Cameras & lenses

I've been using some of my alone time, whilst Theo is at kindergarten, to play around with my camera. I've also been experimenting with shooting in RAW and post-processing, which is a ton of fun!



I actually broke my 28-90mm Canon kit lens shooting these photos. In the background, you can see a storm approaching - well, it suddenly turned and started pouring buckets on me, so I tried to grab my camera and tripod before they got too wet and instead knocked the whole thing over! I was pretty upset - the lens is not a great one by any means (it seems to be causing mirror lockup problems in the camera body, plus the photos it creates are just not that sharp) but my only other lens is a Sigma 70-300mm, and whilst I really like the clarity and colour of the images taken with this lens, it just doesn't work for self-portraits, even with a tripod (I don't have a remote shutter, only the camera timer). I have in the past used an old Praktica Pentacon 35-70mm lens with my Canon 350D body, which gives a nice creamy, vintage feel to photos - but I have to hold the lens in place manually since the mounts are incompatible (although I have heard of there being an adapter for Praktica PB lenses and Canon cameras, which I will look into eventually).



As an aside, when I first got the Praktica bx20 camera, the mirror mechanism was pretty messed up and the shutter wouldn't fire. I took a chance and tinkered around with the mirror and whatever else I could reach without taking the camera completely to pieces (although I did consider doing this for educational purposes and to satisfy my "how does it work" curiosity), and finally got the camera working. I ran a roll of film through it, but having not shot film in the last decade, I accidentally exposed it when rewinding the film.



So, after the fall, the Canon kit lens seemed to have jumped the threads for zooming/focusing and was jammed. I'd dropped the camera and lens before but luckily the UV filter that the previous owner had screwed on and overtightened took the brunt of the force and shattered. The camera and lens had no such protection this time! Given my success with the Praktica bx20 and the fact that I really had nothing to lose (there's no way I could afford to have a lens fixed professionally), I did an awful lot of poking around and levering and prising inside the lens. My heart stopped a few times, particularly when I heard a snap and a crunch - but somehow, I have no idea how, I got the lens unjammed and working again. I'm looking forward to picking up some new lenses (and a new body) as soon as I have some spare money - but for now at least, the 28-90mm lives to see another day and take many more slightly blurry photos!