New Love

Yesterday my Mom and I spent the day taking an Introduction to Photography class through Capturing True Emotion (Thanks for the great deal Groupon!). I bought a DSLR camera back in January and have played around with it but basically had no idea how to use any of the features other than the "green box", or automatic mode.  I've always been interested in photography and have always wanted to learn how a SLR camera works and how to use its setting to take great pictures. After 6 months of playing with my camera it was clear that I wasn't going to learn those skills from the camera instruction manual, so I finally got off my butt and took a class. It turned out to be one of the most useful ways I've spent a day in a long time. The course was intense and at times  a bit overwhelming, but it covered everything I've been wanting to learn and the instructors were informative and entertaining. We learned about lighting, metering, ISO, Aperture, Shutter speeds and composition during the 4 hour classroom time in the morning and then we spent the afternoon putting it all into practice. It's crazy how just a few hours of instruction have completely changed the way I think about photography. I feel way more confident about taking photos and even know how to use all those random settings on my camera. Bye bye "green box" , hello "manual mode"! It'll be great to practice on some of our hiking trips this summer and have a solid understanding of my camera settings a before we head out on our South American traveling adventure next spring. I'm very excited to try some "Blurry background" shots and some "Silky Water" stream scenes (both technical terms, of course!). I can't wait to get out there and practice some of these new learned skills!