For me I had to come full circle. My father was a photographer in the Navy in WWII aboard the USS Wasp in the pacific. He then continued as a civilian employee of the military as a photographer and motion picture cameraman and then a director. He tried to teach photography to his kids but he didn't have the patience of a teacher nor was he able to express the passion he must have had for photography with us for some unknown reason. Plus because he was always around to take good pictures we never bothered to pick up a camera on our own. So growing up I was always around photographers and cameras and those damn lightmeters that looked so fascinating to a young boy but were never allowed to touch. I couldn't tell you how many of those of his I must have broken, taken them apart losing parts, screwing up the settings. This was in the 60's and 70's, that stuff wasn't all automatic and it was expensive. At one point I developed my own b&w images but I wouldn't do it right and my father would yell and take over and that would be the end of that. On occasion I would buy a P&S take some decent pictures, then lose the camera or break it. It wasn't until I was 30 that I picked up a N50, a Tamaron lens and started shooting. Whether he realizes it or not, everything my father and his friends taught me started to come to the surface. I quickly grew out of that system and have sinced moved on to both simpler but better equipment to more elaborate professional 35mm equipment. And every once in awhile when all the cylinders are firing and the lighting falls just right and I know I just nailed the shot, I then know the passion he must have had when he often did the same.