Practice, practice, practice...

I was doing a bit of practicing with my new lens today. It's a handy lens for several reasons. First it's a fixed or prime lens meaning it doesn't zoom. It's fixed at 90mm. Second it has a 2.8 aperture which means it's fast. I can take pictures with less light than say my regular lens which only goes down to 3.6. And lastly, but the best part, is the macro feature. It has 1:1 macro capability.

And incidentally I stopped at the camera shop on the way home from work tonight to have my lens looked at. The guy I talked to checked it out pretty thoroughly and thought it was fine. It's amazing how much ambient noise stores have! I had a hard time hearing the sound and I could barely hear it in the lens the store had. But he thought it was fine so I think I'm okay with it. EDITED: I got this message from Tamron this morning. That is normal for that mount lens as there is a pair or bearing in the lens that interacts with the camera but when not attached, you can hear them more clearly moving around. If the lens is operating fine otherwise, then you do not have anything to worry about.

So first a macro shot of some primas.

Second a macro shot of this cool old postal scale that I have in my craft room. It used to be Morgan's grandpa's.

Here's Ashton Henry sitting on his suitcase waiting to take a trip. Poor Ashton Henry has been waiting a long, long time. I feel bad about that but he was lost for a bit.

The 90mm is a good lens for portraits also. It creates good bokeh which you can see in this first photo of Owen and also in the one above of Ashton Henry.

Owen isn't the best subject for portrait practice. He doesn't exactly hold still!

I also used the lens to take pictures of my latest project. It's actually an ongoing project for the year. Cathy Z. posted some templates for tags to tell stories with. You can see some of her tags on her blog.

I decided this is my project for the year. I am doing one tag a week. Kind of like the Deck of Me cards last year. I was feeling a little lost not doing those cards each week. I don't have any for January or February but hey, that's okay. So each week I pick a little something to write about. The third tag is my favorite. Mostly because it has pictures.

On another note, did you know, according to the U.S. Department of Labor Statistics, the average person changes careers 3 times in their life? I've decided that since I'm going to be 35 this year, I need to change careers. And I've decided I am going to be an artist. I thought maybe if I decided it, and declared it, then I could make it happen. We'll see how it goes. I suppose it would be good to settle on a medium.