Week 3

Another week has whizzed by. To recap all that happened this week I will start with Monday when I had a 4 hour class on Business and Marketing (this class makes me so nervous). They throw around a lot of big numbers about how much it will cost to start a business and then tell you all that you need to do to market yourself... ahhh... scary. Then I learned about creating black and white imagies in a computer class for 4 hours. Which was followed by 2 hours in computer lab. Yep... another 12 hour day.

Tuesday I had to sit through a Nikon camera rep's depressing presentation. And I shoot Canon, so it was incredibly uninteresting and he wasn't a very good speaker. I could only handle 3 hours and then left early. But I had the afternoon off to catch up on some reading for classes. My friend Amanda and I took a drive about an hour north of here to the Bison Range (we didn't see any bison because we were too late to get in) and Nine Pipes National Wildlife Refuge. It was fun to be out shooting for a couple of hours.

Wednesday we had a class on digital cameras in the morning and wildlife photography in the afternoon... both excellent classes.

Thursday the Canon rep was here for his 4 hour presentation. He was a much better speaker and I was a little more interested in my brand of camera system. In the afternoon we had a 4 hour class on studio lighting. It was interesting but it was also the first time I was so tired in class it was hard to focus.

Friday we had 4 hours in the lighting studio playing with the lights and equipment. I had a lot of fun and could see myself doing portraits. In the afternoon or Photo Studies class learned about creative techniques and then went through an exercise on figuring out our styles. I felt like we were released creatively. It felt good to do some of the creative side of photography and not just the technical stuff. The real treat for the week came that evening when the Canon rep brought a bunch of gear for us to try out. At one point I had about $7,000 worth of equipment out on the street trying it out. I loved trying out the different lenses and cameras, but I am also realistic that it will be quite some time before I can have any of those expensive toys. That evening a bunch of us went over to someone's apartment where we had a Canon vs. Nikon dart game going on. Canon is totally winning and it looks like the game is going to continue through October.

Saturday slept in for the first time and had absolutely no plans. It was good to take a break. In the afternoon a couple of girls from my group called and asked if I wanted to go hiking (and taking pictures, of course). We went for a 3 mile hike with all our gear. It was so much fun. Then in the evening I went downtown with another friend to take night pictures. I filled a 4G memory card in one day... nearly 400 photos.

Today has been a day of catching up on laundry and the details of life. But I did manage to squeeze in a 12 mile bike ride with Cora and her boyfriend. I think I have had more exercise in the last 2 days than I have had in the last 6 months. Oh, and the weather has been fantastic! 70's-80's perfect for adventuring.