What Camera Do I Use? Updated December 2011

First posted on May 1, 2008 and updated on December 29, 2011

I get asked this question a lot in comments and email. I have shared before that I really don’t use a fancy camera but one that I can take with me everywhere in my pocket or in my backpack with no worries.

So what do I use? 
For most of my everyday shots I use the Nikon CoolPix S3300 (Point and Shoot). I also take some of my bird photos with my son’s really old Canon Rebel with a zoom lens. I would say 90% of the photos on my blog are with the inexpensive point and shoot Nikon. Purple of course!

My point is that you don’t need a fancy, expensive camera to take a good photo. If you learn a few tricks and practice taking photos, you will have more success.

Honestly, I use this camera for all my regular and macro photos with minimal cropping on the computer. I rarely, if ever, mess with anything other than that. If I do make any adjustments to a photo, they are done on Picnik (through my Flickr account).

Here are my tips for taking a good photo.
1. Take lots of photos. If I am trying to get a good photo of something for the blog, I will sometimes take ten photos of the same thing. I’m not kidding…with digital it doesn’t really matter how many you take since you can delete the ones you don’t like once you get home.

2. Learn to use your camera. I know those manuals are intimidating but you can skim through to find things that will help you take a better photo. What I did to take better photos was to learn what all those little symbols on the back of the camera meant and that immediately helped me take a better photo. I love the little flower setting….better known as macro. I can take close-ups of flowers or bugs now and they are truly in focus. I decided at the beginning of 2011 to read one page in my camera manual everyday and then practice what I learned. This was an easy way to work through the ins and outs of the camera and show me what it could do. 


(This photo I took many years ago. On this day, I think I took 50 photos to get this one keeper.)

3. Pay attention to composition. Take that extra second to see if there is something weird in the background, to make sure your subject is framed in a pleasant way, and that you are not taking the photo directly into the sun.

4. Watch shadows on faces if you are outside.

5. Remember your flash typically doesn’t work farther than about 5 or 6 feet.

6. Take flower shots early in the morning or later in the afternoon and not during the glare of mid-day.
 
7. Take photos from different angles. Get low and look up. Get high and look down. Go child level. Sometimes an interesting photo is just one that comes from a different perspective than normal.

 
8. If you are taking a close-up photo, steady your arm or hand on something solid like a table or a fence post. Before pressing the shutter, breathe in and hold your breathe so you are as still as possible. This has made a huge difference in the quality of my close-up photos.

Taking a good photo is sometimes just a matter of being in the right place at the right time with your camera in your hand so take it everywhere you go.

You can see my Favorite Photos on Flickr:
Favorite Photos from 2005
Favorite Photos 2006 – this was a big year
Favorite Photos 2007
Favorite Photos 2009
Favorite Photos 2010 – my favorite slideshow
Don’t know what happened in 2008….didn’t tag my photos for some reason.