Introduction
For me, my journey into better photography started many years ago by wanting to get better family and holiday photos. This became more important when I got married and we had our first child. I was already fed up of the myriad of photos (mine and others) which were blurred, out of focus, people with things poking out of their heads, heads cut off etc etc. I could go on but I'm sure you get the point.
Now don't get me wrong, these photographs are priceless and this was brought home recently when I started to digitize some old photos. But I am talking about photos we might call happy snaps, memories or snapshots. Whatever term we use to describe them, we all take them, those quick photographs we take of family and friends, important life moments like you baby's first step, places and events. In essence, those things that we want to remember.
In those first years we where also broke, we couldn't afford the expense of professional family portraits. So I had to resort to DIY. I got my first SLR, Canon EOS 300. Bought lots of books on the fundamentals of photography and started to get hooked. I believe I did start to get better and create better family and holiday photos. It also (and still does) drive my wife and kids mad. Because I'll stop, pause, think, compose and then shoot. So instead of taking 1-2 seconds, I might take 30 seconds or sin of sins a minute or two. And as my kids tell me that's too long and boring.
Back then it was film, expensive (relative to income), slow (shoot the roll of film, send it off to Trueprint, wait weeks to get that pack of 6x4's back).
In 2015, I upgraded to an Olympus OMD EM-10 with just the kit lenses, choosing to go mirrorless for the first time. And joined my local camera club.
I currently use an Olympus OMD EM-5 Mkii, with m.Zuiko 40-150 mm F2.8 Pro, m.Zuiko 14-42mm F2.8 Pro and my original pancake kit lens m.Zuiko 14-42mm F3.5-5.6.