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I bought my first digital SLR camera in July 2004. It was an early birthday present to myself but long overdue. I had been taking photos well before that date, but never considered myself worthy of a “real” camera. 

I’ve been interested in photography since my youth in the 1970s but an early summer camp experience in the darkroom turned me away from further exploration. I don’t remember the details but just remember that the chemicals used in developing images from film gave me headaches and I didn’t find the experience pleasant. So I missed an early opportunity to learn how to create a good exposure from the aperture, shutter speed, ISO triangle using a 35 mm SLR. Instead, I contented myself with a series of Kodak Instamatic cameras with the convenient 110 film cartridges that could be sent off to the drug store or the drive-thru drop-off.

Later, I graduated to 35 mm film and compact point-and-click cameras. Some of the more advanced models I experimented with had shooting modes to adjust shutter speed or aperture, but I was restricted in my ISO choice by what film I had chosen to load into the camera – invariably ISO 100 because I thought I was shooting with the “best” film although sometimes I experimented with ISO 800 and low-light conditions or even black & white. Despite the options I had with these cameras, I rarely strayed beyond Auto mode and concentrated my efforts in achieving something that resembled artistic composition.

I had some early successes in composition and story-telling. And I have a plan to scan the prints that did make it into an album that I once prepared for my grandparents as a “greatest hits” portfolio. But I was still scratching the surface when it came to creating really good photos. It wasn’t all dumb luck, but close to it.

Early forays into digital cameras had similar results. I had a good eye for what could make a good composition, but no skill whatsoever in adding depth to the story. But I still value the early photos I took as a record of my life and my experiences with my wife and twin daughters.

My father-in-law had also been an avid photographer and had been an early adopter of digital SLRs. When he sent my daughters home with a CD loaded with images from their summer visit in Kansas I was jealous of the quality of the images. Not only was he creating great story-telling with his composition, but the sheer quantity of images he was able to share was also inspiring. Because he was so pleased with his Nikon DSLR, and because he was so loyal to Wolff’s Camera in downtown Topeka, KS, I decided to buy a Nikon D70 with kit lens there one July day while visiting.

For reasons I can only now suspect was my hesitancy to try something until I fully understood it, the first image I have from that Nikon D70 is dated August 1 at 2:35 PM, after I had returned from Kansas. It shows my niece, Emily, visiting my house in White Plains, NY, with my brother. Dishes are stacked on the counter dish rack behind her. Only my brother’s hand and arm show evidence of his presence. The composition was nothing more than a shapshot. But the Auto focus and exposure with on-board flash did a nice job of creating a soft depth of field allowing Emily in her flower-print sundress to pop.

A week later, I took this photo of a barn on our family property in the Catskill Mountains. The composition is slightly better and even artistic with the low-to-the-ground angle with tall grass in the foreground suggesting a setting for the old structure. I’m still in Auto mode, but look at that resolution and the clarity in the barn details! I was in a different realm from my old point-and-shoot for sure! There were many more photos from that weekend. Shots of the flowers in the garden where I used the auto focus to force a shallow depth of field. Broad landscape shots with colorful rainbows and even some moody shots of the old barn in silhouette against gathering storm clouds.

I don’t recall what I did with these images at the time. I hadn’t yet entered into the dimension of post-processing and digital asset management because, well, I was still an amateur and those were tools for only “proper photographers.” Early photo printers had limited utility for me. I tried using digital photo frames from time to time, but those also were more frustrating than fun. So I ended up dumping my early photos into a proverbial digital shoebox and I just kept taking photos. Since my daughters were active in soccer and, later, running, my shoebox is full of their athletic accomplishments along with the requisite first-day-of-school shots. I would often bring my camera along to visits to the Bronx Zoo, the New York Botanical Garden, or the Rockefeller State Park Preserve and I will likely share some of those early experiences in later blog posts as they have been foundational places for my photography exploration.

My external hard drive is now full of gigabytes of travel photos, weekends at track meets, family events in the Catskill mountains or Kansas, and cats. Lots of cats. But aside from a set of a dozen or so photos in 2006 where I experimented with aperture and shutter speed, I was stuck in Auto. It would be a full decade before I had the courage to learn more.