Thanks for sticking with me! I promise I'll do better at telling you stories if you keep reading them.
If you're familiar with my blog here or me in person, you already know I love to learn. I can be a sponge when it comes to soaking up information and new ideas. I tend to want to learn EVERYTHING about a subject. There are drawbacks to that kind of eagerness, though. Instead of focusing on one thing and mastering it, I tend to go off on tangents before I ever get back to my original task. I end up being a Jane of all trades and a master of none. I blame it on being a Gemini and claim I must have multiple personalities! I definitely bounce around from one thing to another and probably more quickly than I should. Boredom isn't really to blame because these are all projects I thoroughly enjoy. Though my attention span could use some refinement...
Over the last 18 months, I've focused on my photography more than any of my other hobbies. I want to know what everything does! When I bought my camera, I sat down with the manual and read it all the way through the first day. I even took notes! Ordinarily, that's not how I try to master things I enjoy! Usually it was a quick dive into the deep end and hope my doggie-paddling was enough to keep me afloat and learn what I needed to know. Photography is different for me. I want to learn all my camera can do so as the maker, I can create what I want to do. Have you ever noticed with technology that we sometimes only understand and employ about ten percent of its capabilities? Seriously! My phone can do so much more than text, snap photos and allow me to entertain myself with some Toon Blast. (Did you know it can also be used as a telephone?! haha) But that level of use is consistent with a lot of my devices. I didn't want my Canon to be that way. So I would practice several of the features and compare different lenses and settings until I could grasp the concepts enough to pass it on if anyone asked!
Once I started to understand my Canon, I wanted to learn about lighting techniques. Again, I couldn't just get one light and practice like so many photographers recommend. No, I went ahead and got three and a variety of modifiers and let's throw in some gels for fun! And it is fun!! I was totally energized by what I could do with my new toys. Excitement filled my veins and again, I jumped into that deep end and began swimming. Sometimes I had to do the backstroke, but I was okay with that! Every time I created something new that I didn't know I could do, I would grin and think, "What else can I do?" It became a challenge to see what my limitations were. Thankfully, the internet and YouTube provided me an inexhaustible assortment of ideas and activities to tackle. There was no such thing as failure while performing these exercises. It was freeing!! So even now I am still uncovering what I can do. It's a never-ending story here with me Shooting My Canon.
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