for my own little troop of 5 anyways. I had always been interested and loved taking photos. When I was a kid in 4-H I took photography class for a few years. I learned about F stops, etc. on my dad's old Minolta. As a teenager and adult I only had compact cameras and outside of calls I didn't get to use dad's camera. And, of course, when he moved out when I was 16 it was pretty much impossible.
I've always taken a ton of photos; especially when we became parents. By 2000 when I had our 2nd son the dawn of the digital age was going strong and we took the leap to buy a digital camera and link up to the internet. I've been photo crazy ever since. In just 10 years I'm on my 5th camera, but it's finally a DSLR. Not my dream DSLR, but I'm really happy with it since DSLR quality is tops over compact. Compact has it's pluses too. It's pretty much one of the cheapest Canon's you can buy, but I won't bore you with those details. By the way, we still out all of the other cameras. My two oldest boys have two of them, I keep one in my car (just in case) and the other has a movie mode that I love, so I still use it. No waste then.
I've taken boat loads of pictures with these cameras. My goal, aside from taking great snapshots, is to take all the portraits for our kids and eventually save some money. I'm not great, but not bad either. I've only taken the kids somewhere for formal pictures a handful of times in the last 13 years, so not too bad. But, I want to be the one to take their senior pictures, so I'm starting now. I've spent under $2,000 getting the camera, lenses, basic backdrops, flash, etc. I figured just a few years worth of pictures and I have the money made up. My mother in law insists on 8x10 pictures every year anyways and the school charges $25/child for the smallest package. This, again saves money.
So, I took these pictures without the backdrops and lighting that will soon be at my door. But, they're still not bad. I'm so excited because I just itch to take pictures and while I LOVE outdoor photos the weather doesn't cooperate often enough. Wish me luck on my long awaited hobby. And hopefully, I'll get a few people wanting me to take some of theirs too so I can afford one more prime lens. Woohoo!
