My favorite camera is whatever camera I have in my hands. Really. I love all cameras from disposables to DSLR's.

 

My first camera shot 6x7 roll film. It was made of plastic.It melted in the back window of my Dad's car on a hot summer day. It looked like a Salvidore Dali watch. Before that happened it took surprisingly good photos, thanks to the large film format.

 

For a kid I composed photos well - no chopped off heads or anything. The pictures were often hilarious. Kid stuff. A six year old boy's view of the world. I wish I still had them. They could be enlarged and hung in the Smithsonian Musem. For that matter, so could the Salvador Dali camera that took them.

 

As a teenager my interest in photography grew. I got my first good camera after I got my first job and my first apartment at the age of 19. It was a 35mm Olympus OM-2. I loved it. I soon got a 24mm wide angle lens, macro tubes and a 3x barlow. I shot tons of slides and made some impressive photographs. I made slide shows that synchronized nicely to a track from Pink Floyd's "Wish You Were Here".

 

Around 1999 I got into larger film format cameras I bought from people all over the world on E-Bay. I got a nice Yashicamat 6x6 from a guy in the Chech Republic, a German 6x9 of no pedigree from somebody in England (still got it), and two 4"x5" cameras - a rail camera and a press camera. The latter were so big and heavy and so slow to use that I never shot much with them. Too much rigamarole. And the Polaroids were so disappointing that I never bothered to develop the negatives. I sold the remaining Polaroid film for more than I paid for the cameras.

 

I resisted the urge to buy a digital camera until the quality satisfied me. I took to digital like a duck to water. Immediately I started shooting thousands of photos instead of just hundreds. I saved hundreds of dollars a month in photofinishing.

 

I was tired of carrying around a heavy camera bag. I wanted something small and light for travel rather than going for a DSLR system.I also wanted video capacity.

 

I got a Sony Cybershot with a 15x zoom. It's still too big to take everywhere. And it calls attention to itself. It can not deliver DSLR quality, but it satisfied me.I have never printed a digital photo I made. 1 Megapixel is probably good enough for my purposes. Everything more is overkill.

 

Now that "everybody" has a digital camera, photography has exploded. But few people know how to get the most from the camera they own.

 

I shoot way too much - especially in Sports mode. Digital photo editing takes me way too much time. Selecting a favorite few shots out of thousands can take way more time than taking the photos. And I don't even bother with Photoshop.

 

Video is a new medium for me. I'm just starting to learn video editing. I've shot some HDTV time lapse photography that I want to edit into video. I will post links when the video is up.

 

I want to travel more, so portability has become an issue for me. I island hopped for three weeks in the Caribbean with just one carry-on bag, but I had to leave the laptop at home. Maybe I could substitute a Blackberry and nix the camera, too.

 

IPhotography used to be an art form for me. Now it has become a visual record of memories. And although I shoot thousands of photographs it amazes me how looking at a single distinctive photo can take me back to the moment I released the shutter. I often remember the sounds, smells and emotions I felt when I made the photo. I often wonder if other people feel the same emotions I experience when I look at a photo - whether or not I created it.

 

I find my best photos happen when I shut off my mind and just experience my emotions through the viewfinder.

 

I invite your comments and questions.

 

I encourage you to explore self expression and communication through photography and every other medium. Above all, I encourage you to enjoy creativity.