Everybody has a story on why they got into photography and what event contributed to purchasing their first film or digital SLR camera. In my case, the decision was based solely on one picture that my wife sent me via Google Talk while I was at work – the picture of Omar in a cradle swing. When Omar was a few months old, Lola decided to take a picture of Omar on a very old Sony point and shoot camera that I had back from 2002. As with any other point and shoot that I had before then, I never knew anything about taking good pictures – I just pointed at a subject and took a picture without worrying about camera settings, ISO, aperture, shutter speed and other photography lingo that I had no clue about.

Here is the picture that started my journey into photography:

I remember the day when I received it. Lola said that Omar started to smile and it was her attempt to capture the moment. It drove me nuts that such a beautiful picture turned out to be so blurry and we both agreed that we desperately needed a professional camera to capture those kinds of moments. Little did we know back then that it was the light and our technique, not the camera, that caused the above image to be blurry :)

Long story short, I came home and after a couple of hours of research, bought our first DSLR – Nikon D80 kit with an 18-135mm f/3.5-5.6 lens.

So, what is your story and what got you started in photography?