Preface: Compact Camera Photo Gallery: Believe It or Not

Believe it or not, I have been photographing with digital compact cameras for about ten years. Among numerous trips around the world, I took a compact camera to the Royal Kingdom of Nepal in 1997, India in 1999 and Cuba in 2001. I thought it would be fun to select my favorite compact camera photos from those trips; they are pictured in this chapter.

Believe It: Inspirations for a Compact Shooter

This is not a how-to chapter. Rather, it's a gallery-type chapter that's designed to inspire you take great pictures with you compact camera.

I also wanted to show you that I actually have been shooting with compact cameras for some time—in addition, of course, to shooting with my pro SLRs. Some of these pictures have never been published ... and may never have been if not for this book.

So you might be asking, "Why did Rick take pictures with his compact digital camera when he had his pro SLR with him?" Well, on my trips to Nepal and India, my pro camera was a film camera. I was just getting into digital photography at that time, and I wanted to compare the results from both cameras.