charles brown Loc: Tennesse

good points

delder Loc: Maryland

Once I graduated from my Yashicaflex, most of my cameras had some sort of Match-Needle exposure adjustment.
Did this mean that I was NOT shooting in Manual?

BigDaddy Loc: Pittsburgh, PA

Shooting in manual is not all that hard to learn. Of course using all the features of your camera often requires knowledge of how to do it manually. That doesn't mean you always need/should be in manual mode.

russraman Loc: New York City

Some of the best high quality new and vintage prime lenses for the Nikon ecosystem are only available as manual focus lenses, such as Carl Zeiss 35mm f2 ZE/ZE2 Distagon T*, Nikkor 50mm f1.4 Ai/Ai-S, Nikkor 50mm f1.8 SERIES E AI-S “Pancake,” Voigtlander 58mm f1.4 Nokton, Carl Zeiss 85mm f1.4 ZE/ZE2 Planar T*, Nikkor 105mm f/1.8 Ai-S, Nikkor 135mm f2.8/f3.5 Ai/Ai-S, Nikkor 200mm f/4 Ai-S Micro and Nikkor 300mm f2.8 Ai-S.

Blenheim Orange Loc: Michigan

Why not? Serious question. What am I missing? I don't want the settings on the camera to change on their own. Why would I? Specific apertures and shutter speeds are used for specific purposes.

dustie Loc: Nose to the grindstone

Why, oh why, are cameras not made with a most useful AAC mode?

Automatic Artistic Composition mode could be so very useful to those of us who want to take pictures that do have artistic appeal value. Instead, we mostly just either collect or discard mundane stuff that does not really interest others nor ourselves.

Besides, maybe it could be kinda fun to watch the little figure on the LCD screen which is directing us to move left, right, forward, backward, up, down, left tilt, right tilt, downward tilt, upward tilt.

Well, you know, if AI is supposed to be the next "in thing", why can't we just let it do the composition for us stumblebums, too?

RodeoMan Loc: St Joseph, Missouri

You are a photographer if you use a cheap disposable off brand camera to make a blurry image of God knows what. You are simply at the poor side of the spectrum of photographers that range from the poorly equipped incompentent
poorly trained, no experience, could care less clicker to the professional photographer with all qualities that entails.

rmalarz Loc: Tempe, Arizona

Thank you very much, Blenheim Orange.
--Bob

KarenKaptures Loc: New Jersey

👍🏾👍🏾

dustie Loc: Nose to the grindstone

Thanks, Man. 👍

Maybe there is a place in the world for us doofuses on the poor side of the spectrum, after all.

Now, if we can just learn all the rules of keeping our failures out of sight, so we don't drag down the public impression of proper photography and skillful photographers in general, and make things unjustifiably tougher on those at the experienced upper side of the spectrum.

gwilliams6

Bigdaddy, the reality is I and many pros still prefer the TOTAL creative control that shooting in manual mode gives us to control ALL variables of settings at the same time.

I will sometimes shoot in auto ISO in fast changing lighting conditions, but even then I control that by setting limits to the auto ISO range, so the camera doesn't blindly take me too far into high ISO, losing too much dynamic range and pushing the limits with noise.

And I shoot all subjects, indoors and outdoors, professionally all around the world.

Cheers and best to you.

bikinkawboy Loc: north central Missouri

It’s truly amazing that I was able to get any kind of photo, good or bad, with my dad’s 35mm Zeiss Ikon. It has an exposure meter that is coupled with that beautifully machined ring up front that adjusts the aperture. No ability to change the shutter speed and focus is turning another nicely machined ring around the lens to one of three positions, a face, a group of people or mountains. It cost my dad $50 in approximately 1962, give or take a few years. Making $7.50 a day at the refinery, that was a fair chunk of money.

Whether you take advantage of preprogrammed modes or do everything manually, we have it made today. Even if you do every conceivable thing manually, you still have more creative control than my dad could have dreamed of. We can actually see if the subject is in focus, hit a depth of field button to see what all is in focus, change shutter speeds and the flash, whether built in or external, communicates with the lens and camera and you really have to screw up to get bad exposure. My dad died ages ago, but he would have been amazed that if you wish, you can simply twist a knob for the kind of scene you are looking at.

Before that he used a Graflex, which operating was a total guess and as a boy watched his dad set up the glass plate Rochester (that I still have). If those two guys could see this thread, they would both think that everyone here (including myself) are a bunch of blooming idiots. And for you manual only shooters, my grandfather would no doubt laugh in your face with you thinking you have control over everything. He’d probably say something to the effect of, “throw the cape on the Rochester over your head and then tell me you are exercising manual control of your camera.” Even our manual mode is automated compared to the Rochester. Instead of calling it manual, it probably should be called “less automated.”

gwilliams6

Nice stories and memories. No one is comparing the "manual" of old with the "manual" of today. I am old enough to have shot with every kind of camera from minox size to 620, 120, 35mm film, 2 1/4 film , up to and including view cameras, up to an 11X14 Inch Dierdorf and a 4X5 inch Graflex. No wet plates, but plenty of loading and unload film holders in the dark and processing in chemicals. And decades without any autofocus, including shooting major pro sports and breaking news. Try that on sometime..

So my answer to you is yes, there is some automation working for us even when we shoot in "manual" mode nowadays. But mine and others' choice to shoot mainly in manual DOES give us the most complete creative control over ALL our settings to achieve our vision for our work.

Trust me I get all the cutting-edge performance and image quality in stills and video out of my Sony A7RIV, A1, A7SIII, and my current 13 E-mount lenses from 10mm to 600mm while mainly shooting in manual mode.

To me the results are worth it for the extra effort. But no one has to shoot like me, or put in that bit of extra thought and extra effort. I teach my hundreds of photo students to know how to use and master all the features and settings on their cameras ,and they can choose to shoot all auto or manual or a combination of both, depending on their needs and preferences.

IMHO it is very shortsighted and arrogant for anyone like any youtubers to proclaim that manual mode is overrated. Who made them the photo gods and gave them the rights to say what is overrated or outdated if people are still using it and making great shots. That is like anyone prematurely saying DSLRs are dead. They aren't as long as folks still love and use them. But hey a topic like this gets youtube channel clicks and that makes them money, LOL

Everyone has their preferences and we can talk about this forever here in UHH, and folks can make up their own minds which path they choose to go down, and which methods work best for what they are trying to create. There is still room for all of us and our different ways of doing things.

To demonize or infer that others are dumb or out of touch because they do things differently than you or the masses is very intolerant and I wont sink to that level in my career as a photographer and as a Professor of Photography.

I will never teach it or advocate for a photo world where everyone has to do everything the same way. Maybe one day youtubers will be overrated and/or outdated themselves and no one will listen to them anymore, LOL

Cheers and best to you all.

(Download)

bikinkawboy Loc: north central Missouri

Well put gwilliam6. Regardless of what it is, we all tend to use the best or do things the best way...for us.

MrBob Loc: lookout Mtn. NE Alabama

I am only entering into this because of some thing I just read yesterday regarding the brain being very resistant to any change from bad habits... Don't get me wrong, Everyone is doing what seems to them to be the most effective and most comfortable to him/her. Gw, as a working pro, and well above my pay grade and expertise, is more aware of the finer points of photography and what they can offer, and being a professional incorporates these finer points into his work. Scott has his opinions as do everyone else; if everyone is right, then no one is wrong, right ! I guess what I am saying is that no matter how comfy you are in your MO, sometimes just getting out of your comfort zone and TRYING something else can be a revelation or maybe just plain revolting ! But, as always, do what you really enjoy and is comfy to you doing so... Otherwise you will be putting the camera in the drawer and that is not productive at all...