Brand New Bag

I recently bought a new camera bag. It's just big enough to fit my camera and one lens. And my wallet, cell phone, keys, and a chap stick (just one of twelve, sadly).

Normally, I would not encourage anyone to carry anything other than a camera and their accessories in their camera bag, but I can promise you that these few personal belongings are clean and are being kept in smaller, separate pockets.

The reason behind this? I decided that from now on, instead of a purse, I'd carry my camera bag. I thought long and hard about this. See, I don't like not having access to my camera. I often find myself wanting to take a picture of something or someone and then end up frustrated.

For example, a few days ago as I was leaving work, I noticed a man who had paused during his walk, had his camera out, and was taking pictures of Hispanic workers loading fruit onto a truck. This intrigued me. What did the man find so fascinating? Well, I immediately wanted to take his picture.

And then there was the car I was stopped behind at a red light and the license plate read ADHDX5. I knew various ADHD members of my family would get a giggle out of this (for the three seconds they'd be able to focus on it), but did I have my camera? Of course not.

I don't carry my camera around because, well, as much as I adore the thing, it's... bulky. And my camera bag is even more bulky. And carrying that, along with my purse, was not something that would make me happy. Quite the opposite, in fact.

So, I finally decided to get a new, smaller camera bag, call it a purse, and get on with my life. So far, I'm loving it. Have I found myself needing it now that it's finally at my disposal? Of course not. Except the other day while Hubs and I were at Starbucks.

I call this "My Idea of a Good Time".



So, maybe I haven't taken tons of grand pictures, but it's only been a few days. And it's there if/when I need it. That's all that matters.

So, how about some more random pictures?

I call this "I Don't Know How To Ask For Help".



I call this one "Dinner".



The weekly assignment over at the Digital Photography School website was "low light/night photography." I wanted to submit a photo, but it was the last day and so I did the only think I could think of. Turn off all the lights and take a picture in the dark. Of my dinner.

Believe it or not, that photo was taken in near pitch black. Unfortunately, I was too late to submit a photo and all I had to show for it was slightly burnt asparagus.

Then, as I was watching Idol (and, yes, the right David won, thank you very much) I did this:



This was fun because I recently learned that, when photographing the sun, you can achieve this star-like quality if you use a very small aperture.

Well, this is a candle, not the sun, but I tried the same effect and I kinda laughed out loud and maybe said a couple words of encouragement to myself when I saw that it worked. Note to anyone who might try this: you have to pair the smallest aperture possible (in this case, f22) with a long exposure (I used a 15 second exposure in this picture) to achieve this effect.

The only problem with a long exposure is that it can really blow out your photo. (Haha, get it? Blow out? Candle? Aww, c'mon!) So, you'll notice that the candle is way too over-exposed. Oh well, it was still fun.

That's all.