MY BIO

My father bought me my first SLR when I was 16, a Minolta X-700. I took pictures of everything, except people. My intrests have always been nature, sunsets and sunrises, animals and whatever else it is that I don't have to ask to smile :).

I would quite often go out during a weekend and shoot 150-200 pictures. I always shot slides because they were much cheaper to process, and no one else ever saw your mistakes.

Well I got married, had three children, and all of my photography turned to videos and P&S type cameras. Kids don't always wait for dad to go get the camera, make sure the right film is in it, the right lens was attached and the flash had batteries. So the SLR just sat in the closet and waited for a field trip once in a while.

But for most of the next 10 yrs. I was taking pictures with 35mm P&S and then digital 2-4MP P&S cameras.

The kids grew bigger and got into sports and other indoor things that a P&S just couldnt do, like too slow to auto-focus, not enough light and not enough zoom.

Fast forward..... to October, 2005 when I got the itch to really want to go out and shoot pictures again, and yes get a few family pictures (remember I still have the problem with people in my pictures).

I decided that I wanted to go the route of researching a DSLR type camera (and I thought raising three kids was hard), there were Mega Pixels, low light issues, noise, ergonomics, memory card types, 4:3, 3:2, full frame, CMOS, CCD, LCD size, menu layouts, and yes pricing. Well, here is where the real problems could be. These cameras started at about $699, WITH NO LENS! Well I had alot of research ahead if I was going to convince my wife that I had to have a new DSLR.

So, I set out to research all of the cameras that I thought would be in my price range. I looked at magazines, books, web sites, blogs, and forums and narrowed it down to a few. Then I went to camera stores and actually handled the different cameras that I liked, which narrowed the field some more.

After reading more reviews and trolling a few months on my favorite website, DPReview, I finally felt that I knew what I wanted Santa to bring me for Christmas. Well, I asked my family for the camera, and I also asked all my relatives, and anyone else that I thought might get me something for Christmas, to donate to the camera fund.

Surprise.....Christmas morning came and so did my camera, an Olympus E-500. I was more excted than a 6 yr old with a new bike. I absolutely love it and I take it everywhere.

It is now December and I am finaly figuring out all of the above mentioned complexities of these cameras, and a few more like white balance, saturation, contrast and post processing (this is another life within itself). But I wouldn't trade it for the world.

I have taken 15,000 pictures with it so far, and everytime that I go out, I learn more and more.

But the greatest thing is that my 9 year old son who goes out with me quite a bit with his own camera, has figured out that his P&S doesn't take the same kinds of pictures that dad's camera does, and wants a DSLR as well. I knew that I was in trouble when he called me at work one day saying that he had picked one out that he saw on the front cover of Shutterbug magazine, and had already done the research on the internet. All of this at 9 years old, WOW. But I think we will grow into that one.

...UPDATE...Christmas 2006...
For christmas, Santa brought my son a Panasonic Lumix FZ7 with full control, 6MP and a 12X zoom. Hopefully this will satisfy him for a while.

***Update May 1st, 2009...I got a brand New Olympus E-3 with a 12-60mm Lens and FL-50R flash. This is the best it gets from Olympus.

Also...I am now shooting people :-)

Something that I have also wanted to do is have my own website. Where I could share my pictures, my hobby, and a small part of my life with others.

So I hope you like what you see, and please leave a note, a critique or anything else that you think might make this a better place.

And if you are in Arizona, e-mail me. I am always looking for someone to go shoot with.

Thank you and enjoy.

Jon Anderson
pixel_creations@cox.net

All photos on this site are the property of Jon Anderson and Pixel Creations Photgraphy and are not to be used without permission.

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