Steve McCurry just so happened to be in town yesterday to speak at Texas Tech about his career and what compels him to take the photos that he does. One of his most famous photos titled 'Afghan Girl' was one of the first pictures to really inspire me to start taking my own photographs.

Well I must say that I am very pleased with the 
1D 2. It has a very solid, well built feel that I have not experienced before and the kind of weight you would expect from a high quality product. I have to say that the first thing I noticed that really impressed me is the quality of images taken at high ISO. Even at its highest ISO of 3200, the noise that is present has a quality that beats a picture taken at 400 ISO from my Pentax. The noise produced by the 1D 2 gives the images a really classic feel and I like that a lot. Pixel peepers may be cynical about all the technicalities but the difference between a great photograph and a snapshot is its substance.

          It has been quite some time since i have made a blog post, or any post for that matter. The reason is mainly due to work. I have been working a lot more lately and since have had not much time left for myself, and that time typically gets devoted to my girlfriend so there really isnt time for much else. However i still produce images when i can and normally just upload them to Facebook and call it a night, not so much Flickr activity anymore. 

Now on to the meat of this post. One thing that has always interested me also so happens to be the thing that really got me into photography, and that is sports. Ive always enjoyed watching participating and reading about all kinds of sports. I used to look up photos of athletes doing insane things all the time and always wanted to be able to replicate these moments. Paintball is one sport in particular that I can really associate myself with. Its something i grew up playing with friends and family and really have never stopped. So naturally photographing it was my next step. Unfortunately all i had when i first started was essentially a glorified point and shoot Kodak camera that made any kind of shot very difficult. I never upgraded to a DSLR until i had moved away from home. Back home my friends and i would go play paintball nearly every weekend, but since moving to Lubbock i havent been just due to the fact that i havent had my buddies around wanting to go play. 

          Recently (today actually) I have acquired a Canon EOS-1D Mark II and a sigma 70-200mm 2.8 and oh has the inspiration hit me again! With the Pentax i have now i never really felt that the shutter speed nor the autofocus would leave me anything other than frustrated so i never took it out to a field. However, now that i have a machine gun of a camera and a lens capable of much more i know i can reach out and grab those shots i want. Now i know FPS (frames not feet) isnt everything and that its more about timing; all im saying is there is a reason you dont see the pros using a pentax. Not to dog on the pentax brand, by all means they are a great company and their customers get some great perks from their cameras that you dont see in other brands, but thats another subject....