If you loved the Apollo space program, get this

[amazonify]B003NOGNPQ:right[/amazonify][amazonify]B000XJ5TPE:right[/amazonify]Last night I watched In The Shadow Of The Moon, with some of the surviving astronauts, telling, in their own words, what the Apollo program and moon landings were like, interspersed with tons of footage of the events themselves. It was wonderful. While the space stuff is great, it was also very personal, and you … Read more

Great Canon 40D shots without computer processing

OK – call me lazy. Tell me I’m not getting the full benefit of my Canon 40D digital SLR camera. Yes I know about RAW files, curves, unsharpening, HDR, etc. But sometimes, well, most of the time, I just want to take pictures and have them look great on screen and printable at anything less than a HUGE print without loads of, ok ANY, computer ‘post processing’.

Little point and shoot digital cameras in decent light situations (i.e., outdoors) take great pictures in most circumstances. But they’re still slow, cannot do shallow depth of field, often don’t have a very wide angle field of view, and to me at least, are generally irritating (except for their size)! Once you’ve seen the quality of pictures and enjoyed the flexibility and range of options and control with an SLR, it’s hard to go back. I know, I tried. Got tired of lugging the Canon 20D and lenses around, sold the lot. But less than a year later, I was ready to throw my Canon point and shoot camera in a fire pit.

Read more

Digital cameras are still in the early days

[amazonify]B000V5P90K:right:product:thehigginswebsit[/amazonify]I recently bought a Canon 40D digital SLR camera. “SLR” stands for single lens reflex and basically means you can change lenses. SLRs are also more robustly made and definitely don’t fit in a pocket like regular ‘point and shoot’ cameras.

I previously had a Canon 20D and sold that a year ago as I wasn’t using it so much and had grown tired of lugging it and the lenses I owned then around. But after 9 months or so without an SLR I couldn’t take it any more! Small point and shoot digital cameras are convenient but still have many disadvantages compared to an SLR. They don’t do well in poor light, the focus slowly, and can’t take multiple pictures quickly. The picture quality is also nowhere near what an SLR can do. Once you’ve had one you get spoiled!

The 40D improves on the 20D in many ways – it’s faster, has better auto focus, a bigger LCD on the back, new quick dial custom modes, auto dust removal, etc.

But none of this is what I’m really posting about! Digital cameras are still WAY too hard to use.

Read more