February Photos

February Photos

I saw my first 35mm single lens reflex camera in the 1970s; It was a Canon AE-1, and I eventually bought it from the friend who had been foolish enough to show it to me. When it eventually broke and I could find no one to repair it, I bought a Minolta Maxxum. Although the Maxxum had autofocus and automatic metering, I never really warmed to it and didn't take many pictures with it. It was stolen in the early 2000s when someone broke into my house.

I replaced the stolen Maxxum with a digital camera, but never really warmed to it. So when I retired a year and a half ago I used a bit of my 410k money to buy a used AE-1 (just so I'd have a good film camera), and  a first-generation Canon Rebel digital SLR-- both on eBay. I bought a bigger zoom lens, a flash, a set of filters, and a couple of extra batteries and memory cards-- also on eBay, and I was in business.

Or so I thought. I didn't take many photos the first year. But this year I've been carrying the camera as I walk about in Pine Lake and have been taking a lot of pictures.

Although film aficionados swear emulsified celluloid is intrinsically superior to the charge-coupled capture devices of electronic cameras, there's a lot to be said for my Canon Rebel. It will shoot automatically, and yet it will allow me to compose my own shots, setting exposure time, lens opening diameter, ISO, focus, and white balance. I can take hundreds of photos before I need to replace the battery or will fill the CompactFalash memory card that holds images-- and best of all, when I get home I simply remove the memory card from the camera and insert it into a slot on my computer and I have instant access to the images-- instantly and without writing a check to Walgreens.

Below the fold are a few of my photos of Pine Lake, all taken February 2011. (Click READ MORE, just below).