blk (01/24/83)
It is nice to see people with strong feelings about the art of manual photos, *BUT* ... if a photographer plans to shoot in color, and have a lab develop and print, full manual is of *minimal* value! The color processing equipment is highly automated and becoming more so. Just as the auto camera averages the scene to one level of 'gray', the auto printers *and* the newer developing machines average to the same overal brightness. The result is that if you meter against the figures face (for perfect exposure of the skin tones) the developer and printer will screw up the picture. Getting a lab to do it 'right' is an expensive hassle. Personally, i like B+W in a private darkroom; but i don't think most cameras are used this way! -brian
3216lmb (01/25/83)
In the article it was mentioned that manual metering is only
of minimal value in color photography because the Lab
uses automatic printers.
First, if you use color slides nothing is printed and
therefore the slide has to correct. Second the point
is made that the lab will charge extra to print it write.
Any decent lab (except ych! photomat) should reprint the
photo until it is right, at no charge.
Larrymalcolm (01/26/83)
#R:sytek:-27600:pur-ee:8400010:000:730 pur-ee!malcolm Jan 25 23:54:00 1983 The main reason that I love my fully manual camera is that it forces me to evaluate the lighting on every shot. I find my shots are much better when I do this. But then I'm somewhat of a perfectionist and get very upset when either I or the camera blows an exposure. I don't think speed is a factor at all....I miss more shots because I can't focus fast enough (usually very low light). I have a Vivitar 282 flash that I use mainly in automatic mode but then I am very careful to choose an appropiate f-stop (one of four possible) based on what ratio I want between ambient and flash light and how difficult it is to focus the camera (a function of number of beers and low light). Malcolm Slaney Purdue EE Dept.
smith (02/23/83)
#R:sytek:-27600:umn-cs:9000005:000:690 umn-cs!smith Feb 22 15:59:00 1983 Maybe I just have too much distrust of automation (too much experience programming, perhaps) but I feel far more comfortable with my FM2 than I feel borrowing friends' automatics. Maybe I just have this fetish for weird lighting, but I've found that typical camera meters too often average the wrong things when left on their own. I've done best when I measure the light, set the camera, and then take pictures till the lighting situation changes. This is especially true in backlit situations where the automatic camera will happily underexpose your picture. Sorry, but I really doubt that automatic equipment will screw up when printing a PROPERLY EXPOSED backlit picture. Rick.