The History of Photography: 1987

Use Your Telephoto: It's not nice to disturb the wildlife, so to properly convery the true grandeur of this majestic buck, I reached into my arsenal of lenses and used my telephoto 105mm. The animal remained undisturbed. It inspires awe, doesn't it?

Trip around Indian battlefields out west. Marry Karla. Honeymoon in Seattle and Victoria. I carry new Billingham bag full of Nikon gear, Karla takes my Dad's Nikon point and shoot. I take negative film for the first time in ages. Pictures from P&S more or less indistinguishable from FE's unless I have distinctive lens on the FE. We drop the Nikon P&S and bust a piece off it, so buy Dad a new one when we get home. The old one still works, however, and we keep it around.

More Photo Hints from 1987

Record Your Exposures: If you keep careful track of your exposures and then compare your results to what you expected at the time you took the picture, you will learn better exposure control. With this picture, for instance, the exposure was as long as it took for some lightning to happen at an f/stop <=11. Turns out the aperture on the 55 was getting sticky and opening to random degrees. However, shoot enough frames (40, in this case) and some will work out (3, in this case). This is a superb lightning picture for two reasons: 1) I didn't get wet and 2) there's no yard light on at this farm, pretty rare in Iowa.

Go Where It's Scenic: If you develop a passing interest in the history of the Plains Indian Wars, you spend some time along the front of the Bighorn Mountains and other time....well, in South Dakota. Here I am in my Uncle Jack's Tacos t-shirt on the Pine Ridge side of the Dakota Badlands. Bonus hint; the light is best at dawn and dusk. Enough said.