Hot Sunny Birthday

I thought I was in trouble last night, Debbie tried out her birthday present (a day early) and wasn't happy at all that the Canon EOS D1000D only allows live view to be used in the 'farting about' modes. I managed to get it working on aperture priority but it was still a bit of a let down.

This morning, Debbie forgot about live view and got stuck in using the viewfinder. All I could hear from the living room was a machine gun type sound coming from the kitchen as she rattled off over 200 pictures!

We've had another busy day, more shopping, getting the second part of Debbie's birthday present, an 18-200mm lens for her new camera. It's the same lens I use on my Nikon and is just right for carrying about everywhere.

Also on the shopping list was a new lawn mower, we've got this terrible habit of killing them, one last year and two this year! We took it in turns to drag the heavy mower through Meadowhall back to the car. After that we called at Dad's for a coffee and more cards and gifts.

Then finally it was feet up time in the garden, soaking up the sun, drinking ice cold larger and watching the birds.

All images are courtesy of the birthday girl, all the action happened while I was busy this morning and while feeding Lucy this afternoon lol.

Paul.

Debbie Just Clicks & Goes

It's been a whole week since we last posted, we've just been too busy walking to get any pictures uploaded. We did try this morning but it all went Pete Tong in the rush, we'll have to try again tonight if we get chance.

Debbie got an early Birthday present at the weekend, with the Panasonic FZ7 proving to be somewhat of a disappointment, we've gone back to a tried and trusted Nikon and the one Debbie chose, in about 0.04 seconds was a P5000 which does just about anything you would ever want.

I was worried that having just jumped in and picked this one without trying it out, this too might be too cumbersome to operate but my fears were unfounded. We've taken it walkies a couple of times now and it's superb for Debbie's point, click and go style of photography. It's got all the preset modes you would ever need for point and click as well as all the manual functions I've got on my chunky Nikon D50. The pictures are pin sharp, the colours as fantastic and none of the photos are blurred, even though Debbie does hardly ever hold the camera with two hands, let alone use a tripod.

I'm going to give the Panasonic another go, it's had good write ups and I want to find out why the pictures we've got previously have been so dire. It would be handy for getting those shots of wildlife where 3.5x zoom sometimes isn't enough.

Paul.

Debbie gets all creative!! 

Join The Club

We got a message from the camera club yesterday telling us to go along to the next meeting where we would be made very welcome, which as luck would have it, is in a pub!

So last night it was time to sort out our photo collection, something we've been putting off for about three years. It was nice looking back at some of the older photos which we've not seen since we took them. While browsing through we picked out over a hundred to print out and put in our new portfolio. While the printing was going on and boy did it go on, we copied all our existing photos on to CD which is something we should be doing every week, a slap on the wrist for that one.

Printing the photos four to an A4 page, we ended up leaving it running overnight with the eyes giving in on page nine of twenty five lol. This morning there was a message waiting for us on the computer, 'ink running low, please replace cartidges'. Somebody somewhere is rubbing there hands together with this ink cartridge business! Anyway all the photos printed out overnight and they all look fantastic!

Paul.

Cat In A Basket

We've submitted this picture to Photo Friday, this week's challenge is 'plastic', so we are pleased to present Misty modelling a contemporary white plastic linen basket.

New Toy

Debbie's birthday is in a couple of weeks time and over the last couple of month we've been looking at necklaces and bracelets etc. So on Sunday morning when Debbie said she wanted a new camera for her birthday, I was a bit surprised, but not totally, as I had been thing the same thing. On the one hand, would it be silly to have two cameras instead of sharing, on the other hand, we do miss things at Knowsley when there are animals on both sides of the car or other places when by the time you've got the camera, what you were going to take a picture has buggered off. So after calling at Dads, off we went in search of the perfect digital camera. After looking at quite a selection in several shops, Debbie picked out a Nikon which is a little like the one we have now but much smaller and with better image quality. When we got home, I wrapped it up and put it in the loft . . . . . err . . . nope, where's the fun in that! With the weather getting better, we've getting out more and there's no point in the shiny new camera doing nothing so we had it straight out of the box and started taking pictures. We just need to get another set of re-chargeable batteries and a case for it and we'll be off on the search for the perfect photo.

Paul