The Fuzzy Mind

Fuzzy, with his new Canon Digital Rebel tucked safely on the backseat, headed for his hovel anxious to get down to shooting pictures. I walked through the door with the box just begging to be opened.

I settled in my chair and opened the box. There encased in plastic and styrofoam was a shiny silver camera. As I pryed it from its packaging I was once again amazed at the buttons and dials that festooned the body. In my mind, I could hear it saying " wait until you experience what I can do!" So Fuzzy let  the Rebel take him to school. I opened the text book ( instruction manual ) and began to explore my new sidekick.

Wow! This baby will do everything except make the morning coffee. I realized that the camera could do so many things that I would never remember it all and what this actually was going to be was on the job learning. The instruction manual was going to always travel along in the camera bag.

Most SLR digital cameras have basically the same functions and there are too many to go through one at a time. So let Fuzzy tell you some things he has discovered over travels with the Rebel.

First, the manufacturers, who want to make sales, point out that film camera lenses are not compatible with digital due to the size of the sensor versus the size of a frame of 35mm film. If you keep in mind that the lens will see a larger area than the digital sensor you can effectively crop your scene in the camera and your film camera lens will do an acceptable job.

Mega pixels are everything. This is actually a case of  appealing to the "Bigger, Better, Faster" syndrome they think will appeal to the buyer. Actually the number of pixels is important to the cameras resolution and to the print that can be made from the image. This last has lost some of its meaning due to the software that is available today. Fuzzy has made an acceptable 24 X36 inch print from a 6 mega pixel camera. If you look at the print up close you can see that the edges are not as crisp as they could be, but from two feet away it is very acceptable. You do not view very large prints up close, they are always viewed from a distance that allows you to see the whole image, which is usually more than two feet.

Last, be prepared that you are now entering a whole new world of software and printing. You can find imaging software that ranges from free to hundreds of dollars. The software that comes with the camera is very limited in what it is capable off and you will soon be searching for more tools. Fuzzy tried the free trial version of Adobe Photoshop Lightroom. It didn’t take but a few trials to convince Fuzzy to buy it. This is such an easy and intuitive software to work with that I can give it a 5 star rating.

Printers range from the simple that take the images from the camera and give you a standard print. These are fine for the snapshot, but if you are going to want to fix brightness and contrast you need to use a program and one of the many Photo Inkjet printers on the market. Before you buy, make sure the ink is readily available. I can tell you that it is important to use the printer manufacturers ink and papers. Once you learn how to make prints you can then experiment with art papers.

Fuzzy is constantly learning all of the things the Canon Rebel can do. I am sure this educational experience is going to continue for some time.

It is Fuzzy’s opinion, that the world is running amok. Of course I want you to understand this is just my opinion and a wiser man than I once said "opinions are like a**holes. Everybody has one.".

This is another case of who would have thought. Obviously not our elected representatives!

Who would have have thought that fuel hitting $3+ a gallon, both to run our cars and heat our homes would not affect everything else in our lives? Why it won’t affect the cost of bread, milk, beef, chicken and everything else we need to live life as we have become accustomed to?

The craziness of the mortgage debacle aside, which is also a huge part of the problem, fuel cost spreads farther than many even considered. The high cost of crude is causing the world to rush headlong into alternative fuels. Bio is the major renewable source but, like anything, everything causes a reaction. We have embraced ethanol made from corn with wide open arms. This caused the price of corn to rise and farmers could make more selling the crop for ethanol rather than feed for the animals we eat. The farmers raising the beef, chickens, etc. that we all enjoy now have to pay higher prices for feed which is passed along to us, the consumers.

Not just the cost of the animal feed  causes the rise in prices, but the cost of transporting the product from farm to market. The cost of processing has also risen due to these high fuel prices. Remember you have to heat the plant. Everything runs on electricity which also costs more to produce and so on and so on.

Fuzzy’s wallet is suffering like all. Those of us living on fixed incomes are hit hard. Some have very hard choices to make. The people who work in the service area, like the counter at the store and those who clean our motels just to point out a few, are struggling more than most. These are not high paying jobs and many are working just to be able to buy gas to get to work to earn more money to buy gas to get to work. There are those among us who are working 2 jobs and still have to decide whether to eat, heat the house, have a phone, electricity or medication.

And so now at this point in our economic history we are once again facing a recession. These are cyclical occurrences and if you want to take the time to do a little research you can see how this has occurred in the past.  The economy cannot continue to just grow, every once in awhile it pulls back and these are called recessions. They are not easy times and even the billionaires are affected, though not as badly as most of us.

Fuzzy does not have an answer but is just working with a modicum of common sense. Fuzzy is of the belief that there is a very large lack of common sense in the world. One thing I have learned in life is that you cannot borrow your way out of debt. This only causes greater debt and part of our problem is we are all paying off debt. On an individual basis we buy items at the convenience mart, grocery store and pay for life’s necessities with our credit cards and thus incur more debt. It just seems like each of us individually needs to tighten our belts and not keep buying  and buying. Damn, most of the stuff we buy is not even made in the USA.

So the final question, to which Fuzzy does not have an answer, is why is our government borrowing money from another country in order to send a measly rebate check to some of our citizens? How in the hell is this going to do any real good? Won’t we have to repay the loan at some point? Just how much are these rebates going to do to help the whole country? Just how are the rebates going to jump start the economy? Many who have responded to poles have said they will use the money to pay off debt. This does not put the money back into the economy and the rebates are not large enough to purchase any durable goods like cars and refrigerators. If it is spent to purchase anything, how many of those items will be made outside the USA?

All of these things affect the Stock Market and this causes jitters around the world. Part of any long term fix should take into account that now we are, whether we like it or not, living in a global economy. Think not? Look at the label in the clothes you are wearing, where were they made?

So like Fuzzy must, and the rest of us should, just suck it up. Things will get better in time. Just don’t go poking it with a stick  if you don’t know what will happen!

You may remember my little episode with my film camera and dry bag in the canoe as I was getting the shots of the Egrets. After telling several of my outdoor  sportsmen friends about it, they suggested I get a new digital camera.

They had been on the market for awhile but like many of us who have used film and some who still do, I was hesitant to make the switch but decided to give it a try. Many told me of their experiences using digital and to tell the truth it all sounded too good to be true. The biggest drawback I saw, was that it was going to effect my relationship with the young lady who processed my film and scanned the images onto a CD. I always had my images put on a CD because it made archiving them easier and I could use my printer to do some nice 8X10’s. I had over time gotten used to the software available for working with my images and had purchased an Epson 7600 large format printer.

So where to start? First I looked for camera stores in the local yellow pages. Once again Fuzzy has been left behind by progress, as there is no camera store in my area any more. They have been driven out by the big electronic chains. Woe is me, Fuzzy thinks, as he remembers buying his film camera at a real camera store with sales people who actually understood what photography was about. But not to be set back, off I went to the big stores.

Just inside the door I stood in amazement at the size of the place. Electronic stuff everywhere.  It boggled my mind. I must have looked quite confused because it was only a few seconds when a very young girl asked what I was looking for. Unsure I stammered "a digital camera." "Right over here", as she led me past a mountain of big screen TVs. "We have", were the first words out of her mouth when we reached the display, and then Fuzzy blanked out. I was taken aback at the sight of the number of cameras and prices before me.

Aha! I spied a familiar friendly name among the jumble arrayed before me, Canon. I knew that brand quite well as it was the make of my film camera and lenses. I reached for the digital slr on the counter and as I tried to lift it to my eye I was stopped short by a cable that was connect to the counter. She explained it was an anti-theft device and I explained that I wasn’t paying almost $1000 for a camera I couldn’t try. So after becoming a contortionist I managed to squat and get the camera up to my eye. I removed the lens cap and pushed the the shutter release. Nothing and I mean nothing whatsoever happened, at which point I was told I needed to turn it on and was shown how to do this. Wow, nothing once again happened. Then she discovered they had removed the battery so no one would steal it. At this point Fuzzy was ready to go home and stick to film, but I had made a promise to myself to move forward into the future and at least give digital a fair shot. Once a battery was found and installed I got to try a couple of shots in the store.

So feeling panicky I quickly purchased the camera and a spare battery and headed back to the comfort of my hovel. Upon arriving home and opening the box I spent the next week learning all of the tricks this new gadget could do. I call it a gadget since like many who shoot film feel, it isn’t really a camera since everything is controlled by a chip and not the photographer.

NEXT: What I learned about digital photography.