A New Camera

As I had mentioned in some of the last few posts, my husband had gotten me an adapter kit and some lenses for my compact camera. He had been suggesting for a while I use his DLSR camera in order to get better pictures for my blog but I always felt that both the camera and the lenses were too heavy for me. I also did not want to take the extra time to pull the camera out of the backpack (an issue I have with the camera attachments for the compact camera as well), set it up, take the picture, put the camera back and adjust the backpack. This took time. I did not want my adventures to be photo shoots. That was not my goal. I wanted to be outdoors exploring nature, and taking the occasional picture of something I enjoyed seeing.

Still wanting to improve my photography skills, my husband surprised me with a new camera for my birthday. I received a Canon Mirrorless camera EOS M50. It came with 2 lenses; what would be my go-to 18-45mm lens, and a telephoto 55-200mm lens. So yes, the camera had interchangeable lenses but the biggest plus was the fact that the camera with my go-to lens felt as light as my compact camera. And recent reports seemed to indicate that these smaller cameras produce photos just as good as the DLSR cameras.

All this research revived my husband’s interest in his long abandoned photography hobby so that one sunny day, we both grabbed our cameras and decided to give my new toy a test run.  I thought a walk to Barrett’s Cove would be the perfect place to get some interesting pictures. It certainly seemed a good place to test the telephoto lens since I had never been able to get even an okay shot of the cross on top of Maiden Cliff. The cross is visible from the beach but even with the telephoto attachment for my compact I was not overly impressed with the results. This time, however, what a difference! The image was so nice and clear, no matter what setting I used.

After that, we just played with our cameras. I enjoyed capturing the activity occurring on the lake; the fishing shack, people walking towards their various fishing holes, snow mobiles racing across the frozen water. People were just enjoying a beautiful, clear day.

I also loved the juxtaposition of some warmer season objects against the snowy landscape. The lone kayak left on a boat rack for the duration of the winter looked so out of place in the snow. I also liked the half buried chairs surrounding a fire pit that was no longer visible. There were a number of other test shots but these were my favorites.  Overall our test run was a success.

I think I will like my new camera and hopefully will get better pictures. After all, a better camera does not necessarily create a better photographer. My next task will be to figure out what will be the best option for me to carry this new toy around on my adventures.