Baby Steps

I got a new camera a few weeks ago, a Canon Rebel T2i to be exact. It has lots of buttons and dials so to say it intimidated me when I pulled it out of the box would be an understatement. First off, I read the manual because I knew I would get nowhere without it. Then I started taking pictures ;I just shot in auto mode at first, to get a grasp on the basic functionality of the camera (and because I was too scared to try manual mode).

I put the camera down for a few days, not ready to dive into it any more. Then, I read this post and it gave me the courage to begin the journey that will be learning my camera. I realized two things that changed my perspective completely:

1. I should not compare myself to anyone but myself. Hopefully over time, I get better, but I should focus on developing my own personal style and not worry about what someone else is able to do.

2. I won't master photography overnight, but I have to start somewhere. If I just take it one thing at a time, eventually I might just be pretty good.

With my newfound courage and determination, I got the camera back out and decided to tackle my first learning project...blurring backgrounds.

Here are my first manual-mode, blurred background images:

There are probably a million and one things wrong with them, but look how blurry those backgrounds are ;)
I didn't edit these photos so you (and I) can see exactly what I was looking at through the camera lens.
I'm going to keep working on this background blurring business for a little while before I move on to the next step.

I think I'm off to a pretty good start :)