The first few digital images

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Well, after thinking about it for a few years, I bit the bullet and bought my first digital camera. I've used digital cameras at work for years, but they've never been quite "there yet" -- terrible shutter lag, small file size, poor image quality, bad form factor, etc. etc.

Last year, though, a couple of people I know bought the Canon Powershot G1, and for the first time I saw something close to the combination of features, form factor, and image quality I was looking for. It still wasn't there yet, so I decided to wait a little while longer.

Finally, a combination of things pushed me over the edge. One was the release of the Powershot G2, which several reviewers have described as "Canon listening to owners' complaints about the G1". This was finally basically the camera I was looking for. (Well, what I really want is a 10 megapixel 12-bit Leica M6, but I have a feeling I'm going to be waiting a while for that...)

The other thing that pushed me over the edge is that in the spring I'm going to be teaching an Introduction to Digital Photography class at the Photographic Center Northwest, and while I've spent years dealing with digital imaging, I figured I couldn't really stand in front of the class on the first day and say "Uh, actually, I don't have one myself."

So how do I like it now that I finally have it? Not surprisingly, mixed. Shutter lag still sucks. I'm used to shooting film with my M6, which is about as close to instant response as you can get. I've heard some people describe shooting with a prosumer digital camera as "the indecisive moment", which has really rung true for me. On the other hand, instant feedback is a beautiful thing. I bought a 1gb microdrive for storage, which means that at the compression I'm shooting at I can store just over 500 images; replacing 14 rolls of film is a neat thing. Shooting color and never having to make it down to the lab to process it is nice; so is being able to custom white-balance, which means both no annoying color cast when I don't want it, and the possibility to add really bizarre color casts when I do.

I'm also interested in how the tool affects the work. Composing by looking at an LCD is a very different experience from looking through the optical viewfinder, and being able to point the camera in one direction and the LCD in another is bound to change how I compose.

The bottom line is that in the first five days or so I've gotten some images I like quite a bit. The technology isn't perfect yet, but the possiblities are exciting.

Let me know what you think of these photos: dae@davidadam.com.

Prints from this series are available for purchase. Please see the purchasing prints page for more information.