My Beginnings in Photography

My first experience with photography was when I was a young child and my parents gave me a Kodak Brownie camera that took 127 roll film. The fact that I could take pictures was amazing and thrilling.

Later when I was a young teenager, I had a morning paper route as did one of my friends. One day, after delivering papers, he invited me over to his house where he took me into a makeshift darkroom and used a contact printer to expose some paper. When he put the paper in a tray with some liquid (I found out later it was developer) a picture started to show. I was hooked. It was fantastic.

My first SLR was a few years later when I bought a Praktica LLC. I bought myself an enlarger and built a quasi darkroom under my parents stairs. My parents later gave me a twin-lens camera for Christmas. I used those cameras until I was about twenty-six.

One day I came home from work and my young daughter met me at the front door and in her two year old's language said, "Daddy, we got you a camera for Christmas!" Of course it took her about four tries before I understood what she said. That camera was a Pentax Super Program.

I had the Pentax Super Program for about twelve years until the film winder broke from too many pictures. The shop I took it to said it wasn't worth repairing. I later bought a Nikon N80 which was a fantastic film camera. About the same time my wife and I bought a Nikon Coolpix and started in the world of digital photography.

We now have a Nikon D500, D90, and SB600 Speedlights.

So where does this take me? I love taking pictures, especially landscapes. The intent of this blog is to describe my adventures, the problems that I encounter and how I solve them. I hope you enjoy the journey with me.