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Photography |
My other hobby is computers, so naturally I combined the two. We initially used film that we had processed and then scanned ourselves. This became tediously slow. A few months before Lisa became pregnant with out twins, we both decided to bite the bullet and spend the money on a higher-end (i.e. more expensive) digital SLR , the Canon EOS D30, with which we could continue to use our collection of lenses. This opened a brand new window in our photographic endeavors. Though the quality of digital may not match film in larger print sizes, the benefits far exceed the loss of quality on larger prints, especially considering that we can only print to 8x10 inches and at this size the D30 competes quite nicely. The benefits include simple correction for different types of illumination; the ability to review the pictures immediately after they are taken, thus enhancing learning; additional flexibility of shot-by-shot film speed adjustment; less color correction compared to scanning negative film; the ability to delete absolutely horrid shots; and on and on. There are of course some drawbacks. Since I moved from scanning film to digital, my time spent in front of the computer actually decreased. This is good! However, for someone else who hasn't used the computer to process photographic images, the learning curve can be daunting, especially when the highest quality of final output is desired.
The internet has proved an unparalleled resource of learning our new hobby. Unfortunately it has also provided the means to spend many dollars as well. Actually, in this regard it has also been helpful since we were able to shop around for prices, get other's opinions on equipment, and avoid the dealers with questionable ethics. The links below provide some of my favorite sights as well as dealers with whom I have had good experiences. My worst experience buying photo equipment online was waiting excessively for a shipment - not too bad compared to some people's experiences. I suspect the dealer offered a significant discount on a product that they really didn't want to sell for the low price, so hoping I would cancel the order, they stalled. After sending numerous (all polite) apologies for the delay with an offer to cancel the order and receiving my subsequent replies that I would wait, they finally shipped my equipment. Though I'm not sure if they really were playing this game, I've not included them in my list of good experiences below.
I intend to add a lot to this sight, so most of the stuff that follows will be links to other pages either on this site or elsewhere on the web.
These pages provided by Stephen Werst.