Part 3: Blogging Journey
If you have been following my blogging journey posts, Part 1 and Part 2. I am continuing the series today. I am sharing the part of blogging I love best; well second best since you are my favorite part of blogging. I know this part of my journey may be of more interest to other bloggers and not to everyone, but I get so many questions about it that I wanted to include it in the series.
So…my favorite part of blogging besides getting to engage with you is the photography, images, and graphics I have learned to take and create. I have always been a visual person so it makes sense that I like this aspect of blogging.
For me, photos make the post. They are visual and if taken with the right light, angle, etc. can tell the story all by themselves. I can express myself without having to write a word, which I sometimes struggle to do.
I have learned a lot about photography over the past 6 years… and I mean A LOT!
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When I look back on some of my older posts, it makes me smile to see how far my photography has come. Above is a photo of the upstairs bathroom in my house.
The photo on the left was taken over 3 years ago. I used a Canon point-and-shoot to take the photo. I did editing on it at the time, but only knew a little bit about how to do it. It is dark and the white balance is off.
Fast forward to a few weeks ago and you can see I learned how to take and edit photos better. I used a Canon 5D Mark II and a 24-70 mm lens to take this. The photo has the right white balance and it shows the true brightness of the room, as if you were standing in it. I did not change the paint color on the walls. This looks like the actual color. The wall color looks green in the first photo. Learning how to use a DSLR and edit pictures in photo editing software made all the difference for me.
When I first started blogging, I had the 7 year old point-and-shoot (mentioned above) with a battery door secured with duct tape. It took OK photos if the light was right, but no matter how hard I wanted that sharp focus and dreamy blurry background in my images, I could not achieve it with this camera. I tried to rock it, but got frustrated with my images. My blog grew even with the photos I was posting, but I knew the photos could be better and made it my mission to become a better photographer.
One of the things I learned is that a good photo is not necessarily only about having a good camera. It is all about the light. If you have great light, you are going to get a much better photo. I also found out that to get the types of photos I wanted, I would need more than one lens. A good lens can make all the difference and I think they are more important than the camera.
Even though DSLR’s are the go-to of most professionals, the camera on your phone can take excellent images if you know all of its features and have good light. You truly don’t need to have a DSLR. I got a new phone last fall, I switched from an iPhone to a Samsung Note 4. Here is an example of an image I shot recently without the need of a photo editing app, I just used one of the modes that came with the camera.
It may not be perfect, but does show that if you take the time to learn basic rules of photography, like the rule of thirds you can get some pretty nice shots.
After all my research I knew I wanted to upgrade my camera to a DSLR and asked my Dad if he would loan me the money to buy it. If you remember, Ed had lost his job and spending money, especially thousands, was not what we could afford to do at the time. Of course, my dad said yes and just gave me the money. XO to my dad. I bought a Canon 60D with a 18-35 kit lens and also a Canon 1.8 50 mm lens.
This camera and a course I took called, Shoot Fly Shoot were the game changers for me. If you want to become a better photographer and learn what all the bells and whistles are on a DSLR, Photoshop, and more. I highly recommend their courses. I took Photography 101 and 102. Although I took many other online courses and watched YouTube videos about Photography before this, these 2 online courses made it all come together for me.
Two years ago I upgraded my camera equipment again to a Canon 5D Mark II. I did this because it is a full frame camera. Without getting technical, it captures a larger area and is not what is called “cropped” frame.
I bought it “used” along with two used lenses. Spending more to get good lenses was really the key to get the type of photograph I wanted to create.
Sharp, clear, and vivid images and in some cases a soft blurry background that puts the project or item I am photographing in focus. Buying a used lens from a reputable company like KEH made this upgrade affordable.
I wish I still had the Canon 50 mm f/1.8 lens that I used with my 60D, but I dropped it and it broke :-( To replace it, I bought a Canon 50 mm f/1.4 lens, but never liked it. It was too soft and I came to learn that not all the glass in lenses is the same – the glass in one can be a slightly off. I sold that lens and splurged to buy a used Canon 24-70 mm f/2.8 EF L lens. I loved it from the moment I viewed my first few photos with it. It is what I use to take 90% of my photos.
I use a Canon Macro 100 mm f/2.8 EF L lens for close up shots for tutorials and smaller projects I post about.
I still miss that nifty-fifty 1.8 lens and want to buy a new one on Amazon. KEH and Amazon make it so easy to buy camera equipment with no-hassle returns if you find you don’t like the item. It is the way I have purchased most of my equipment.
I take all my photos in manual mode on RAW. PS Elements has a RAW editor built in that allows me to fix the white balance and more in my photos. I have Adobe Lightroom, but just can’t seem to get my groove with it even after going to a day long course to learn how to use it. Since PSE has the RAW editor, I am happily sticking with it for now.
To accommodate the task of having to take photos on an ongoing basis, I redesigned my studioffice when I started to blog full-time.
I created it on the window side of my worktable. When I want to take a photo of something small or the steps for a tutorial, I simply roll down a white roller shade that I mounted on the wall above the worktable. I place a dollar store foam board on the left side to bounce the light from the window, set up my tripod and camera and take the photos.
You can read all the details about it in this post: My $20 Dollar Photo Studio
I take a lot of photos and edit until I like what I see. I get much better photos when it is a sunny day.
So much still to learn…along this blogging journey of mine.
As with anything, the more you do it, the better you get. This is true and I hope to learn even more in the coming years so I can rock every photo I take.