My brief moment of fame

I've been so very busy with mom stuff and house stuff the last few days! Mostly fun stuff, but I've hardly had time to check email, much less get through all my photos, not to mention posting them! So I'm behind on responding to comments, sorry. In the coming week I hope to catch up. Meantime, I thought I'd share something I ran across I'd forgotten about: my CD cover!

Back in the early '90s, my friend Jenny asked if she could send one of my photos to the band negativland to use for a CD cover. I was disappointed the reproduction was so dark, but still, it's my picture! I'm famous! Among a very very very small group. (Have you even heard of negativland? I bet you haven't.)

And for proof, here's a shot taken yesterday of the original print, side by side with a shot of me in gradual school printing it up (taken by the professor).
I took a photography class for fun, and never went much further with it after I finished school. When I took up the camera again a couple of years ago, I had to relearn everything from scratch. Digital is so different! But also so much easier because you don't have to worry about wasting film. I take dozens of pictures of the same thing, and hope that one or two turn out OK.

I've also messed around with all the settings to figure out what works best for certain situations. The features I use the most are the macro setting, the manual white balance (could've used it at left; see how yellow it is?), the long exposure setting and the 2-second self-timer. Those are all handy for low-light restaurant shots. I never use the flash if I can help it, and never, ever on food.

If you have a digital camera, even a little point-and-shoot like mine, you can get some pretty decent shots with a little practice. I don't claim to be a super photographer like some bloggers (say, La Tartine Gourmand, Steamy Kitchen, White on Rice Couple or Use Real Butter), but I'm working toward it, one snap at a time.