The Progress Thread

Whammy!

This is a thread for anyone to show and document their progression as a photographer (in a light-hearted way).
Photography like any art form is a constant journey of learning, experimenting and evolving. It should never stop. But every once in a while it's good to look back and reminisce

Maybe you've only been shooting for a few months or a few decades. It doesn't matter.
If you feel like sharing your progression with everyone post an early photo along with a recent photo. Give as many details about both photos as you wish. Having both photos of the same style (portrait, landscape etc) would be quite interesting but of course not everyone will be shooting the same things as they were when starting out so it's not necessary.

Any time you feel like you've changed direction and/or feel like you've made progression feel free to post again. It doesn't need to be a landmark of a progression, just once you fell like sharing again do so As I said, photography is a constant journey so hopefully this thread will continue on for a while.

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I post first and get the ball rolling


Personally I feel like I've made very little progression. I still dislike most of my photos
Technically I feel I've improved over my former self (still loads to learn, I need to delve into strobist stuff) but I have still yet to feel like I've found my own style.

The first photo is one of the earliest photos I still have on my hard drive. It's from 2008.
Taken on a film camera. An Olympus OM-4Ti. The lens was an Olympus OM 55mm f1.2. Can't remember the film type. All I know is it was B&W film.
The scanner I had was really cheap so I don't know if the softness in the photo is from the scanner or the camera lens. Or maybe I just off with the focus which is highly likely
It's a photo of my sister. Looking back I didn't take anything into consideration apart from her expression and the framing. I didn't notice her face was in shadow nor did I notice the light source on the right which is completely knocked out of focus. I assumed once something was out of focus I didn't need to worry about it, not realising that it can still be distracting.




The second photo was taken recently enough (Sep 2014). It was for an engaged couple.
Funny enough I am actually using the same lens I did for the 2008 photo. camera bodies come and go but lenses are for life
The body is a Canon 5d MkII.
Overall I'm happy enough with it but I can see things I overlooked when taking the photo. One of the things that bugs me is when I used the reflector to bounce light back into the ladies face I should have moved it slightly so more of the light hit the gentleman's face too, rather than just the side of his neck.

knickerbocker

Great idea for a thread.......time to dig deep through the archives!!!!!

Ben D Bus

Great idea, but as I shoot people and portraits I'd be reluctant, for their sake, to show the botched job I did on some of my earlier sitters

In fact some of my newer models probably wouldn't be too pleased either

dirtyghettokid

i was an auto shooter for so many years. it wasn't until 2007, that i started to dabble in manual settings. i wanted to do light trail pics.. bought a book about night time photography, and got stuck into that.

my first attempt
cherrywood bridge by dgk905, on Flickr

i then, unfortunately had to go through an HDR phase *cringe*
autumn sky HDR by dgk905, on Flickr

then i experimented with strobist stuff (my first attempt)
DC5 integra type R by dgk905, on Flickr

portraity people type pics?
alan by dgk905, on Flickr

i think everybody does a planet thing?
TO mini planet by dgk905, on Flickr

& some photoshop stuff. which was handy to me, as i'm a graphic designer. and have been fiddling around with photoshop for over 20 years now.
took the moon from the sky by dgk905, on Flickr

i dunno if i've progressed. i still take pics, and try different stuff out with PP techniques. i don't think i have a defined style at all. it's just one big project.
some of my latest...
mostly nature or shoes and hardly anything else :S (i don't get out much!)

amber by dgk905, on Flickr

baron thirteens by dgk905, on Flickr

south beach sunset by dgk905, on Flickr

superflyninja

I've always had an interest in photography. I started though about 7 years ago. I got a Fuji s5600 bridge.
This was my first shot I uploaded back in the day (on deviantart)


I didnt really have a style of shot I liked just whatever took my fancy really.From stuff like this:

to this:


I of course went through a completely overprocessed phase and a photoshop phase with results like this:

and


ooooer

The only style I saw emerging was taking shots that others thought were unusual.
Like this:

I then upgraded to an entry level olympus DSLR. Which was sooo cool at the time. I would shoot most days. Anything and everything. My first child was born and that cut into my free time massively. The recession cut into my cashbucks so no gear upgrades.
All was fine until one day I ran into another (hobbyist) tog who had pro level gear, could go on photography holidays etc and I realised that for me to start to improve I needed time and money. (yes i know you can take photos on a phone, gear dont matter etc etc. Cept it does. You wont get any shot on an iphone like I get on my m4/3 with OM 50mm f1.8) So I gave up for while.
Until a mate asked me to take some shots of his wedding. So that got me interested again. I went and got a yongnuo s560ii and did some strobist stuff. But only on a tiny scale. Still lack of free time etc.


Then I bought a m4/3 oly and grabbed a nice sigma 30mm f2.8 and OM 50mm f1.8 and started shooting again.
Leading to this sort of stuff that Im doing now:







Most of my more up to date pics are on 500px though here and I dont post any photos of family online (bar facebook).
I've stopped most of the strobist stuff. I really want to do portraits and got a bg kit, wireless flash triggers, another flash, umbrellas etc but it was a disaster. I had tried to get some family in as guinea pigs and though the photos were fine, the people werent lol. I cant manage my own family I figure I got no chance with strangers.
These days I dont get out for dedicated photo time any more Tis a pity but thats how things roll!