My New Baby

My new baby is actually a camera. I've been contemplating getting one for a while. I loved the camera I had, which I got after my house was robbed. It was a little Canon Powershot and really did everything I needed it to – except for one thing. The macro was just not powerful enough to get the really close-up shots I wanted to take. The other thing I wasn’t wild about was the way it chewed through batteries, even using rechargeable batteries.

Since I also have a food blog, I like to take tight shots of plates and dishes that I am eating. I also like to take close in shots of flowers, leaves, rocks and textures. But most of all, I love capturing the details of furniture, architecture and other things that a lot of people overlook. The tiny details are often what makes a piece special.

When I got back from the Eastern Shore, I needed to take some ultra detailed photographs of hallmarks on some old English silver. I tried several times and several ways with the old camera, but only got excellent shots of the background fabric. If you don’t know about hallmarks, I will do a post on that later. It’s fascinating.

I grabbed a piece of the silver and took it to the camera store to see what I could find that would capture the information I needed from the back of the silver. Even though the teenage geek who was helping me thought I was a complete nutter, I accomplished what I wanted – to find a camera that could take extreme close up shots.

I had a few criteria for a camera. First was the macro capability, but nearly as important was the portability factor and ease of use. I know that a big SLR camera would take spectacular shots, but I can’t really stick it in my bag and carry it with me all of the time.
So the camera I selected was another Canon, figuring that the learning curve would not be too steep. It’s a Powershot SD1100 IS Digital ELPH in a lovely chocolate brown. The IS stands for image stabilization which is a brilliant feature! Short of carrying around a tripod (which I do, in my car), I would have to improvise and wedge myself on doorframes, prop the camera on beer bottles and generally look like a complete idiot! This will save me from continuing that!

I am teaching myself to do all of the manual features like white balance and ISO, as well as playing with all of the automatic settings. I will look forward to sharing more wonderful pictures taken by my new little baby.

These are some photos I took in my mother's garden the other day.

This is a tomato flower!

Daisy Bug

Marigold center