I got my first camera around age six, and my first film around age ten. I joined my first camera club at age 13  (Washington Jr. High School, Bellflower, CA). Photography was a fascinating hobby for me, and I took photography classes in high school and college.  I did a fair amount of backpacking while I was in college and after, and I always took my camera gear.  Most of the photographs I took then were slides, mainly for reasons of economy.

When my children started arriving,  my film preference shifted from slides to prints,  and I shifted from landscape photographer to snap-shooter of birthdays,  holidays and other family events.

Fast-forward many years.  On retiring from a career mostly in technology,  I started taking classes at the local community college,  just for the challenge.  I took courses in things like Writing for Film and Japanese Cinema, even Mandarin Chinese (Ni hao ma?). I once tried taking another photography class,  but found it to be the same as the courses I had taken thirty-some-odd years earlier.

Then,  I saw a listing in the college catalog for a class in digitial photography,  and thought I'd give it a try.  As a result of that class,  I now own a digital SLR camera and have Photoshop running on my computer. 

I am now (spring 2008) taking my fifth digital photography class. I am exploring the world of what they call "fine-art digital printing," using "archival quality" papers and pigment-based inks with my HP ink-jet photo printer. This semester, I am focusing on color management in computer-based image production.

I am very much enjoying discovering all I can about digital photography. I find the scope of the subject seems to continually expand before me.