down to intuition. A photography simply “knows.” Instead, I want to learn the technical side of photography. All that exposure, ISO speed, F-Stop jabber I’ve heard about.
I’m lucky. My husband (here’s his food blog) is an excellent landscape and food photographer. He’s never been published but friends always comment that his photos could be made into postcards. Our home his filled with his photos of Italy, Switzerland, and France. He took his first photography classes in high school using an old 35 mm all-manual film camera and remembers much of which he learned. On several attempts he has tried to teach me how his camera, a first generation Canon Digital Rebel, works but I tend to forget his lessons soon after they end.
This blog will chronicle my lessons in photography. I’ll start using my camera then move to using Matt’s and, eventually, that old 35 mm film camera that sits on our shelf. I would love to get to the point technically where I can use a 35 mm film camera and shoot slide film. Something about the connection to the not so distant pass appeals to me.
While I’d love to say I’ll write weekly or monthly I know that’s not going to happen. I’m a full-time Mechanical Engineering student with other passions (knitting, robotics, family) that will scream for my attention. My goal, however, is to post photos once a month and a photography lesson every other month. I hope you’ll enjoy my little adventure, especially if you’re someone other than my parents.
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