In the manual mode
I was recently reminded after watching a news segment on the assassination of JFK on November 22, 1963, I thought it might be good timing to suggest for your approval, one of my recent quotes. Like so many people of my generation, I remember exactly what i was doing the moment I had heard. I was sitting in a barber chair getting my hair cut.
Now, in remembrance of those incredible times, I offer you this quote that you’ll hopefully take to heart and include in your thought process when composing your photos: “Ask not what your camera can do for you, ask what you can do with your camera”. There’s no disrespect meant here, since I like so many others in that generation loved the president and agree that his famous quote will go down as one of a poignant reminder of such a tragic time.
With my online class with the BPSOP and in my “Stretching Your Frame of Mind” workshops I conduct around the planet, I work mainly with fellow photographers that have only been shooting in the digital era. The era where you no longer have to worry or think for that matter about how to take a picture…it’s so simple you see. All you have to do is aim the lens at something and pull the trigger; that’s Texas talk for clicking the shutter. The camera will do all your thinking for you, and what the camera leaves out, the computer and all the software you crammed in it will do the rest.
It will blink when you’re clipping a highlight, it shows you a histogram so you don’t have to actually study the light for yourself, It tells you what exposure to use, whether you like it or not, It focuses automatically which is a luxury not a necessity. It can bracket automatically which is a good thing, and some cameras even cleaned the sensor for you. Last, it provides so many different shooting programs that to know what all of them mean would take a degree from MIT.
I’ve heard of plans for some states to make it legal to actually marry your camera…No, say it ain’t so!!!
Ok, here’s some of the things you can do with your camera. You can crop in it so you’ll know where the edges of your frame are and use those edges as a compositional tool. You can move your camera to the ‘M’ setting.
For those of you that have no idea what ‘M’ stands for, it stands for manual. From there you can set your own shutter speed/aperture combination thus beginning to study and learn about the light. You can focus it yourself when those weird times come into play where the camera can’t decide what exactly it is you want in focus.
For those people that only shoot horizontally (and you know who you are), you can turn the camera 90 degrees and shoot vertically; btw, there’s more energy in a vertical than a horizontal. You can either look through the viewfinder or use live view when you’re in a weird spot. Some people even hide behind it to be invisible; war photographers did this all the time. If you put your camera on a tripod, you become the same artist as the ones that put a canvas on an easel. With the help of your camera, you can capture the beauty that surrounds you, making you feel good. And last, I seen people hammer small nails with their camera!!!
And so my fellow photographers, “Ask not what your camera can do for you, ask what you can do with your camera”
Visit my brand new website at: www.joebaraban.com, and check out my workshop schedule at the top of this blog. Come shoot with me sometime.
JoeB
