Photography: A History

For as long as I can remember, I have loved taking pictures.  I finally got my first camera when I was 12.  It was a Polaroid, the kind that, right after you took the picture, you had to pull a white tab, then pull the picture.  Then you had to wait a few minutes, and  then peel the picture off of the chemical papers.  As soon as you pulled the white tab out, another one took it's place, so if you weren't paying attention, you would pull the second white tab out, losing a good picture paper.  But I took lots of pictures with it, I loved it!  Here I am, Christmas day 1974, taken with my brand new Polaroid:

During high school, I upgraded (?) to a Kodak Instamatic. I bought it with Blue Chip Stamps!   You had to be very still, or the picture would be blurry. I had a bad habit of taking a picture and  quickly moving the camera from my face afterwards.   I have lots of blurry photos of my high school friends :(  The camera got stolen from my friend's car, I wonder what kind of pictures I lost, I've forgotten.   Here is a picture of blurry me at school, about 1978:

For my high school graduation, I got a Canon AE-1.  A REAL camera!  I was so happy!  I have albums and albums filled with photos from that camera.  Pictures of friends, family, weddings, babies, kids, holidays, vacations, mission trips to Hawaii, Cook Islands, and Thailand.  I had the same camera at Bible school, almost 20 years later, where I met my future husband.   It was faithful to take good pictures of my first couple of babies. 

Raratonga, Cook Islands, with YWAM,1988:  (mmmm, I can almost smell those fragrant flowers!)

Falling in love at Bible School, 1992:

 

My first baby, 1995:

 

The trouble is, I never really learned to use the camera the way I could have.  I even took a photography class in college.  I just didn't get it.  Aperture, Fstop, exposure, iso, film speed.  Ugh.  I just wanted to take pictures.  For our final, we were supposed to make a box camera.  Too hard, I didn't do it.  I didn't pass.  But, afterall, the AE in my camera meant Automatic Exposure.  Why take it off auto pilot if I don't have too. So, I never learned. I tried, I really did.  I understood a little, but I wouldn't use it, so I lost it.  Then the photos starting having black shadows.  It was over.  I had to get a new camera.  I got a Canon Rebel sometime in the late 90s.  Again, I never really learned all of the fancy stuff I could have done with it.  But I have hundreds and hundreds of pretty good photos of my babies as they grew. 

My oldest son, 2002:

Then, the age of computers and digital photography arrived.  At first, we used our video camera for digital pictures.  We later realized that the quality wasn't very good at all.

A, 2002:

A couple of years ago, we finally bought a Canon Powershot digital, which was a lot of fun.  I took lots of pictures, though, I seem to have a harder time  getting them printed and organized into a photo album.  (Or it could be that I am now homeschooling 5 kids!)

B, 8th bday, 2007:

It was a fine camera, the Canon powershot.  I loved how small it was, fit easily into a bag, or onto my belt.  It was so small, I lost it last spring at a school field trip.  I would  post pictures of that, but they got lost, too.  :(  So after a few weeks without a good camera...oh, about the Canon Rebel, I would still use it now and then, but the battery seemed to die a lot.  I finally figured out that the Autofocus broke.  I will look into getting it fixed, for my daughter, maybe.  But then, it isn't digital!  As I was saying, after a few weeks without a camera, and wondering if we should get a good digital, we went ahead and bought a Canon Powershot again, but a little more up to date. 

It does take pretty good pictures:

S, 2008:

But when it came to taking pictures of fireworks, I was quite disappointed.  I mean, have you seen the PioneerWoman.com's fireworks photos? 

Here is mine, 4th of July, 2008:

I was beginning to regret our purchase.  E and I wished we had bought a better, SLR camera (interchangeable lenses).  So we took it back to the store.  But first, we had to have our replacement, so we bought a Nikon D40 with an 18-55mm lens AND a 55-200 mm zoom lens.  I am determined to learn all I can about this camera.  I know that talent is a biggie in great photography, but knowing how to use the camera properly has got to be a very big part of it!  I have been poring over the owner's manual.  One of my goals is to be able to take my own portraits of my kids.  The kind you can hang on the wall, but aren't from the studio.  I have a lot to learn, but this is what I did this weekend:

And remember that baby from back in 1995?  Here she is in 2008:

When I sent these to Costco, they touched up the colors, so we will see how they turn out.  My plan is to learn Photoshop to fix them up just the way I want.  The Pioneer Woman has inspired me to learn! 

The Preamble

I forgot to add that we watched America Rock from School House Rock.  I particularly love the song The Preamble, I get choked up everytime!  I just found the song and cartoon on YouTube  tried to get it linked here, but couldn't figure it out.  Here are the words:

We the People of the United States, in Order to form a more perfect Union, establish Justice, insure domestic Tranquility, provide for the common defense, promote the general Welfare, and secure the Blessings of Liberty to ourselves and our Posterity, do ordain and establish this Constitution for the United States of America.

I Found Your Camera blog

My friend just told me about this blog.  Since I had lost my camera in May, I checked it out.  I didn't see any of my pictures, but thought I'd pass it along.  The more people know about this website, the more people will find their lost cameras and pictures.

 ifoundyourcamera.blogspot.com

 

4th of July

This is our fourth 4th of July in this town.  I remembered this year that in our former city, fireworks sales were illegal.  We rarely even got to see a nice professional fireworks show, only snippets from our back stairs.  Since moving here, dh has been having fun setting off our own booth-bought fireworks.   And we have tried to find a good place to watch the big fireworks shows.  In the past, we would go to the park next to the baseball field, where they would have a nice show after the ballgame.  Except they always went into extra innings.  Last year, I decided we should just find a park close to the college where they have the biggest show in town (that I know of).  Well, we ended up buying our house right near there!  So we had a fabulous fireworks show right from our own front yard!  Here are a few pictures:

A great summer meal: bbq pork chops, watermelon, salad, corn on the cob, macaroni & cheese, and yummy no-bake garlic bread (I toasted the sour dough slices in the toaster and spread garlic butter on them, so good, and my house didn't heat up)

Dessert didn't turn out as good as previous years.  I need to perfect this thing!!  But it tasted yummy!

Hanging out in the front yard, with Grammy:

A girl and her cat:

Flag football with Daddy::

Planning the next play:
Sparklers!

Waiting for the big show:

The "mini finale":

I tried to take pictures of the bigfireworks, there were some neat new styles.  But my camera wouldn't cooperate.  I did get this, and wanted to post it because if you look right in the middle,  you can see the crescent moon and it just looked cool as the fireworks were exploding right in front of it:

$100!!

For the first time ever, it took $100 to fill up our van with gas!!  It would have taken a little more, but the machine would only go as far as $100.   Ugh!  So discouraging!  We used our van a lot last week.  The kids had Vacation Bible School, so we drove to church everyday.  Plus, E's car was in the shop all week, so I had to drive him to work and pick him up!  Whew! That's a lot of driving.  But this week, we have no appts, so I do plan to stay home as much as possible.  But hey!  I did notice the price of gas went down by about five cents a gallon yesterday, so there is hope.  Maybe.

Lots of camping pictures

We had a wonderful time camping!  The weather was in the 70s, which is so much better than the 110 they had at home!  The tenting experience was fine.  I was cold the first night.  E didn't really like the inflatable, bouncable mattresses.  But I did, much better than the hard floor!  We went fishing on Friday and Saturday, in two different small rivers.  The second day, D caught two fish and E caught 1!!  They even cleaned them and cooked them.  And ate them.  We had bonfires.  And roasted marshmellows and hotdogs over the fire.  I must buy an old fashioned perkolater for my coffee.  In Yosemite, I always took our electric coffee maker.  We didn't get much hiking done, but they sure had fun fishing and splashing in the cold water.  At one spot, there were millions of ladybugs on the rocks!  I have never seen anything like it.  On our way home, we stopped to see some of the giant sequoias.  I am always amazed at the size of those things!  Some of them have even been growing since the time that Jesus walked the earth!  The oldest living things in the world, right here, just hours from our home!  Okay, here are the pics:

 

"Our" meadow:

Monster campfire:

Team work!

Roasting hotdogs:

Smoke protection:

GIANT Sequoias:

 I got a fish!

Millions of ladybugs:

Gone Campin'

We are going on our very first tent camping trip since our 10yo was a baby!  Since then, we have used our trailer, or stayed in Housekeeping in Yosemite, which has a cabin sort of thing, beds and electricity.  And showers.  We are going up into the Sequoia National Forest, to a campsite that has outhouses and no showers.  For three days.  I used to be able to camp for several days without showering, but the last couple of years, I just needed my daily shower to wake up and feel normal. But I'll manage.  As long as I don't have to touch any fish.  E is getting a fishing license today.  Hopefully, we (they) will actually catch something.  The boys want to even clean them and cook them for dinner.  Yikes!  I remember as a kid, going to our friends' cabin "in the mountains" not too far from where we will be, an hour maybe??  The boys caught some fish and we were walking back to camp.   They asked if I wanted to carry the fish, and for some crazy reason, I said ok.  They handed it to me, mouth wide open, and I had to hold it from the mouth.  Well, that was just too much for this girly girl.  I dropped the fish right in the dirt!  They were not too happy with me.  That was the last time I ever touched a fish like that.  We shall see what happens this weekend. 

When we get back, I will post PICTURES!!!  We bought a new camera to replace the lost one.  I have a handy camera case with a strap, so I can always be wearing it.