Photogorasmic!

Welcome to Photogorasmic!

First of all, let me introduce myself. My name is Cheryl, I live in Seattle with my 2 cats and spouse. I have been taking pictures since I got my first camera in 1965 at the age of 12. Since then I have been through plenty of cameras.

First, let me be clear. I am an amateur photographer. I have no formal education in photography, although once I no longer have to work full time, I’m pretty certain this is the direction I will be going.

In 1983, my mother bought me a Pentax K1000 with a basic 35mm lens and a Star-D 80-205mm zoom lens, both still made in Japan. I have boxes of pictures taken with that camera and I still own it, but have to say I haven’t used it in over 7 years now.

I began taking pictures with and learning a great deal about using digital cameras in 2000 when I was managing a hospital imaging system. My first digital camera was 3 megapixels and it took OK pictures, but I knew I wanted something better. I still hadn’t actually purchased my own digital camera, this Olympus belonged to my employer.

In 2001, my partner and I traveled to Angkor Wat via Singapore. In the airport in Singapore, I purchase a Samsung Vega 77i 35mm pocket camera. It had a German Schneider-Kreuznach 35mm – 70mm auto macro lens. That was the selling point for me at the time. I’m still amazed that I didn’t purchase a camera before the trip, but I was still on the fence about digital camera picture quality.

What is history now, I took about 40 rolls of pictures with that camera at the numerous temples we visited during our 6 days in Angkor Wat. When we got home, I decided to create a website to post my travel photos on, purchased a flat bed scanner and proceeded to scan in the majority of the photos taken.

Needless to say, that took a long time, 3 weeks to be exact. As I was scanning photo after photo on that old, very slow scanner, I vowed I would purchase a digital camera before my next trip. The camera I purchased was a Nikon Coolpix 4500. I loved the swivel feature and the sturdiness of that camera and took pictures with it during trips taken between 2002 and 2005.

In 2006, I purchased my first (and only, so far) digital SLR, a Nikon D70s. I packed that camera on a few trips, eventually adding a Tamron 28-250mm digital lens to give me more flexibility with a small physical lens. I’ve also recently purchased a remote shutter release for nighttime pictures – I really want to go somewhere where I can take pictures of starry skies.

A few months ago, I decided that I really didn’t want to have to lug that large camera around anymore and I wanted more than 4 megapixels (even though that Nikon 4500 really took some great pictures). I chose the 9 mp Lumix DMC-T75 because of its 10x optical zoom and its Leica lens. I read lots of reviews, looked at pictures on Flickr and bought it. I love this camera.

If you are interested in looking at my years of travel photos, please visit my travel website.