During the month of June, I worked long and hard in my college’s summer camp. The group I had in charge was 8A, the first half of the 8 year olds (there was an impressive 66 kids of age 8, so it had to be divided into two groups). The experience was gratifying! I had worked twice before in the same summer camp; in 2004, with age six (now ten), and in 2006 with age eleven (now thirteen). I can gladly say I hadn’t had so much fun in camp as I did this year. It was exhausting but worth every second! I worked every day from 7:30 AM to 4:30 PM (or later, sometimes as late as 9 PM or, like the day before the talent show, midnight!) and was going to be paid only the four hours I had been assigned. I was asked a couple of times why did I stay so much time if I was going to be paid only four hours; my answer was simple: I’m doing it for the kids.
It came as a surprise to me when I was told by Alicia, one of the people in charge of camp, that I was working too much time and wasn’t allowed to do this. I explained that I was just doing it for the kids, I wasn’t staying more time for the money. She replied “But you cannot do that. We’re only going to pay you four hours per day… you know that, right?” She continued, ruffling some of the papers she had in her desk, looking through them and said “Well… you know what? I’ll pay you for six hours. Enjoy what’s left of camp.”
Nikon D60 digital SLR camera body with a NIKKOR AF-S DX 18-55mm f/3.5-5.6G VR lens. Image source: NikonUSA.com
My face went from nervous to complete happiness. I was going to be paid 50% more than what I was hoping for! As I thanked her while leaving the office, my mind couldn’t bare thinking that I was finally going to be able to afford my own digital SLR camera! As I looked through, I found a great offer at the local Costco: a Nikon D60 body with a NIKKOR AF-S DX 18-55mm f/3.5-5.6G VR “kit” lens, a NIKKOR AF-S DX 55-200mm f/4-5.6G IF-ED VR Zoom lens, a Nikon dSLR camera bag, 1 GB Lexar SD memory card, and 50 prints at Costco… all for $825 + tax, for a paid total of $891!
I had been thinking of getting a digital SLR for a few months now and had been looking into them. I was confused by if I was to get a Canon, a system I was already familiar with, or a Nikon, which are relatively new to me. I opted for the Nikon because of two things: I’ve been told gives better colors and my best friend, a photographer, uses Nikon. He has a Nikon D70s and recently got the much-appraised D300. That way we can exchange lenses and he can lend me a Speedlight (external flash unit) until I can afford my own.
People who know me know that when I get something new I go straight to the instruction sheet or booklet, so I did. The first thing you need to do with the camera is, obviously, charge the batteries… for 90 minutes. Let me repeat that: 90 minutes. That’s nothing! A short charge that will last me a long time, hooray for advanced technologies! The camera can do three shots per second for as long as you can in JPEG mode, memory permitting of course; this means that you can shoot continuously for as long as you like until you fill up your memory card! Isn’t that amazing?
One other thing that’s impressed me very much of this camera is that you can retouch pictures in-camera. This isn’t limited to resizing the image or lowering the quality though. This menu includes a Quick Retouch feature (which pretty much does anything that the picture might need, automatically), D-Lightning (which fixes shadows and highlights), removes red-eye, you can add filters, change a picture to black and white, process RAW files, and even overlay two different RAW files onto each other! Now, isn’t THAT amazing? For an extended (and I do mean extended) review of the camera, I recommend heading on to Digital Photography Review’s article on the Nikon D60.
By the way and while I’m at it: I started another blog last night dedicated to photography. Come have a look! Don’t forget to leave me comments! I love it when I recieve some good comments; please provide critique, be it positive or negative!
