Wednesday, January 07, 2009

Digital Camera Bloopers and More

Peekaboo!

I read that the expected sales of digital cameras in 2008 in United States alone was expected to exceed 40 million units. In 2007, 37 million cameras were sold in the America. Digital cameras have created huge numbers of new casual and serious photographers who can take hundreds of pictures a day if desired without being concerned about film and developing costs.

Do you think my butt is too big?

I use Flickr to share my favourite pictures and to browse through photos taken by others. Upwards of one million photos are uploaded daily on Flickr* from four million users around the world, an absolutely mind boggling number of images. There are people who upload every single picture they take to Flickr (and Facebook) with no editing or elimination of poor shots at all. I would estimate that for every 100 pictures I take, perhaps five to ten are worth sharing at the most. Some pictures I keep for personal reference, and every so often I go back and cull the pictures on my computer before I store them on an external device.

Please look at the camera!

There are privacy concerns raised with so many cameras clicking around us all the time. Most of us find the camera a harsh judge of appearance and do not like to see indiscriminate pictures of ourselves, especially as we get older. HP has come out with a camera that offers slimming photo editing options that can make the subject look ten pounds lighter instantly. How about a camera that makes someone look ten years younger?

Those twigs in the foreground are very annoying!

This week I was out on a very cold but beautiful day when I came across a number of less common winter birds. I dropped my walking poles and backpack and stood quietly trying to get pictures while not scaring off the birds. Here are some of my worst shots. I have tried to be selective by not showing all of them. At least these pictures have a bird in them. See if you can identify them and I will post some better pictures at the end of the week .

You are so beautiful! Why won't you pose for me?

* These stats taken from the Flickr blog in 2006. Undoubtedly the numbers are higher now and there are over 3 billion pictures hosted at this site. In the past minute, 5200 pictures were uploaded to Flickr according to information on their home page.

Now for some unabashed bragging, mainly so my parents can say, "She got it from me!"
Every day the top 500 most interesting pictures uploaded to Flickr (out of about 1 million) are featured on Explore. I have had 7 pictures on Explore and am proud of them. Some photographers I have as contacts have had 50 or more pictures on Explore while others who take equally excellent pictures have had none. Go figure! I do not know the formula.

Here is my Explore poster. (click to enlarge) I didn't even know about Explore until someone emailed me to tell me I was on it. Here is link where you can check to see if your Flickr photos have been chosen.

20 comments:

  1. Golden-crowned Kinglet?
    Pine Siskin?
    Pine Grosbeak?

    Coincidentally, I just finished going through my pictures that I store on my laptop, trowing out many. We're going to look for an external hard drive for storage this weekend. Any advice?

    ReplyDelete
  2. One million per day? Crazy.

    ReplyDelete
  3. Lynne- I was hoping the one was a Pine Siskin. Those winter finches, especially the females and 1st year are difficult to ID. The one with the twig blurring the head was not a Pine Siskin. You are right on the first picture. I bought a small 160 gb external storage drive at Costco. It works well and was reasonably priced. Now they have 250 gb drives for the same price I paid for mine 6 months ago.

    AC- I took those numbers right from the Flickr blog. Unbelievable!

    ReplyDelete
  4. I think it is a bit sad that people would buy a camera to make themselves skinnier, rather then be happy with who they are. (Or make the lifestyle changes to get healthier.)

    I try to put a photo on each of my blog entries, I feel it brings another dimension to what I write. Sometimes I have to take 10 or 20 photos of something to get what I want. It is almost always worth the time though.

    ---

    LYNNE - We use the My Book USB External Hard Drive. It is small (easy to pick up and go if there was a need) and has a terabyte of space (1000 gigabytes.) We have been using it for about 5 months now with zero problems. I can store about 500,000 photos from my camera on that amount of space.

    ReplyDelete
  5. Digital bloopers,o,we have tons of them.Many times more pictures are deleted than what are kept,but that's the beauty of digital,it doesn't cost any more.
    Blessings,Ruth

    ReplyDelete
  6. Anonymous1:19 pm GMT-5

    Great images Ruth and a happy new year also!
    Yes, I have indeed placed a few there too... :)
    DSD

    ReplyDelete
  7. Hi Ruth......My camera still frustrates me....I erase most of my photographs and just keep the ones that seem to say what I want them to.......

    It is fun though and for me that is the main thing.

    ReplyDelete
  8. What a refreshing post! I definitely delete more photos than I save. Some of them are so bad, I wonder what I was thinking when I clicked.

    I use Iomega with a 120 gig external hard drive. It's old now and much better ones are available for the same price. Unfortunately, you still have to be faithful about getting the photos moved.

    I loved the poster. Congratulations!

    ReplyDelete
  9. LOL..I think i have allot of bloopers i deleted and still more that i kept for whatever reason.
    You take some very nice photos.

    ReplyDelete
  10. These are the type of bird pics I take all the time. Only mine are worse. And I usually keep even the not so good photos.
    All those images out in cyberspace seems mind boggling. And I suppose that makes them available for anyone to copy.

    ReplyDelete
  11. really wonderful post. i like that you included the frustrating side of the camera.

    ReplyDelete
  12. I don't think I take any more pictures than when I had an SLR camera--though I am happy not to pay to develop bad photos.
    I go through my photos right away and delete any that are out of focus. I tend to take two or so of a particular shot, then select the best and immediately delete the others.

    ReplyDelete
  13. Anonymous9:50 pm GMT-5

    We gave my Dad a digital camera for Christmas this year and he struggles with it. He says that there are too many buttons to remember. We encourage him to click away as many times as he wants and that he can delete what is no good. Hard to teach an old man a new trick - lol. But the price of film these days...ouch!

    Just like TV bloopers, camera bloopers can be fun. I love the "candid" shots. The first pic look like he is playing hide and seek. His yellow head may have given himself away though.

    One million per day eh...that is crazy!

    ReplyDelete
  14. My sister bought a digital camera, and after a couple of weeks asked me how I got my good bird shots. I had to tell her that I take probably 20 or 30 to get one that I consider a keeper. I do a lot of deleting at the end of the day.

    ReplyDelete
  15. Jaspenelle- A photo is really worth a thousand words and I like to see a picture with a blog post, especially yours. A terabyte..!!

    Ruth- You know both film and digital camera systems well. Being able to experiment without extra cost is great.

    DSD- Maybe I will be lucky enough someday to find one of your stones.

    Cheryl- I expect to erase the majority of my pictures. To get a couple of good shots makes it worthwhile. I have learned a lot about taking pictures from my Flickr contacts.

    NCMW- I need to move about 4 months of photos off my hard drive. I can tell when my computer starts to get more sluggish.

    Dawn- Thanks. I should post a few more of my bad ones. I am no different than anyone else, I just take a lot of pictures to get some good ones.

    Gaelyn- lol, I am sure you are not that bad. Some people keep their Flickr images private. Flickr also allows you to add an option so people cannot right click and copy your pictures.

    Marmee- You take excellent pictures!

    KGMom- You are a very organized person. I seldom delete immediately but like to see if there is anything I can salvage from a photo first.

    Cheryl- I am sure your dad will catch on eventually. My newest little camera has very small buttons and more options than some people would be happy with. My first digital camera was very basic in comparison.

    Jan- You have the formula right;- 20-30:1

    ReplyDelete
  16. I haven't used flikr until recently, so I didn't know about Explore. I love your photo poster on Explore. You certainly take wonderful photos. I think I need to look into the slimming camera..smile..

    ReplyDelete
  17. Kinglets can be really hard to get a good picture of. They are so small and constantly on the move. But they are so much fun to watch.

    ReplyDelete
  18. RW- I am in awe of some of the photos featured on Explore. They are excellent! I wonder how well that slimming camera has sold?!

    NM- Yes, the Kinglets are very hyperactive and I have never managed to get a good picture of them. The other birds are #3-I am not certain about these finches #4- Common Redpoll, #5 male White-winged Crossbill.

    ReplyDelete
  19. We share the same bloopers, Ruth! LOL! I have plenty of them...thank goodness for digital photography. I certainly could not afford film cameras now.

    ReplyDelete
  20. Anonymous1:03 am GMT-5

    Your parents are really proud of your pictures and you. Even if you did mention it. Your pictures are incredible but am glad as the non-artist in the family that you delete many as I do.

    ReplyDelete

Note: only a member of this blog may post a comment.