Photo Equipment & a bit of advice...

Today I received a package with some much awaited photo equipment:

Monfrotto190XB Tripod with a 486RC2 Compact Ballhead

Sigma Zoom Telephoto 70-300mm lens

Arctic Butterfly SL-700 rotary sensor brush with sensor loupe

13x19" photo semi-gloss photo paper

I splurged a bit as you can see and I am thankful we are getting a refund on our taxes this year as it helped. I am totally in love with the Manfrotto tripod and ballhead, it's delicious!! I have 4 tripods now and 3 of them are junk!! I learned my lesson trying to save us money...do NOT buy cheap tripods and do NOT buy items from EBAY!! Anyone want to buy some tripods?

I haven't really had a chance to try out the Sigma lens yet. I was able to snap a few photos before the sun set (the flowers above) and there was NO color distortion. I hope to try again with the lens soon. This weekend we will be visiting the Grandbabies so I may have to wait until next week on the lens...I really want to try it out on the birds and wildlife.

As to the Arctic Butterfly sensor cleaner...this was NOT something that I thought I would need but when I noticed last week that my sky photos had dust specks even after I changed lenses I knew what the problem was...sigh!! Dust on my sensor...I'm a bit hard on my cameras and don't always change the lens as quick and clean as I should...Thanks to my friend John he recommended the Arctic Butterfly and it did a fantastic job...I have a clean sensor again!! I really would have preferred taking it into a camera shop and letting them do it but being that we live out in the middle of no where and the closest camera shop is over 2 hours away that wouldn't have been feasible...And can you just imagine me sending my camera in to be cleaned, Ekkk!

As to the photo paper it worked fantastic with my Canon Pro9000 printer and printing out 12x12 digi layouts that I have done or that were done for me...I am really impressed with the Canon printer and love the photos it prints...Pretty soon I am afraid our walls will be filled from top to bottom with photos, lol....

I hope that is it for the year...I doubt Santa will be tolerant if I purchase anything else...lol

But just remember the old saying "you get what you pay for" so make wise purchases! I know I've learned my lesson.