Zen and the Art of Camera Design

Driving Your Camera by Sean Reid

This article put me in the amen seats. What I read from the likes of Thom Hogan, Michael Reichman, etc, is that digital camera designers are engineers not photographers.

Bob

Its one of the reasons that I most enjoy using a Leica M8 to shoot with (above water of course). Yes its digital, but any 1950's photographer used to using an early Leica M3 could pick it up and use it with a couple of minutes instruction. I doubt that this is true of most other cameras and I find many cameras overly complex and bristling with utterly irrelevant controls (has anyone printed direct from a 5D2 I wonder). Photography is in essence quite simple focus, shutter, aperture. Where Sean's analogy with the car steering wheel falls down is that the only non-auto function that most cameras now have is composition. Everything else is/can be automated - and to carry the analogy through the car would need to have merely a steering wheel. This is, I assume, because most camera users want lots of automation (or their manufacturers/designers/engineers think that's what they want) and the result is that shifting back to manual settings is often cumbersome and ergonomics suffer too. Its an interesting piece though.

On an aside, you'd be amazed at how many people seem to think that the Leica M digitals should feature live-view - although why it should be needed on a rangefinder camera baffles me.

Maybe (read the article) it's because I use a D300s, but I haven't found the key controls a problem on digital Nikon SLRs. I only use one or two menu-driven controls underwater (typically flash mode, toggling between TTL and manual), and since the menu sits on the last item accessed, it's not a big problem. Luckily, mirror lock-up isn't often needed underwater!

Tim

Maybe (read the article) it's because I use a D300s, but I haven't found the key controls a problem on digital Nikon SLRs. I only use one or two menu-driven controls underwater (typically flash mode, toggling between TTL and manual), and since the menu sits on the last item accessed, it's not a big problem. Luckily, mirror lock-up isn't often needed underwater!

 

Tim

 

Well yeah, I am a Nikon bigot also Though the GH1 UI is relatively good, I find that I long for the ease of use of my Nikons. I perfer my D200 over my D80 (except for size & weight). That's the unsaid in my orginal post. I am looking for a small and light travel camera with decent video that might also be used u/w. The Nex (*) could do it with more direct drive (buttons) and lenses. Nikon is unlikely to produce anything like this for many years to come (IMHO).

Bob