stepping up

So, the other night I did a little teeny tiny bit of sewing after dinner. When the kitchen was all cleaned up I took a few minutes to do some mending for my dad {yay, we're seeing my parents this weekend} and then I busted out some fabric choices for Lukas. The goal was not too girly and with my fabric stash this was hard to get at. We settled on this Heather Ross print. And just a few minutes later - really not much longer than it took me to do the mending earlier - I had a new wrist strap for my brand new {to me} little camera. This little camera is quite impressive. While only slightly bigger and with a bit more heft than my previous camera, the images this new little guy produces are leaps and bounds more rewarding.

I remember when I bought my previous camera I clearly told Lukas, "Nah, I doubt I'll ever use manual controls. It's ok if the camera doesn't have them." And so I ended up with the Panasonic TZ5. And while it was serviceable for quite some time, the pictures I was able to get with it just didn't live up to Lukas's standards. Plus, noise reduction smeared the heck out of things and that was just yucky {but now I'm getting all technical on ya}.

So for my birthday {and every other gift giving holiday from here until I'm old and wrinkled} I got this new little number - the Panasonic GF1! And boy does it pack a punch. A big enough one that I may be slightly worried Lukas might want to steal it from me.

This little camera uses interchangeable lenses like Lukas's big fancy camera, but it's missing a few other big camera features to make it fit in this little body. I picked out the 20mm f/1.7 lens for its large aperture and pancakeness {yes, I can make up words}. Pancake lenses have a lower profile than your standard lens and are a great fit for a little camera like this where the point is to keep things small. And the 1.7 aperture is great for letting in lots of light. And light... is the most important part of taking a picture.

Boy, have I got a lot to learn! But I'm so excited to have a camera I can grow into. Happy photographing!

{p.s. Notice my pictures have gotten bigger? Well, I've decided to host them on Picasa Web instead of just uploading through the blogger interface. I'm liking the results much more.}