This is all Carl Weese's fault! With an assist from Mike Johnston.

This is my Panasonic Lumix G3, with the wonderful 14mm lens on it. I came to it in a roundabout way. I am a longtime reader of The Online Photographer, a wonderful blog by Mike Johnston about photography, philosophy, cameras, Wisconsin, art, single parenthood, and the godless, communist Packers (I'm a Giants fan and still haven't forgiven the Lombardi Packers). Because of Mike I have added Pentaxes to my equipment bag, mostly due to the review of the 35mm f/2.8 macro, one of my three favorite lenses ever. From his blog I was directed to Carl Weese's blog, Working Pictures. I loved it for the photography and the occasional writing. Carl lives in NW Connecticut and travels about the area, including New England, taking pictures as he sees them and carrying a pair of huge cameras to record old drive-in movie theaters before they disappear. We used to live in Vermont and my best friend lives in the area of CT near Carl so all of the subjects in his pictures look very familiar, even the weeds.

About a year ago Carl did a self portrait in a mirror and I noticed that he was using a small camera instead of his Pentax. I wrote and asked what it was and learned it was a Lumix. He was in the process of trying to add the G3 to his collection. It was just out and he got lucky and got one. We were about to go to France and a small camera that took large camera quality pictures looked to be just what I wanted. I couldn't find a G3 so I went for the closest thing out at the time, a GF3. It had no viewfinder but was even smaller. If you read my other blog, Two Weekes in Provence, about 3/4 of the pictures were taken with the little wonder. I was amazed at the quality of the files. Luckily I had bought the 20mm f/1.7 lens at the same time. What a lens, sharp and so clear.

When we got back from France the only thing I missed was a viewfinder. The G3 was still not being sold but the G2, it's predecessor,  was discontinued and selling for under $300. I got that and loved having a viewfinder. Lenses were added, the 14mm, Olympus's 17mm and 90mm and a large 45-200 zoom. All of the prime lenses are gems and the long zoom (and the kit zoom for that matter) punch above their weight. I added the G3 when it became available and like it's size over the G2. The only thing that I don't understand is a feature that they removed. On the G2, if you put your eye to the viewfinder you see the image there. If you take your eye away the image switches to the screen on the back of the camera. Very intuitive and handy. On the newer G3 they have a dedicated switch that you have to hit to switch where the image is. I hate it, but the rest of the camera is so good that I live with it.

So, as you can see, this is all Carl Weese's fault.