Getting A Bittmoore Here: Greetings all, Long time shooter new to the forum here. As an occupational health and safety trainer as well as incident investigator and a contract...

Bittmoore Loc: SE Wisconsin

Greetings all,
Long time shooter new to the forum here. As an occupational health and safety trainer as well as incident investigator and a contract photographer/videographer I'm always looking for hints, tips and suggestions on improving my skills & equipment. I was quite humbled and amazed when legendary photographer Earl Dotter recently told me he thought I had a pretty nice set up. WOW. I'm still pinching myself.

I've been taking pictures for many decades. It was something I picked up from my grandfather who gave me my first "real" camera: a Brownie 620. Yeah, I had a number of "instamatic" cameras and had fun snapping pictures but that Brownie was something else.

My grandfather had been taking photos for many decades and had quite a few different cameras. He gave me several Brownies as a kid. There was something about that huge film - compared to the instamatics I had - that always captured my imagination. I played with the instamatics just snapping away at whatever caught my eye, but the Brownie was different. I always to time composing my shots with them. Not that I knew what composition was or the quality difference in the film.

When I graduated high school my parents got me a Minolta (I have no recollection of what model anymore). I saved up and got a second lens for it. Unfortunately when I moved across country a couple years later I ended up with some roommates that stole it, and a bunch of my other stuff, and I couldn't afford to replace it.

I got busy with my hectic life and wistfully dreamed of someday getting another camera. Then, when cellphones became "smartphones", I started looking at the specs and the quality of camera made most of my decisions on which to get. Then one day I read about the Lumia 1020 with a 41MP camera f/2.2 26mm Carl Zeiss optics, 1080p video, touchscreen and the native ability to shoot panorama images I had to get me one. Unfortunately I couldn't as it had been superseded by the Lumia 1520 at that point. Since the biggest change was that the 1520 had a 20MP f/2.4 26mm camera with the Zeiss optics - and a few other upgrades - I had to get it. And I did.

That got me back to taking images everywhere I went. And they were pretty decent. The wide range of lighting conditions it could handle with ease, high definition images and video it could produce and the fact that you could shoot using automatic or manual settings keep it in my pocket to this day.

Around the same time I found out a good friend of mine had a Canon Rebel (probably a T2 or T3 but idk for certain) and saw the awesome images he was able to capture made getting one of my own a top priority. I opted for a Rebel T4i. Glad I did as it's an awesome piece of equipment that has helped my recall and use much of the knowledge I learned so many years ago in the fine art photography and industrial arts classes I took.

A year or two ago I decided I wanted a second body so I wouldn't spend so much time changing lenses. Unfortunately I didn't do my homework like I should have. I got myself a Rebel T6 which is a fine camera but it's a bit of a changeup from the T4i and I don't use it as much as I would had I gotten the T6i or another T4i. Once you get accustomed to the touchscreen controls and articulating LCD screen it's distracting to work with menus again.

I haven't invested in many lenses as of yet as I've been fairly satisfied with the Canon EF-S 18-55mm, Canon EF 75-300mm and the Tamron 18-400mm so far. I'm able to set one camera as a stationary and the other use mobily and synchronize pictures with the matching ProMaster RF Wireless Remote Shutter Releases I picked on recommendation of my friend.

PixelStan77 Loc: Vermont/Chicago

Bittmoire wrote:

Greetings all,
Long time shooter new to the forum here. As an occupational health and safety trainer as well as incident investigator and a contract photographer/videographer I'm always looking for hints, tips and suggestions on improving my skills & equipment. I was quite humbled and amazed when legendary photographer Earl Dotter recently told me he thought I had a pretty nice set up. WOW. I'm still pinching myself.

I've been taking pictures for many decades. It was something I picked up from my grandfather who gave me my first "real" camera: a Brownie 620. Yeah, I had a number of "instamatic" cameras and had fun snapping pictures but that Brownie was something else.

My grandfather had been taking photos for many decades and had quite a few different cameras. He gave me several Brownies as a kid. There was something about that huge film - compared to the instamatics I had - that always captured my imagination. I played with the instamatics just snapping away at whatever caught my eye, but the Brownie was different. I always to time composing my shots with them. Not that I knew what composition was or the quality difference in the film.

When I graduated high school my parents got me a Minolta (I have no recollection of what model anymore). I saved up and got a second lens for it. Unfortunately when I moved across country a couple years later I ended up with some roommates that stole it, and a bunch of my other stuff, and I couldn't afford to replace it.

I got busy with my hectic life and wistfully dreamed of someday getting another camera. Then, when cellphones became "smartphones", I started looking at the specs and the quality of camera made most of my decisions on which to get. Then one day I read about the Lumia 1020 with a 41MP camera f/2.2 26mm Carl Zeiss optics, 1080p video, touchscreen and the native ability to shoot panorama images I had to get me one. Unfortunately I couldn't as it had been superseded by the Lumia 1520 at that point. Since the biggest change was that the 1520 had a 20MP f/2.4 26mm camera with the Zeiss optics - and a few other upgrades - I had to get it. And I did.

That got me back to taking images everywhere I went. And they were pretty decent. The wide range of lighting conditions it could handle with ease, high definition images and video it could produce and the fact that you could shoot using automatic or manual settings keep it in my pocket to this day.

Around the same time I found out a good friend of mine had a Canon Rebel (probably a T2 or T3 but idk for certain) and saw the awesome images he was able to capture made getting one of my own a top priority. I opted for a Rebel T4i. Glad I did as it's an awesome piece of equipment that has helped my recall and use much of the knowledge I learned so many years ago in the fine art photography and industrial arts classes I took.

A year or two ago I decided I wanted a second body so I wouldn't spend so much time changing lenses. Unfortunately I didn't do my homework like I should have. I got myself a Rebel T6 which is a fine camera but it's a bit of a changeup from the T4i and I don't use it as much as I would had I gotten the T6i or another T4i. Once you get accustomed to the touchscreen controls and articulating LCD screen it's distracting to work with menus again.

I haven't invested in many lenses as of yet as I've been fairly satisfied with the Canon EF-S 18-55mm, Canon EF 75-300mm and the Tamron 18-400mm so far. I'm able to set one camera as a stationary and the other use mobily and synchronize pictures with the matching ProMaster RF Wireless Remote Shutter Releases I picked on recommendation of my friend.

Greetings all, br Long time shooter new to the for... (show quote)

Welcome aboard. Learn from the forum. I remember the Brownie and Instamatic camera days. Look forward to your images and posts. A great way to learn.

Vince68 Loc: Wappingers Falls, NY

Welcome to UHH.

joehel2 Loc: Cherry Hill, NJ

Welcome to the forum.

StanMac Loc: Tennessee

Welcome to UHH!

Stan

Bittmoore Loc: SE Wisconsin

Thanks for the warm welcome everyone.

I'll figure out posting here and up a few images. I take a variety of types (landscape, astral, events) and will up some of each.