A little late in the introduction, but I've grown fond of this site and didn't want to be "One of THOSE" who lurk in a cloud of mystery. :tongue: How I got into mu-43: I come from a family of professional photographers so I was introduced to cameras at an early age. When I could barely walk, my folks strapped a neon-orange 110 format camera to my wrist so I could snap ho-hum pictures of my underwear and our stained carpet. During my gradeschool years, I discovered I had the common x-chromosome inherited mild red-green colorblindness (I failed the "Ishihara color test"). My chilhood esteem was fragile under the weight of criticism from the photo-saavy-color-discrimant relatives. With a little bit of denial and the urge to rebel, I defected to other hobbies. Years later, my old man's Olympus OM-4 would beckon from the dusty shelves and I couldn't ignore it. I started to dabble a little bit with film but we were at the dawn of the digital age. A half a dozen digital P&S's later and I decided DSLR was the next logical step. This idea was delayed for years because I couldn't get over how obtrusive the equipment was. It didn't allow me to enjoy what I was doing. Fast forward another few years...I'm traveling abroad and one of my best mates hands me his GF-1. "Small, interchangeable lens? Awesome pic quality...what the hell is this?!?" After a few snaps I was hooked. I went online to research everything and anything about this "micro" format, purchased an EPL1 off of Amazon and here I am. I haven't had this much fun snapping pictures since that first neon-orange 110. The general sentiment is that Olympus and Panasonic saved the 4/3rd sensor....but it really saved my passion for this hobby. Cheers! -Zeph
Zeph, yours is a priceless introduction - thank you! and I laughed out loud when I read about your first camera experience, then I felt sad during your rough patch but brightened right up and identified with you upon your re-entry to photography's enjoyment. Thanks so much for backtracking a bit and posting your introduction!
Welcome, and don't forget that many of us spend our life shooting in B & W! The GF1 is a great camera and should bring may hours of joy to your new hobby.
Ha, I totally understand that now. I've always wondered if color-blind people have any advantages shooting B&W. There's a theory that some forms of this condition was a result of cavemen evolving to hunt utilizing contrast, instead of trying to distinguish nature's camoflauge. All i know is when I accidently trip one of the hue switches in Lightroom, I'm screwed if I don't hit reset.
Thanks for work on this site BBW. Good to see admins and mods active. I see this forum's membership growing exponentially once we (North Americans) catch up with the rest of the world with this format.
Welcome aboard Zephy. Nice to see another SoCalifornian here. This place is getting run over by Celtics fans. The east coast and mid-west photogs refuse to believe that we keep our snow in the mountains (where it belongs), that avocados are dropping off the trees and fresh strawberries stands are beginning to pop up. I belong to a loose collection of photographers and we just happen to have a color blind photog in the group. His images are very good and his color processing is consistently, just-a-bit-odd, (in a good way), resulting in a distinct style. Our group shoots every week, so if you want company hit-up LAShooters.org. Gary
"just-a-bit-odd" is how I would describe my style.:tongue: "Her face is a little green" "The sky is tad pink...did you mean to do that?" "Yes...artistic exposure. Deal with it." Thanks Gary, I'll definitely check that site out. I'm from San Diego so I'm a little further south from you guys.
