(This is my first blog entry for my fall semester J2150 class.)
Never before last week had I ever picked up a camera. Like, a real camera. Not a point-and-shoot Kodak like I’d grown up using, or a smartphone with a high-quality lens like those I’d mastered in my teen years. I mean a full-blown, photographer-esque camera: a Nikon D7000.
I have to admit, I don’t know anything about cameras (I don’t even know if a Nikon D7000 is even that amazing of a camera, but I’m just going to assume it is). I worked on my high school’s yearbook staff for two years, the second as the editor-in-chief, and I never once picked up one of the school’s loaner cameras to take any shots at all. I just never took that opportunity. However, anyone who’s ever scrolled through my Instagram account has seen that I have something in me that wants to claim to be a photographer.
But I digress. With my inexperience handling cameras came excitement that one of my classes this semester would be multimedia, where I would learn to work with cameras and editing software (another admission: I’ve also never touched Photoshop). It was cool to hold that professional-feeling camera in my hand. It was also extremely overwhelming. This was the closest I’d ever been to a camera like this, and I immediately noticed the dozens of buttons and settings I had no idea what to do with. The rule of thirds? Piece of cake. ISO and aperture? Never heard of them.
So, in that dim classroom, I shot my first photos. Then I deleted them. I adjusted a few things, took more photos and got rid of them. I can’t say at this moment that I have any idea what I’m doing, or that any of my photos were any good at all, but I’m excited to learn.
Hannah Black 