I started with photography back in 1988 as my great-grandfather gave me some financial reward after I finished secondary school with university-entrance diploma.

With that "seed money" I bought a Kyocera / Yashica 200 AF which was one of the 1st reflex cameras using autofocus technology and my given interest in photography raised more and more. Of course as a poor student I was not able to invest that much in camera hardware so my equipment stayed on a basic level and after finishing university and earning some money the area changed as digital photography became more and more popular so I more and more stopped using the old Yashica compensating it with the entry into digital photography with a Canon Powershot Camera at I think 5 MP. As in 2008 Canon released its EOS 450D with the EF-S 18-55 1:3.5-5.6 IS kit lens at a very interesting price I finally arrived in the DSLR world. I really loved that Canon and added some more equipment like the EF 70-300/4.5-5.6 IS USM and the Canon Speedlite 580EX II which both done great work for me. Unfortunately in 2013 during a summer vacation at Tenerife Island I got rubbed during some "small medical emergency" with my 9 year old daughter, as I left the camera equipment 5 minutes unattended in our locked rental car at a very crowded beach during daytime and the whole equipment was stolen out of the car. Of course insurence company denied to pay for that theft :-( Being back in Germany after that travel I decided to buy the Canon EOS 70D with a Sigma 17-70mm 1:2,8-4 DC Contemporary and a Yongnuo YN 560-II Speedlite. Some months later I added the Canon EF 70-200 f2,8 L IS ii USM and a Rollei C5i tripod. As of status today (January 2019) most of my pictures you see here at flickr are taken with that equipment. Unfortunately my D70 has the often discussed problem with the focus if I don't use the autofocus in life view but want to shoot pictures with the optical viewfinder (especially on mid to long distances). Don't get me wrong the picture quality of the 70D in life view is really good but I missed the "feeling" of using the DSLR in viewfinder mode. Shooting pictures in optical viewfinder mode is for me the main reason why using a DSLR. Now as Canon started its 2018 Winter Cashback with a big pay back for the 6D Mark ii in combination with the Canon EF 24-70 f4 L IS USM I finally entered the area of full format sensor and - even as important - that optical view finder feeling while shooting photos is luckily back as the 6D mark ii is operating really perfect in optical viewfinder mode. Hence from now on you most likely will see pictures from me here at flickr using the 6D mark ii.

I see myself still as an ambitious amateur hobby photographer and am happy to see how many really fantastic other people here at flickr do share their great work giving me new ideas. Speaking about creativity: I assume one of the reasons why I do like photography that much is probably the fact that I think that I am creative with my eyes but I am totally untalented in drawing / painting of what my eyes do see. With the technical and optical support of our loved camera hardware I can still try to be creative with my eyes and compensate my inability in draughtsmanship ;-)

I usually shoot in RAW format and process the pictures using Photoshop Lightroom. I as well own a version of Photoshop elements 13 but don't use it that often to pimp my pictures.

Looking forward to share tons of pictures here with all of you and am happy to receive all kind of positive- but as well supportive negative critic in case you have some ideas how to still improve my skills...and I am sure there is still much room for improvement on my side.

So let's stay connected in this great community,

Regards, Dirk alias FotograficEye.