Arley offered to stir things up in a previous thread. I wanted to respond but as a separate thread to give more focus to an idea rattling around in my head (one of those voices that talk to me when no one is there).
"For those that want to go back to the old days of film, I'm sorry, but those days are fast disappearing if you plan on being successful. Sure you may find yourself a little nitch somewhere, but those nitches are getting harder and harder to find...
"Many members who were still shooting film degraded digital and swore that film was so much better and digital could never match it. For those of us that were shooting digital, we could sense their anxiety of the coming realization that all they had learned about photography and the experience they had brought to the table was about to go out the door as winning digital prints began overtaking film prints in our competitions and less experienced photographers began to excel...
No doubt about it, digital is here to stay. With it comes a new world and a new definition of a photography."...
Arley
Years ago I read an article about the "S Curve" for technology. The gist of it was that every technology starts out rough and slow, then it improves quickly surpassing it's predecessor, then it plateaus and is eventually replaced by the next great technology.
Film started out slow, then blossomed into something great, then improvements became small and farther between. Digital cameras did the same, surpassing film, but I'll say that the hardware improvements are now turning more toward the bells and whistles.
More recently the software, in the form of Photoshop and others, is still improving rapidly. But what's coming up fast is the software internal to the cameras that operates when we put the camera on "Auto" (the green spot). The camera can't tell you how best to compose your picture (yet) but the quality of the "Auto" JPEGs is quickly catching up to what the experts can do in many cases (though they'll probably curse me for saying it).
Therefore, I suggest that new photographers consider sticking with, mostly, auto settings until they become proficient in composition. I think that this will give them better pictures from the start which will increase their confidence, reduce the early learning burden that scares many new photographers off, and allow them to put off buying expensive software until they have a better idea of what they want to do with their photographs.
"For those that want to go back to the old days of film, I'm sorry, but those days are fast disappearing if you plan on being successful. Sure you may find yourself a little nitch somewhere, but those nitches are getting harder and harder to find...
"Many members who were still shooting film degraded digital and swore that film was so much better and digital could never match it. For those of us that were shooting digital, we could sense their anxiety of the coming realization that all they had learned about photography and the experience they had brought to the table was about to go out the door as winning digital prints began overtaking film prints in our competitions and less experienced photographers began to excel...
No doubt about it, digital is here to stay. With it comes a new world and a new definition of a photography."...
Arley
Years ago I read an article about the "S Curve" for technology. The gist of it was that every technology starts out rough and slow, then it improves quickly surpassing it's predecessor, then it plateaus and is eventually replaced by the next great technology.
Film started out slow, then blossomed into something great, then improvements became small and farther between. Digital cameras did the same, surpassing film, but I'll say that the hardware improvements are now turning more toward the bells and whistles.
More recently the software, in the form of Photoshop and others, is still improving rapidly. But what's coming up fast is the software internal to the cameras that operates when we put the camera on "Auto" (the green spot). The camera can't tell you how best to compose your picture (yet) but the quality of the "Auto" JPEGs is quickly catching up to what the experts can do in many cases (though they'll probably curse me for saying it).
Therefore, I suggest that new photographers consider sticking with, mostly, auto settings until they become proficient in composition. I think that this will give them better pictures from the start which will increase their confidence, reduce the early learning burden that scares many new photographers off, and allow them to put off buying expensive software until they have a better idea of what they want to do with their photographs.