Fabulous Friday | Digital Photography and Prints

Digital photography has opened SO many doors over the past six or so years.  One of the reasons I didn't do more with photography in college is because I was a poor college student who couldn't always afford the film as well as getting it developed!  And then, if I did forego a textbook or a meal to do either or both of those, then there was almost no way I could afford to have anything enlarged or framed.  So, things were pretty limited "back in the day".

Enter digital photography.  I resisted... for a long time!  I think I was the only person on our team of 12 that went to South Africa in 2005 who took a film camera.  Everyone else had the digital ones and we could look back at those pictures and email them home at the end of the day.  But I loved my Nikon N50 and held onto my precious rolls of film like they were gold.  Because they were!  But once I made the switch (to a small point and shoot), my life changed.  I could take pictures and document everything without worrying whether I'd have enough exposures left for "that moment"... whatever "that moment" might have been :-)  When we got a digital SLR for work, my life started to change.  I was still shooting on P forever (don't judge!!), but my horizons were still becoming wider and wider.  Finally, in the fall of 2008, I bought my first digital SLR.  

But it still wasn't until a year later when I went to France with National Geographic that things with my camera started to click and make sense (did you see that... did you see what I did with that pun there??  I know, I'm so witty...).  And I proceeded to take close to 3,000 pictures over the course of nine days.  Do you know how many rolls of film that would have been????  And how much money that would have cost... I would have had to sell everything I own to have afforded it.  That's how much it would have cost.  BUT!  This is the digital age!  So we can take as many pictures as we want!  And we can practice and try things out to see what each of the settings do and how they change the photo and all sorts of things!  It's incredible!

And herein lies the problem... we take so many pictures but how many do we actually take off our computer?  Or our memory cards?  gasp!  It took me a year... and the "excuse" of having a show to get my pictures from France printed.  And I didn't regret printing a single one.  So, you can imagine my absolute delight when the Mitchell's, whom I photographed in November, emailed me a picture of their mantel...

And it's not just that they ordered prints and have them displayed but that they ordered a 16x20 print!!!!!  And it looks amazing in their house.

Let me just say... I have never regretted ordering a large print or canvas.  In fact, there have been several times when I've gotten something back and wished that I had ordered it larger.

So, I'm going to listen to my own advice.  As I get ready to (finally) set up my office, I'm excited about ordering some new canvases.  Some really large ones.  Ones that will make you stand in awe at their size.  But that will be the same reason that you'll be drawn into them and the story that's captured.  Trust me... you'll want to do the same :-)

Happy Friday!