I've got plenty to learn about regarding my new toys. I recently got myself some new camera parts with a gift card I was given for my birthday.

I've learned two things so far.
1: I greatly over estimated the effectiveness of an ND8x filter. Sure it blocks out 87.5% of light, and sure it drops your effective ISO by a factor of 8, but even on an overcast day, with my aperture as tight as possible, I still couldn't get the slow shutter speeds I was hoping for. On the bright side I should be able to just get another ND filter and just stack them. Mathematically if I stack an ND4x on my ND8x I should get an effective ND32x meaning a little over 3% of light entering the camera.

2: Using a lensbaby is a lot of trial and error. Mostly error. It's a type of lens that you can bend off center for interesting focus effects. But it has no electronics, so my camera has to be in full manual mode which I'm not used to. On top of that, my camera has no ambient light sensor in the body. All the light sensing is done by the individual lenses that you attach. Meaning that I have no idea if a picture is going to be under or over exposed until I take it.

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