My first SLR camera was a Zenith 11. It was a big solid Russian brick and for me
it was the perfect introduction to SLR photography. The camera was manual focus, with needle and
ring metering You had to set the
aperture and shutter speed for appropriate for what he needle and ring meter
was telling you. In other words it was
completely manual.
I now have a Pentax K1000.
That too is a fully manual camera.
The difference between the two is that the K1000’s light meter is in the
viewfinder. I don’t need to take the
camera away from my eye.
My Micropress 4”x5” pinhole camera is totally manual. It doesn’t focus. It doesn’t have a shutter and it has a fixed
aperture of f512. It doesn’t even have a
light meter. I have to work that out in
my head using ‘sunny 16’ rule or use an app on my mobile phone. Generally, I opt for ‘sunny 16’.
I also own an Olympus Trip 35. It’s a fantastic little camera. It’s mainly automatic. You use a zone focus system to focus the lens
and the aperture and shutter speed are chosen by the selenium light meter. It’s such a clever piece of engineering it
doesn’t even need batteries. I love
using this camera. It’s so much
fun. Even my kids like using this
camera!
My DSLR is a Pentax KX.
I love this camera too (as you have probably gathered from previous
posts). It has these nifty little modes
on it PASM. I use PAS a lot. I only use M on very limited occasions. It has autofocus. Again, I use this more than I have it turned
off.
Does this make me any less a photographer? The answer, in my honest opinion, is a
resounding no.
I do find it amazing that some photographers believe they
are not a photographer unless they are shooting in manual mode. I would love to know where this opinion has
come from because I do believe it to be utter nonsense. Why?
Well read on and I’ll tell you why.
Let’s start with autofocus.
The autofocus on my KX works. It nails
the point of focus I am after 99% of the time.
The only time it starts to fail is if there isn’t enough light or scene
contrast. I know my camera well enough
to know this and will then flip to manual focus. That being said, there is absolutely no way I
can focus as quickly and as well as my KX.
Now on to determining shutter speed and aperture; whenever I
have seen someone using manual I have asked them how are they are measuring the
light. All of them have told me they use
the cameras light meter. Now forgive me
if I am being naïve but as I understand it, in any of the automatic modes the
camera measures the light and sets the ISO, aperture and shutter appropriate to
the conditions in order to give you the
best photograph possible. If the camera
is in aperture priority mode then it will measure the light, and set the ISO
and shutter speed appropriate to the aperture that you have chosen. The same can be said for shutter priority
mode where the ISO and aperture are set for the chosen shutter speed.
Again, my KX has software built in to it that can make these
decisions in a fraction of a second. I
know I cannot possible read my light meter and dial in the appropriate settings
anywhere near that.
I suppose that the point I’m trying to make is that the
major camera manufacturers has invested millions in to developing Auto PAS
systems that are quick, efficient and accurate; they have invested time and
money to make it easier and more practical for you to go out and shoot
photographs. You have spent hundreds if
not thousands of pounds buying a camera that has these capabilities. Why turn them off? If you want to learn how to shoot manually,
why not buy a totally manual film camera?
Shooting in Auto PAS modes does not make you any less a
photographer. It makes you a wise and
happier one!
