Digital Photography Tips.

I've inherited my father's interest in taking photographs, and have inherited his collection of slides taken over a period of six decades.

While my shots are no where near the quality of a professional photographer, I've learned a few tips over the years.

1. Make sure your camera has a thread for a tripod mount. While I seldom take my tripod on trips anymore, I've purchased some The Blue Pod - Camera Platform over the years, and use these as often as I can. I have a small with a center screw for my point-and-shoot, and a larger one for my Ultra-Zoom and Compact SLR. I'm probably going to order one with an off-center screw for the SLR. By simply mounting the camera on one of these, I've gotten much clearer photos.

2. Utilize the self-timer button on your camera. Just the act of pressing the shutter release can move your camera. The last two cameras I've purchased have a two second delay, as well as the twelve second delay.

3. All images look sharp in the two-inch LCD screen on the back of the camera. Be sure to use the image magnifier to check the sharpness of your photos. When purchasing a new digital camera, make sure that your camera's LCD will work in bright sunlight. Check it out in both portrait and landscape mode. I tried a camera which looked great in the normal position, but would go blank when turned 90°.

4. Backup your photos as soon as possible. I always take a remote backup on our travels, so I have a second backup of my photos! While there are some that actually come with a screen for viewing, I've taken my Digital Foci Photo Safe II PST-251 500 GB Digital Picture Storage (Blue/White). It also acts as a hard drive back-up for your computer on those days when you need to restore factory settings.

Depression Era Saving Taken Too Far

I've been shredding my mother-in-law's decade and older documents, and have come across all sorts of things she had used to save a penny or two. Mainly, she's taken used envelopes and recycled them to store other documents, by adding her own handwritten note of their contents. Some of these envelopes two or three handwritten notes as to their contents. Not too bad, and definitely a money saving technique. I've always been a little in awe of how much my mother-in-law's been able to save over the years, and recycling old envelopes is definitely good for the environment. But today, I came across a stack of old Christmas cards secured not with a rubber band, but with that colorful slightly tacky tape they use to anchor gauze to the track wound when making blood draws. Yuck!

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