Some Test Photos

This is the sword that Akutenshi7 brought back for me from Dollism, with it's fabulous copper hilt. I just need to make a scabbard for it and put a tassel at the top--Coppersmith already has his belt. I spent part of the day familiarizing myself with the new camera, which is 90 percent like the old camera, but with a new, annoying user interface. I ended up going back to the Windows image handler instead because it's a lot cleaner and faster, and it seems to work fine. The new camera can generate larger files, which is nice. I still haven't quite made friends with the macro settings and the camera still struggles with full bright daylight and shadows, but it otherwise seems to be ok so far. The zoom setting is nice--this is a sparrow on top of a huge pile of deco straw at Home Depot, and he's about 10 feet above me here:

Here is a couple of macro shots--Shushu was taken before I realized that I had the wrong setting, but she is just in room light, and she isn't too grainy. She has a gorgeous wig also by Akutenshi:

I think those are Ersa Flora eyes, by the way. Here is Raisin, also just in room light:

Some more care in lighting her would really pay off, I think, but it's nice not to have to always use a flash. Here is just an interior general shot of the shop, on the Auto setting, and it looks fine too:

I also found a place to adjust the exposure manually, which seemed helpful--photoshop can usually brighten a dark photo but it can't rescue burned out areas. This little camera still has the crappy little doors over the battery compartment and the usb slots, but I can't think of a better way of covering those besides going to a rotating pin like my phone has over the power slot. The new camera is a Nikon Coolpix L620 and is designed mostly for casual photos. Eventually I might get a higher-end camera-- but at the same time the learning curve is higher, as is the price tag.