Hey Everybody! Hope this week had found you healthy and happy. Me? Pretty good. This week I want to talk about something I certainly have been guilty of . Taking photographs for social media. Taking photographs just for social media and everything that comes with it. I used to call it feeding the gram.  Now I still like to post to Instagram but I try not to take photo's just because they will get likes. Now I know everybody likes to get likes and nice comments about their photography but if you look at these sites al of the photos' have that same look to them. Do you know why? Because we're looking at these sites so much scrolling through other peoples best shots that we start to think that that's how photography is suppose to look like and we try to copy those styles. We even think that our photography is lacking because we can't take photo's like them. We think that they are so talented photographers and we are not. But we forget that they like us are just posting their best photographs and they may have taken 500 shots to get that one good one that you are looking at. I've heard it said that you're looking at the Algorithm's Eye and not your own. Your looking at what the computer said was a good shot and not what your own artistic eye is telling you.

Try to remember back to when you started your photography journey. Why you love taking photo's. What got you started? I wasn't because you would get likes on Instagram or Facebook. If you're like me the internet was far from being invented and you started from the love of it. We took photo's of things we loved or places so we wouldn't forget them. We tried to steal a moment in time by freezing it in a photograph. At least I did. I had no dreams of becoming a famous photographer or a journalist of any sort when I started taking photo's . I wasn't even on the yearbook staff in High School even though I walked around with a 35 mm SLR. You must remember what it was that drew you to photography and try to get that feeling again. Shoot for you. If you do this you will become an artist again and not a copy cat of other peoples vision.  This is easier than said. I'm in the process of trying to do that again. I try not to look or get caught in the scrolling of instagram but I can't help it I do find myself doing it almost every day. I still post to Instagram my Social Media of choice besides Facebook which I don't post photos too often. Beside my website which this blog is on Instagram is where my photo's live. So I'm in a sticky wicket as it were. Trying not to follow the crowd and post photo's like everyone else's and post original things that I like. I think social media is a good thing but too much of a good thing can be bad and social media tends to be this especially for photographers. 

I'm hoping to start a new chapter of my photography life with taking photo's of what I like taking .  Travel fb-art and Landscape. With the MAV (Max's Adventure Van) as my home base I hope to travel to different places and document as I go. I'll be posting to Instagram and Facebook and hopefully getting more recent photo's to my website. 

Hey if you want to check out my photography go to my instagram account Max Stansell Photography there are over 2000 posts there. Here is the link

 Max Stansell Photography Instagram Link

What's up Everybody? Hope you're having a good week. Me? Not too bad. Thanks for asking. I've had a small Kidney Stone Surgery that went pretty well and I'm hanging out this week trying to catch up on some blogs and maybe start planning some trips with the MAV (Max's Adventure Van). This week I wanted to talk about a subject that isn't talked about a lot. Fixed Lens Cameras. A Fixed Lens Camera is a camera that has a lens that is attached and cannot be removed. We get so caught up in our very expensive Mirrorless cameras that have interchangeable lenses that we sometime forget about these cameras and how creative and fun they can be. They have been around almost since the beginning of photography and most of us took our first photo's with them. But since the modern phone has come out over the last 10 years or so they have lost a little of their status in the camera community. But I think that is wrong. There is something about having a 20170107_Brownie Memories_013-Edit dedicated camera in your hand that you can't surf the web or take a phone call on or don't have to be connected to the internet. Now some of these camera's are making a comeback like the Fujifilm X-100 series of cameras that have a fix focal length Lens attached to them and almost have a cult following. And others like the Canon G7X series of point and shoots that have a fixed zoom lens attached. These are fantastic cameras and other manufacturers like Sony, Ricoh and even Leica also has their fixed lens camera's too. I have film cameras with fixed lenses and my first digital was a fixed lens camera and they worked great. 

    My first experience with photography was with a Kodak Brownie that my mother had and I used it to take family photos when we went on vacation or to the beach. It had a viewfinder that I could look down at waist level and one that I could bring to my eye to take photographs. This was back in the late 1960's. My family then got a Polaroid Camera that I used a little with a fixed lens they were cool because you could get the photo right away and didn't have to send to the drug store to get prints developed. The next fixed lens camera I had was during the gulf war a 110 film camera that I took and used while I was deployed to the desert. I have some cool keepsakes from that time in the desert with that fixed lens camera. The next fixed lens camera was my first digital camera. It was a Kodak only a few megapixel but it was fun to shoot with and got me interested in photography again. This was in the year 2000. I had just retired from the military and started working for a civilian company and took the camera everywhere I went.  After a while I upgraded to a Nikon P9100 I think it was called it was a crop sensor camera with a big zoom on it and I used it for a while. Don't really know what happened to that camera. I must have sold it before I bought my first DSLR camera. I have a few fixed lens film cameras that I have purchased over the last couple of years that I really love. They are the Canon Cannonet line of cameras manufactured in the 60's and early 70's. The Canon Cannonet QL17 is my favorite small film camera and I often take it with me when I'm out and about. It has a 40mm f1.7 lens on a rangefinder 35mm film body.

Advantages of Fixed Lens Cameras- There are some advantages to shooting with these cameras. First of all is the size . These cameras are usually small and portable. They usually can fit in a big pocket or small bag and if you have a strap on them they won't weigh you down. You don't have to carry extra lenses. This obvious thing will keep you nimble and quick and you won't get tired lugging around a big bag full of equipment. You can be more creative with these little cameras because decision making of what lens to carry is already made for you you just have to make it work and can use that extra time on decision making on composition. Sensors stay cleaner because you're not changing lenses exposing the sensor to the elements. Over all these camera's are cheaper than their interchangeable counterparts. Lenses are usually pretty good and engineered toward the sensor in the camera. 

_MSP9739 The only real disadvantage of these camera's is you might lack the flexibility that you might have with interchangeable lens cameras. Some sensors may also be smaller making low light shooting harder although some of these cameras come with built in flashes bur maybe not a look you're looking for. Other than that I think that they are great cameras. My EDC (Every Day Carry) is a Canon G7XII . And I really love this little camera. Can it do everything? No but for a lot of stuff I do it's just enough. Great for street, candid portraits, landscape and travel. I like to take it when I'm out with my wife because Its not too big and bulky and I don't fumble around with it as much as I do my big boy Sony camera and lenses. I actually bought it for a trip that my wife and I took years ago to Washington DC and it worked fantastically. I got some great shots and didn't annoy my wife too much with camera nerd stuff like I would have if I brought the Sony. So as you can tell I really like fixed lens cameras for being convenient ,capable, and just fun to shoot. Until next week "Get out and Shoot"

Hey if you want to check out my photography go to my instagram account Max Stansell Photography there are over 2000 posts there. Here is the link

 Max Stansell Photography Instagram Link

Hey Ya'll! How's it going this week? Me? Pretty good thanks for asking. This week is a continuation of last week's blog. Almost Everything Lenses .  But this week I'm talking about a great lens that isn't for everything. It's another prime lens. And again here are a few things that I really like about primes. They are usually less expensive. Of course there are exceptions but overall they are much more friendly to your wallet than a Zoom lens is. You usually can get very wide apertures with these lenses like f/1.8 or f/1.4. These lenses are smaller and more compact and lighter than Zoom lenses are. And these lenses are usually very sharp.  Prime lenses make you shoot with a purpose and intention. The mighty 85mm.

The 85mm is a short telephoto lens. Much shorter than its longer cousin the 135mm. Being a telephoto
even though a short one it can compress a scene bringing things in background closer. This lens is a portrait powerhouse. It can give a flattering perspective of faces and is considered the king in portrait primes. With wide apertures and being a telephoto you can create some creamy bokeh. ( blurry background) The eyes of your subject can be tack sharp and ears starting to blur which really brings your attention to the eyes. The shallow depth of field you can create really separates your subject from noisy backgrounds. You won't be as close as you would with a 35mm or 50mm. You have to give the subject some space which may make them more comfortable. With this lens you can get single and maybe some couple portraits but this lens is not for groups shots. This lens can be used for street but not for tight shots you might have to be across the street which might work for some folks. This is more a specialty lens can be used for specific situations. It won't ride in your bag unless you are a portrait photographer. I have had a few of theses lenses in the f/1.8 maximum aperture and they were great! I had a Nikon version that I sold when I changed to Sony and one of the first prime lenses I got was the 85mm f/1.8. When I do portraits of friends or family this lens is on my camera. This lens is not normally a Landscape lens but can be used for isolating parts of a landscape but I would use a zoom for that most of the time. Although I don't use this lens often it will never be out of my lineup of lenses . I will always have an 85. These lenses are relatively inexpensive especially in the f/1.8 maximum aperture. If you go wider than that the price really goes up also. For new lenses the f/1.8 versions I've seen prices in the 200's dollars for third party to 600 for my Sony. Of course if you buy used you could get cheaper and that may be the route I would go for the best quality at the best price.

For me the 85mm is one of the funnest lenses to shoot. Although I don't use it often I just love taking it out to shoot some portraits. So if you shoot portraits this prime should be in your kit. Until next week " Get out and Shoot!" 

Hey if you want to check out my photography go to my instagram account Max Stansell Photography there are over 2000 posts there. Here is the link

 Max Stansell Photography Instagram Link