I got really into photography in college. I'm talking spending all my extra money on lenses and film, spending hours in the darkroom, forgetting to eat because I was editing photos late into the night.
I've never been so obsessed with anything before or since, but shortly after college all my inspiration and drive just kind of fizzled out of me like some kind of gross fluid. Part of it was working full time didn't leave as much room for photography. Part of it was camera phones were getting better and better, and it was harder to justify taking the time to dig out my heavy DSLR to shoot photos, when I had a brand new, generation 1 jailbroken iPhone in my pocket.
And another part of my demotivation was the loss of my beloved Canon 50mm f1.4 lens. Note: I say "loss" here to mean "I dropped it and the focus ring stopped working," not some more accurate meaning for loss. I could get it fixed, but it's been 5 years, I'm lazy and it would be nearly as cost effective to buy a new lens. It's still sitting on my shelf, next to some other long-neglected cameras.
I've always had a thing for prime lenses (they're smaller, faster, lighter, sharper and cheaper than zoom lenses). Primes also lock you into a fixed focal length, which tends to force you to get closer to your subject rather than adjusting the zoom rate. I don't give much of a shit about the body itself (even a full frame DSLR is only comparable to a 35mm film camera, and the only upgrade I'd consider would be a multi-thousand dollar medium-format equivalent, so forget it!) I'll deal with the shitty crop. I only ever publish to the web, anyway. But GODDAMN a medium format DSLR would be tasty.
But yeah, I'm into lenses. So last week I bought a Canon 50mm f1.8 (the baby brother of the lens I mentioned above, nearly identical in terms of function, but with a plastic housing instead of metal and a much less solid design) and it came in the mail today.
I went with the f1.8 rather than the f1.4 because it's roughly a quarter of the price, and I'm notorious for abandoning personal projects shortly after starting them. Do you guys want to know how my Lego spider mech is doing? IN PIECES ALL OVER MY DESK IS HOW IT'S DOING
I shot a few test photos in the shitty lightbox I built a while back, and this is the one I like best:
I don't think it's a great photo, but I like it for a few reasons. It's the first photo I've taken with a real camera in years. It features several elements I like to use in photography (texture, heavy negative space, square format) and it's an amethyst I keep on my shelf, stolen from my main squeeze, Jessica. It's something I look at every day.
Plus it felt good to dust off Photoshop again. For me, it was like a return to ze womb.
I've really just used this as a test subject, but I would like to get back into a longer term project, and things I see / use every day sounds like an acceptable place to start.
It's kind of funny, because my friend Brian messaged me on Facebook the other day, asking for camera recommendations. I offered to simply send him one of my old cameras and some other things I have lying around, and he could just pay for shipping. Shortly after I sent that message, I got the urge to finally get around to buying a replacement lens.
And here we are.
