I decided that it was time to go digital back in 2006. To start, I bought a cheap Olympus digital compact camera. I was so pleased with the results that I never used film again.

When I look back at the photos that I took with that camera it occurs to me that the photos are actually very good. Not so much in a technical sense – there’s no way that the quality of an image from the small sensor of a compact camera can match the quality of photos taken with digital SLRs. But aesthetically, yes.

I deliberately chose a compact camera with a fixed focal length lens – the equivalent of a 35mm lens on a full frame camera. I knew that prime lenses, even cheap ones, give excellent quality compared to zoom lenses. But also because I didn’t want to zoom. I wanted to get the best out of the wide angle lens. If I wasn’t close enough to something, I just moved closer.

The Olympus compact was incredibly easy to use. I just pointed it at my subject, pressed the shutter button half-way to get a focus and exposure lock, recomposed the photo, then pressed the shutter button all the way to take it. No worrying about exposure modes or histograms, not even a decision to make about focal lengths. Just point, measure, recompose and shoot.

By stripping away the technical stuff, I could concentrate on light, subject and composition. It gave me tremendous freedom.  The only thing to worry about was how the image looked.  I took the camera wherever I went and just enjoyed taking photos. I wasn’t trying to make art, or do anything special, I simply took photos of what I saw around me. It helped that I was travelling to some interesting places at that time.

What I didn’t realise until later is that I was having fun and learning to see at the same time.

You can try something similar yourself, and you don’t need a compact camera to do it. If you have an SLR, put it into program mode, select a prime lens (if you don’t have a prime, you can use a piece of masking tape on a zoom to fix the focal length), and just enjoy taking photos free from having to think about the technical side of things. If you’re not close enough to the subject, instead of zooming move closer. You’ll learn to appreciate the qualities of the focal length you are using if you do this.

Photo Gallery – Roatan, Honduras

Here are some of my favourite photos taken with the Olympus compact. They were all taken on the caribbean island of Roatan, located off the coast of Honduras. I’ve left them as I processed them at the time; quite primitively in Photoshop. I’d ease up on the contrast if I was processing them again, but apart from that I like them.

All photos Copyright © Andrew Gibson. Please contact me for permission to use in any way.