My new best friend...

Well I did it! I got my new camera!!

After a bit of begging to get some Folksy sales and some calling in of favours I manged to get the money together to not only replace my poor, dear departed camera but quite significantly upgrade it!
So my new best friend is a Fujifilm Finepix S2950HD, factory re-conditioned and thus a fair bit cheaper than Argos price (gotta love eBay).

Now the reason I was in such a hurry to get this camera is that I have been invited to a fab event on Friday that absolutely demands top notch pictures so I have 2 days to get to know how it all works and how to get the best out of all the settings...

We started with the obligatory flower shots - exploring the macro functions and the special 'flower' mode, pre-programmed to take perfect close-up shots. Well I am impressed - particularly with how well the colour translates. The beautiful blue of the Borage flowers never came out right on my previous digi cameras. Check out this extreme close-up...

How stunning is that?

Then we moved on to portraiture, and the Little Man was more than happy to pose for mummy's new camera!

There are several functions designed to get the perfect portraits - I particularly liked the multi-shot one that takes continuous frames until you release the shutter - great for capturing those funny expressions!

We wandered down to the fields to see the ponies (my, how they have grown since we last saw them too!)

Utilising the x18 opitical zoom for a pretty view across the Severn Vale (the river is too close to the other side of those hills to see it, sadly)

And finally, one function I know I'm going to have great fun with. The in-camera Panoramic feature!

Now in the old days I used to walk up to high places and take a series of pictures as I turned 180 to capture the 'whole' view. The film was sent off for processing and when the pictures came back I would painstakingly piece them together to make a long panoramic masterpiece. It never quite worked out how I hoped it would...
With the advent of digital photography and photo editing programmes, panoramic pictures became a little easier to produce. Now this camera does it for you! A full 180 view taken in 3 frames and merged together by the camera in seconds! How cool is that? (yes, it's true, I am easily pleased ) Well I HAD to have a play with that one...

We have only just met but I think the love affair with my new camera has just begun :) We are still in the honeymoon stage - finding out what we are capable of together. Give me a little while and I'll work out which buttons to press to get the results I want and soon enough it will be like we have always been together...