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Yes, I got a digital camera. By the way, wouldn't you think that an entry in an online journal that announces the purchase of a digital camera would actually contain a digital picture or two? Well, that's just not the way I work. But trust me, I do have one. I'm just figuring out how to use it, what all the settings are. I think that the technology behind a digital camera is changing the way I take pictures. The immediate nature of the digital camera is totally different than with my old cheapo 35mm. Let's compare, shall we?
With my point-and-click 35mm, I saw a shot, I took a shot, and then I forgot about the shot. I mean really, it would be about 4 years until I saw the picture that resulted from that snapshot. First, I would have to wait for me to finish the roll. That meant that I needed to find at least 23 other interesting things to take a picture of. Worse, if I was dumb enough to buy a roll of 36 exposures. Assuming I had experienced 24 interesting things (and had remembered to bring my camera to those interesting things in the first place), it was time for me to scamper off to the pharmacy/supermarket/warehouse club to develop the film. Of course I am the guy who forgets and forgets and eventually ends up taking 7 or 8 rolls at a time. Now, assuming that I have actually taken my film to be developed, I now have to remember to pick it up again. That could take anywhere from 3 weeks to a couple of decades. Once I get all this done, an interesting thing happens: I can't see those pictures fast enough. You'd think that after all that time, I could leave those sealed envelopes stashed away in a musty crawlspace until my retirement begins. But no, as soon as I pay for the pictures, I open the envelope right there in the checkout line. Thank God for automatic doors as I stumble out into the parking lot barely able to glance up from my bad photos to see a truck bearing down on me.
Now a digital camera doesn't have all that time associated with it. It has instant gratification. For me this is bad. I can see my picture right away and I immediately hate the shot. I become professional photographer, picking apart my shot in that little view screen on the back of the camera. I delete it and start to frame the shot again, looking at composition and light conditions and color balance. By the time I am ready to take the shot again, either the interesting thing I am photographing has passed or the people I am shooting are fed up and are moving away from me... quickly.
For those who care, I got a Kodak DX3600 camera. Before you send any mail about this choice let me say three things:
1) I am very comfortable with the brand Kodak.
2) I spend many months researching specs and comparing features. So much so that I completely confused myself and became paralyzed into buying nothing so I wouldn't buy the wrong thing.
3) The camera was part of the bundle that came with the new computer I ordered so I really didn't have a choice in the matter anyway.
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