Sold my DSLR set up. Not sure this is for me

[The_Traveler]

When someone pays a good deal of money for a dSLR and lenses, the expectations are higher for the resulting pictures.
With dSLR lenses cameras, good pictures depend on proper f stop, proper shutter speed, proper focusing, good composition and proper post-processing.
- and it takes some good degree of skill to choose the 'proper' combinations.
Yes, a total newbie can get the occasional decent shot, because the great, smart cameras are helping and, by chance, the settings made on the camera are correct for the shot.

With P&S cameras the expectation is lower, the effort required is less and depth of field is so great that everything is in focus and so the number of acceptable pictures is greater.

I may be able to get one single beautiful note out of a Stradivarius but a total melody would be out of my grasp - no matter the quality of the instrument.
Same with photography.

 

[sashbar]

Of the 4000 I took, I really like about 25% of them.

I envy you.


On a serious note - from what I read, I feel you do care about the quality of your shots and want to take better photos than an average mobile phone snapshot. Otherwise you would not bother sharing your thoughts on this site.

The images you have posted are not bad. I like the arc shot with the clouds and all. The framing in your shots is consistently too tight, probably because you have never learned composition and feel more comfortable making it all tight and central. But all in all your shots are much better than one could expect from your first post. A lot of guys do much worse than that, but they are happy, because they like thier gadgets: cameras, lenses, flashes etc. You seem to care about the image, and this is a very good sign as far as I see.

Now, what baffles me - why do you refuse to learn a bit ? It is not a rocket science. It will not take much time to learn the basics about exposure, composition and light. Let's say - you get three books on these subjects. One weekend for each book - and by August you will be MUCH more confident and aware of what you are doing. You may then keep learning photography for the rest of your life, but that is not nessessary if all you want is to use a good camera to take good images.

I think switching to a small camera, maybe not nessessary a P&S, maybe a cheaper small mirrorles like Olympus like Pen E-PL5 would be a good start, simply because you will carry it around more and will take more pictures. And this is what you will need: read a couple of books and practice.

So I would say - three lazy weekends with three books:

1/ Understanding Exposure by Bryan Peterson
2/ The Photographer's Eye: Composition and Design For Better Photos by Michael Freeman
3/ Chasing the Light: Improving Your Photography With Available Light by Ibarionex Perello.

And by August you will come back with great images.

One warning:you will still like no more than 25% of your shots. Probably less.
And the more you learn and the better you shoot the less is this percentage.

So choice is yours

 

[Derrel]

Some of these are very decent! I thought you had returned with utter,total rubbish...but these are not that bad. With a bit of editing in an efficient and simple editor, like Lightroom, you could be cranking out well-processed shots. But a 25% "like" ratio...that is insanely high!!!! I LIKE ABOUT 1% OF MY FRAMES, and I've been shooting pictures since 1973.

 

[minicoop1985]

I LIKE ABOUT 1% OF MY FRAMES, and I've been shooting pictures since 1973.

This makes me feel a lot better about myself, suddenly.

 

[jtyson]

Thanks for the positive comments on the photos. From serious folks like you, decent is much better than I expected to hear.

I do like things very central. OCD. I like everything I do to be symmetrical. Been that way since I was a kid. Patterns are my best friend.

When I say I like 25% of my shots, that is probably because I like the subject matter. If I took pictures of things I don't like, I may not be as impressed with the quality.

As for editing - I have no skills. I've heard of lightroom but never seen it in action. I've used photoshop and gimp, but with no real idea of what I was doing. All I ever really do is crop or resize. But actual editing I have no experience with at all.

As for being unwilling to learn, it isn't so much that. I'm just impatient. I can't read books. Takes too long. Seriously I have not picked up a single book since my freshman year of high school. Books on tape is how I got through school and that was only because I delivered newspapers and had nothing better to do than listen to them while cruising along my route. Now I work for myself and spend 90% of my waking hours either working or marketing my business. My other hobbies are building cars/motorcycles which takes up about 5% and the other 5% left over for daily tasks. I'm already spread very thin. So if I can't watch a video that shows me how to do something in 30 minutes or less, it won't keep my attention.

My reason for considering a nice point and shoot is convenience. I like the idea of a DSLR, but not at this point. It is just too cumbersome. Maybe in the future if I ever slow down and decide to pick up another hobby seriously, then I'll revisit it as an option, but there is just too much of a commitment to carrying around all sorts of gear to take pictures. I want to live the moments, not just snap photos of them. Tough to haul all my gear to the race track or on a long ride. The trip then becomes about photography, rather than the ride or the race. For me, that isn't the goal. But if I have a nice point and shoot more capable than my phone, I can get some nice pictures of what I'm doing, rather than just what is happening around me while I'm setting up shots.

 

[Derrel]

I LIKE ABOUT 1% OF MY FRAMES, and I've been shooting pictures since 1973.

This makes me feel a lot better about myself, suddenly.

Vodka can do the same thing. Tequila works even faster though.

 

[coffeefilter]

I'm just impatient. I can't read books.

If you don't want to read, experiment. Instead of watching that 30-45 minute show, or standing around while waiting for your meal to finish cooking, play with your camera.

Set up an area with lighting that doesn't change, a bright lamp, for example. Set up a tripod, and if you don't have a tripod, set the camera on a table or chair, whatever. Now, start with any of the three, ISO, Aperture, and Shutter. Now, do a set with Aperture and Shutter constant, ISO changing. Start at the lowest setting, and take a picture at every setting above that. Look at how they change.

Just repeat with the other two. You'll have a much better understanding of how these settings affect photos, and you didn't have to read a book. Do the same thing with different lenses.

As for editing software, if you again don't want to read, experiment. Open a picture, adjust a setting and see what happens. Set it back to zero, move on to another setting. When you get an idea of what they individually do, you can start combining them.

 

[jtyson]

I do much better experimenting so that wouldn't be a bad idea. I went to best buy today to play with some point and shoot cameras but like always, only a couple of them were working, and they didn't have an rx100 which is what I really wanted to try out. I did play with another Sony. It was a wx350. 20x zoom or something like that. On regular auto mode, the images were pretty soft, even without zooming in.

Anybody have any experience with decent point and shoots? Preferably reasonably priced ones. I'd rather avoid the ones that are $700, unless I can find them used for much much less.

 

[minicoop1985]

I LIKE ABOUT 1% OF MY FRAMES, and I've been shooting pictures since 1973.

This makes me feel a lot better about myself, suddenly.

Vodka can do the same thing. Tequila works even faster though.

The more vodka, the lower my keeper rate drops through the floor.... as does the camera.

If YOU have roughly the same ratio of "I LIKE THIS SHOT" as I do, honestly, that makes me feel a lot better. Granted, my "I LIKE THIS SHOT" shots aren't exactly of that caliber, but hey.

 

[cynicaster]

OP, I'm guessing that you have developed an "expectation" of what DSLR photography results look like, from looking at the work posted on this site and elsewhere. But you have to keep in mind that most of the best pictures you're seeing are made by means of holistic skill sets that include technical knowledge about how to use the camera, artistic vision, and post processing. You really have to be firing on all of these cylinders to create those images bearing that elusive "a cut above" look. On the fringe of that realm is where the expensive gear really starts to take over as the enabler of further improvement.

It sounds to me like you went into the game just like 90%+ of DSLR buyers do--namely, as somebody thinking that you can buy great results with gear--and ended up learning the hard way that you were duped by the power of spec sheets and marketing. Luckily, you liquidated your gear and got your money back while the stuff was still worth something.

I think those photos you posted are pretty decent, especially for run n' gun vacation shots. But, I also think those same photos could have been made just as well using a late-model iPhone (with the possible exception of the bird pic).

What I'm saying is, compared to P&S cameras and cell phone cameras, the DSLR is a veritable warehouse of flexibility, but truly tapping that well of creative power requires significant effort and learning. There really is no way around this, IMO.

If you're not interested in learning about how to set up your camera properly for all situations, how to compose pleasing frames, how to work with raw files, how to post process, etc. then just get an iPhone 5S, download Instagram, and call it a day.

I feel like I'm being the contrarian here, and I'm comfortable with that. No use in forcing yourself to read books and lay out cash for bulky gear if it doesn't interest you.

 

[The_Traveler]

What cynicaster is saying so eloquently is that there is no magic button to press to get great pictures routinely.

If you are not interested in investing the time and effort to try to be a good photographer, stick with cellphones and P&S cameras.

 

[dubiousone]

Ok....first off I don't see anything wrong with your photos! So the Statue of Liberty is sideways...big deal LOL. It is framed nicely and exposed well. Sure, there are other framing 'options' which would emphasize different elements of the main photo but it's just fine. Take the one of the big shiny globe. Nicely exposed, the main element of the reflection is centered. Looks fine to me. Now, you could have just gotten say, the person behind the guy in the red shirt on the left who looks like they're taking a picture. Zoom in until (I think its a she) is framed around the lower third on the left and her reflection on the other side. You could even play with the depth of field by focusing on her or the reflection putting the other slightly out of focus though the distance might not be far enough to get that perfect slightly out of focus glow. Even if there's none of that, it would still look pretty good I think. The canoe guy; zoom in a bit more, less foreground/background and again using the rule of thirds put him in the left had side of the photo but mostly just him. Still, that photo has some nice clouds, smooth water disturbed by only the boat's wake and the waves beyond are nicely visible.

So...if I went out and bought a good quality banjo and without ever reading the instructions, taking a lesson or learning really how to play the thing and found out I couldn't even play Dueling Banjo I should become frustrated and give up? No, I'd learn how to play the thing!

Photography isn't rocket science; there are techniques that will improve your photographs if you take the time to learn them. I have boxes of negatives and megabytes of photos that I have taken and some are ok, some are good and some are...yeech. I use my cameras for snapshots of 'stuff' and I also go out, not as much as I'd like, on days just taking my time, learning different techniques and trying to improve my skills. One day I might focus just on exposures. Taking difficult situations like half in deep shade half in bright sun and try to 'read' the exposure and see how close I could get not to blow the bright and blot out the shadows. The last roll of Kodak Tri-X (which cost me $23 bucks to develop versus $7 for Fuji color) came out very nice as far as exposure. I am getting better. And I learned that I like Tri-X better than Delta. And, a yellow filter would have made things even better but I wanted to see what it was without a filter. And I found out. Other days I look for depth of field situations and try to use that in creating a photo I might like. More often than not it looked better in the viewfinder than it does...after. Well heck, even when they're crappy I can look at them much later and say 'I took that one like this' or 'this was where I tried for this but I didn't want to stand in the road to get the shot and get run over' because each one tells a story in its own way. The trick of course is to go to the next level I suppose it could be called, take a photo is such a way that someone who wasn't there that day can look at it and 'get it'. I'm so not there yet but I'm still having fun trying!

 

[dubiousone]

I do much better experimenting so that wouldn't be a bad idea. I went to best buy today to play with some point and shoot cameras but like always, only a couple of them were working, and they didn't have an rx100 which is what I really wanted to try out. I did play with another Sony. It was a wx350. 20x zoom or something like that. On regular auto mode, the images were pretty soft, even without zooming in.

Anybody have any experience with decent point and shoots? Preferably reasonably priced ones. I'd rather avoid the ones that are $700, unless I can find them used for much much less.

Quite honestly I have yet to pick up a P&S that is equal or even close to any of my DSLR's (or film cameras for that matter). I have a Canon powershot; 16MP, about as big as a pack of cigs and it has a nice live view screen. Virtually no control IMO of aperture, shutter or anything. It takes pictures when you press the button. When it needs a flash it does it and those are usually over or under exposed. It has poor focus points and the autofocus sucks compared to even my D50 BUT...when I need a camera to stick in a pocket and ALL I need are pictures and don't care if they're 'good' that's what I use. At my local store I played with the new-hottest Fuji XT-1. Has kind of a retro look that appealed to me but it took about zero point two seconds for that to wear off once I held it. Way too small. Controls poorly placed for me and I absolutely HATED the 'video screen viewfinder'. How anybody can compose properly in such a murky little tunnel is beyond me. I'm sure it takes technically wonderful photos but it is definitely not for me. Like I said, I haven't found ANY P&S that even comes close to even my 1970's vintage Mamiya DTL 1000.....

 

[IzzieK]

Photography, like playing a musical instrument, is learned. You were not born to it. As simple as that. If you put the time in, with mistakes you will learn. With reading you will learn. With practice you will learn.

 

[jtyson]

I appreciate all the responses. I've been doing a bit of searching online and seeing a lot of poor reviews in regards to speed with P&S cameras. That was one of my main complaints with my photos with my a55. The focus is slow. For landscape, not always an issue, but I spent an entire day on a train and shooting pictures from the train, I probably liked 1 out of 50 because the camera just wasn't fast enough. Granted, that was on dummy mode, so maybe it was fast enough if I was smart enough, but basically a P&S isn't going to get it done for me either.

I've decided to shop craigslist for a good deal on a decent DSLR. I'm in no hurry to buy so I'll wait for a deal I can't pass up, and I'll learn with that over time. Lots of time I'm sure. In the mean time, I'll just work on taking better pictures with my phone.