Cameras are missing ... fun ?!?!?!?!

[pocketshaver]

T

It's true, you cannot compare the 2019 cell phone with a 1973 canon FTB. The cell phone has a web browser, the camera, a video camera, a music player, and worldwide Internet connectivity, and it allows you to snap a photo, and to instantaneously share that photo through a wide variety of media platforms. The FTB uses a now-defunct type of mercury cell battery, and it only shoots photos.,Which will be developed, and then require scanning to share with others.

In 1973 or so, the FTB was a cutting-edge camera, but now it is tremendously outdated, and the batteries it it was originally designed to use are no longer allowable by law.

Again Johnston is firmly rooted in the past, and was unaware of the shortcut to get his iPhone camera into almost instantaneous action with a double press of the home button. Several years ago he complained of how slow it was to get his iPhone camera into action. To compound matters, he was using one of those flip open wallet- style cases, so anything he has to say about digital cameras is in my opinion somewhat suspect.

His idea that a Camera introduced in 1953 (The Leica M3) is the ideal learning tool in the year 2019 is suspect. Imagine if I selected something approximately 7years behind the times as the ideal way to learn how to operate an iPhone or iPad. I guess one could say that the best tool To learn how to use a modern word processing application would be a 1953 underwood portable manual typewriter?

This is pretty amazing really, that a person can be considered an imbecile in the operation of a phone simply for getting a phone case that you don't like... Seriously. The phone case has no impact at all on skill or not. Its like saying I can call you a moron and imbecile if you don't get snow tires with the mountain peak as well as the snow flake logo.

The FTBn is SUPERIOR because it is only a camera. Gasp how horrid, to have a machine to take pictures with that was designed to take pictures. THAT is part of what makes an actual camera so freaking fun. All you do is point the lens at something, get it in the frame, zoom and focus all you want, then adjust aperture and shutter so it balances.... and take a photo.

 

[pocketshaver]

If you get an old enough camera you don't need a battery at all! But now you get the zinc air etc. and it is what it is. Adapt and live with it.

One advantage to mechanical cameras is no need for an extra battery or charger, you just toss in another roll of film and keep shooting. (I used to be pretty fast rewinding and reloading a camera but I'm out of game shape!)

Who needs word processing? I don't, a manual typewriter would suit me fine (and I've had that in the back of my mind, one of those cool vintage ones, maybe one of these days).

What I see often is people not learning how to get proper exposures, how to frame shots well, or how to see everything in the viewfinder/on the viewscreen. Somehow those skills are being bypassed, and those of us that learned on film or shoot film today seem to get the importance of those skills. A lot of people seem to depend on shooting whatever and fixing it later which seems to be making more work for yourself but so it goes... and this is getting enough OT by now I guess! lol

That's kind of the problem, I remember a few articles from way back in time when the electronic auto focus systems came into being. They took so much OUT of taking the picture... Its why so many people in the enthusiast/proconsumer markets despised and loathed the point and shoot cameras.

When you are sitting on that park bench, and have to manually adjust the lens and shutter speed you are learning something. When you develop the film you learn even more. Sure it may not be "instant" feedback in the form of a digital photo but there is something that is important with a film camera.

You have to get the photo by adjusting aperture, focus, zoom, shutter speed, and in some instances the iso setting. All manually. That way you actually learn how the forces of photography work together. It may not be a fun learning curve, and the fact that you wont make "great" pictures for a few months doesn't help but you learn something.

Unlike on a cell phone that automatically adjusts brightness, contrast, and gives you the same damn aperture no matter what. Sure a fixed aperture is ok for most things, but having a fully adjustable aperture like on a simple 50mm FD prime lens, you GET SO MUCH MORE OUT OF IT.

 

[weepete]

There is a wider conversation that does need to be had. We as photographers can be viewed in a negative light nowadays and that's possibly part of the lack of fun.

Gradually, it's creeping into the minds of people that if you have a big camera (read dslr) you are up to no good. The media, ironically, I think have had a big part to play. Where as getting your photo taken in the 70's and 80's was a bit of a laugh and viewed as harmless there is a suspicion now.

 

[pocketshaver]

There is a wider conversation that does need to be had. We as photographers can be viewed in a negative light nowadays and that's possibly part of the lack of fun.

Gradually, it's creeping into the minds of people that if you have a big camera (read dslr) you are up to no good. The media, ironically, I think have had a big part to play. Where as getting your photo taken in the 70's and 80's was a bit of a laugh and viewed as harmless there is a suspicion now.

I have seen so many issues of people walking into school and public bathrooms and locker rooms and using CELLPHONES and mini cameras to take naked pictures of people without permission.
Have never seen anything of someone walking into one of those places and taking nude pictures of people with say a SLR or DSLR at any time, like say with a Leica M3

 

[beagle100]

I'm just going to say that if you are not having fun with your camera you're not photographing the right stuff!

seems reasonable
www.flickr.com/photos/mmirrorless

 

[Derrel]

I'm just going to say that if you are not having fun with your camera you're not photographing the right stuff!

seems reasonable
www.flickr.com/photos/mmirrorless

As I wrote above: "If a person cannot have fun taking pictures with any camera made from 1899 to 2019, then the problem lies not with the camera but with the photographer."

Most new cameras for the past 35 years have been autofocus. For the prior 35 years, a good percentage of the cameras had built-in light meters. Seems there's a subset of photography
entuhsiasts who feel that "fun" requires stepping backward 40,50,60,or70 years in time, to now-obsolescent tech and methods, in order to do things much as they did when they were youthful.

Suggesting that using a meterless, bottom-loading 35mm rangefinder Leica camera and ONE lens camera to become proficient at modern photography is kind of silly, like studying abacus computation as a way to become a modern mathematician, or relying on a slide rule to solve complex mathematical equations...when a teenager with a $30 HP scientific calculator can solve the same problem in less time...

 

[Derrel]

There is a wider conversation that does need to be had. We as photographers can be viewed in a negative light nowadays and that's possibly part of the lack of fun.

Gradually, it's creeping into the minds of people that if you have a big camera (read dslr) you are up to no good. The media, ironically, I think have had a big part to play. Where as getting your photo taken in the 70's and 80's was a bit of a laugh and viewed as harmless there is a suspicion now.

I have seen so many issues of people walking into school and public bathrooms and locker rooms and using CELLPHONES and mini cameras to take naked pictures of people without permission.
Have never seen anything of someone walking into one of those places and taking nude pictures of people with say a SLR or DSLR at any time, like say with a Leica M3

Jesus.. you are really wound up today!!! This is your THIRD anti-digital screed today,and you have had your two earlier threads locked today...

I hope you come to peace with the world of 2019, and get over your nostalgia for the FTB and the state of the world back in 1973...

YOU wrote: " I have seen so many issues of people walking into school and public bathrooms and locker rooms and using CELLPHONES and mini cameras to take naked pictures of people without permission."

Sure, sure, sure.

 

[Peeb]

"A good photograph is knowing where to stand"- Ansel Adams

THIS, to me, is where the fun often resides.

My favorites photographs invariably have resulted from a preconceived vision of what I wanted, followed by planning, preparation, (often) travel, and execution, followed by processing. The fact that cameras are amazingly more effective at capturing light and images has not diminished this fun.

Perhaps, for Mike, the fun was in having arcane knowledge that gave him a competitive advantage that is ever quickly evaporating in the face of technology?

 

[Derrel]

This is pretty amazing really, that a person can be considered an imbecile in the operation of a phone simply for getting a phone case that you don't like... Seriously. The phone case has no impact at all on skill or not. Its like saying I can call you a moron and imbecile if you don't get snow tires with the mountain peak as well as the snow flake logo.

You are clearly uninformed here.

Clearly, you did not read his article a few years ago...he 1) did not know know the double press-the-home button-to launch-camera-instantly-with-iPhone that was current at the time,on the exact model and with the OS that his phone had and 2) he had a case in which the camera was very slow to get into shooting operation. He basically didn't have a CLUE that millions of people knew the shortcut for...he was bitching and moaning about how slow the iPhone was to snap a photo--but he was acting like an old man trapped in a time warp...he had Not learned the basics. He was blaming the tool, not himself and the wallet-style case is an example of a person using and old-fashioned idea..a case that entombs the camera/phone.Sort of like the 1950's style everready case, often called the " never ready case".


A newbie pontificating about something he knows nothing of...imagine that....

In short, he was an out-of touch guy, bitching about technology limiting him, when he was at fault for not understanding that his complaint had been solved, and that there was a solution that had been developed--but his "old man" side prevented him from learning a basic that millions of other users understood fully. He was about five years behind the times in his thinking.

Luddites are comical when they wax poetic about things made in1953 as being great tools for learning. Fountain pens, propeller airliners, slide rules, bias ply tires with inner tubes, and tube TVs and radios,over-the-air television broadcasting, vinyl disc records..all sooooooo 1953, and yet all sooooooo obsolescent.

 

[Derrel]

Here is his level of inexperience on full display:10/16/14 The Morning Comment: iPhoneCam


The statement that the iPhone is a good camera has achieved the level of truism, but it mystifies me. Mine isn't, to me. I have an iPhone 4s, which I've been forced to carry far more often recently because it's temporarily the only phone I own. When I was young—to you younger people, that would be when Teddy Roosevelt was President and they hadn't invented the Victrola yet—cases for MMM (metal, manual, mechanical) SLRs were sold that were called "ever-ready cases." The standard joke was that they were really "never-ready cases." Because by the time you had wrangled your camera out of its case, your picture had retired and moved to Florida.

The iPhone is worse than those.

Granted, this is partially because I use a beautiful little leather iPhone case that interferes with the camera. So when I want to take a picture I have to: fish the phone out of my pocket. Flip open the case. Flick to unlock. Enter the number code. Hit the camera app. Unfold the case to get it out of the way of the lens. Squint at the poor viewfinder. Try to hold the phone still even though it's not meant to be held that way. Taking a picture with it is a bit like the famous walking dog: It is not done well; but you are surprised to find it done at all.

My picture by that time had better be static; a fast-moving picture has long since escaped by the time I'm ready to "capture" it with an iPhone.

Of course if I do manage to take the picture, I'd better hope it's a bad picture, not a good one, because if it's something I want I'll have to suffer from having gotten the right picture with the wrong camera! Always a miserable fate.

I guess an iPhone is good enough for some people. David Hume Kennerly, who I met once in a line at a deli in Washington D.C., used one for a project

to improve his photography. He's a better photographer than I am, by quite some.

But to me, the iPhone is a wretched, paltry little camera, one that's only "good" insofar as something is better than nothing. I hate using it and I can't understand why anyone feels otherwise.

But then, I don't understand everything.

 

[Derrel]

so.... he1) first opens the leather never-ready case,2) he flicks to open the entry screen 3)then he enters his 4-digit passcode, then 4) he searches thru the apps, then 5)he launches the camera...and the photo has disappeared by then.As he wrote in his last line, " But then, I don't understand everything." No kidding!

The very FIRST reader comment/reply showed his uninformed nature:

"Press the home button, then swipe up from the bottom of the screen, and you'll see about a dozen icons, including one for the camera. Unlocking the phone isn't necessary—this shortcut allows you to take a photo with up to three stops of dynamic range in just a moments."

( Note: the idea that the iPhone4s had a mere three stops of dynamic range-- as uniformed a comment as Johnston's 5-step process of readying the camera for a shot.)

 

[petrochemist]

Long rambling nonsense.
Nearly all my interchangeable lens cameras still have 'fun' as a feature - the probable exception is an old low resolution cs-mount camera which needs both mains power & a computer to use.
Despite the claim that cameras offer everything you could want none of the cameras on the market has all the features I want, in fact I'm pretty sure it would be impossible to design a single camera with ALL the features, but perhaps all I want could be fitted into 3 custom designed bodies - not much chance of every finding out.

Personally I don't enjoy photography with a phone, but I certainly wouldn't think that means they cant be fun.

 

[Derrel]

I find it ironic that the guy who didn't know how to operate his iPhone 4s would have the nerve to write that modern cameras are no longer fun. Of course he's the same guy who several years ago came up with the brilliant idea of buying a Leica and one lens and shooting nothing else for a year


Like I said in my first response, Mike's column was really a poor one, and came off as an old curmudgeon telling people that the camera that was released at the tail end of the Korean war was the best learning tool in the 21st-century. Of course a guy like this is going to not understand where he is at in time. Come on, a Leica M3? Yes it's nice film camera, but is it a Nikon D500? A camera for which there are no zoom lenses made? A guy so firmly entrenched in the 1950s mentality that he has the hubris to suggest that the best learning tool is half a century out of date?

The idea that modern cameras are no longer fun is really a photographer related problem. It's kind of like my dead grandfather lamenting the fact that"cars now drive 65 miles an hour at half throttle."

 

[Derrel]

A few years ago I was looking through a 1950s era book, and it showed a boxing photo that was made with it Leica M3, and pushed black-and-white film. This was around 1957 or so, and the photograph was extremely Poor by what are today's standards. Using 200 ASA Super-XX film pushed two stops,the photo was at best,what one would expect from a poor modern cell phone shot at the modern boxing ring.

As to the Leica-made 1950's boxing match ring photo: I was appalled. The poor technical quality was staggering. Today a kit lens and a Nikon D3400 would do better, by way of its far better high ISO performance. Even using the kit lens, a beginner level single lens reflex camera and lens that can be bought for less than $400 today would have easily shot rings around a top level professional kit from the 1950s. Imagine the lessons one would NOT be able to learn form the 1953 Leica M3.Zooming. Autofocusing. Fill-flash in broad daylight. Macro. Long tele work. Low-light sports. And more.

The idea that a person should select a Leica and shoot nothing else for a year to learn photography in 2015 and 2016,was to me, a really far out idea. The Leica is one of the worst flash cameras ever made, and has a flash synchronization speed that is roughly 100 years behind the times. Seriously .

A modern mid-level or high end camera can synchronize flash at Up to 1/8000 second. The Leica M3 came out 25 years after the flashbulb was invented.

And now several years later,we have the same guy talking about how all the fun has been engineered out of modern digital cameras. Keep in mind this is the guy who suggested that his readers buy a rangefinder camera and shoot nothing else, with one lens, for a year
,in order to "learn photography". About 50% of the comments supported his idea, and the other half of commenters saw through his BS.

 

[Solarflare]

Well, I dont ever use zoom lenses and I dont ever miss zoom lenses.

And I would have no qualms about recommenting people to learn photography with prime lenses. Whats the problem ? You have to move around more to get the right perspective for your shot, but thats all the "cost" compared to prime lenses.

On the other hand prime lenses are smaller, more compact, cheaper, brighter, offer to shoot with less depth of field, and offer higher image quality. Thats why using them is more fun and thats why I never use zooms anymore.

I especially get annoyed whenever I read zooms would be more "flexible". In truth prime lenses are just as flexible as zooms, if not much more so. The only difference is you have to move around for the right perspective, but you get all the other options primes can do and zooms cant.

Sure, sometimes you really need the variability of focal length. Then you need a zoom. But other than that, your default lens should really be a prime, not a zoom, for the reasons given above.

 

[RVT1K]

I especially get annoyed whenever I read zooms would be more "flexible". In truth prime lenses are just as flexible as zooms, if not much more so. The only difference is you have to move around for the right perspective, but you get all the other options primes can do and zooms cant.

Unless you're attempting to photograph animals and your moving scares them away. I've even spooked birds by simply bringing my hand to the shutter.

There are lots of scenarios where moving isn't really an option or moving will not really help.

And I really don't think any one of us is the reference standard for defining what fun is.