Adjusting to digital

eastangler

eastangler

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Nothing serious but a hangover that I didn't expect.

Twenty plus years ago I did freelance photography, mainly stock agency medium format transparency. As many will know, in the old 'wet' days, it could be very expensive having to submit 200+ images of which only 10 may be retained and also waiting months for stock to be returned.
The effect of this is that I developed a mindset that every photo must have a purpose and, as much as possible, be of marketable quality. Nothing wrong with this of course.
Eventually I sold all my gear and invested the proceeds into my new business as a stained glass/glass engraving artist.

In October this year my wife and I were on a weekend break in Cromer. With high tides the sea was crashing over the seafront and I commented that I wished I had something better that my phone camera to catch the full drama of it.

Forward to earlier this month and, while my wife was on her laptop, I noticed a piece of paper face down beside it through which I could see a familiar outline. I wondered if I should say anything but then my wife confessed. With the help of a work colleague she had ordered a camera for me for Christmas but, as there's so much gear out there, she wasn't entirely sure that she'd bought the right thing and it was due to arrive any day.
As it happens she was right to say something because she hadn't realised that what she'd ordered was body only. I also told her that one thing that had held me back from getting back into it was all the other gear that was needed to produce 'good' photo's.
So, now I have a Nikon D3400 body, 55-300 DX VR, 18-55 DX, UV and CP filters and lens hoods, set of tubes, SB700 flash and a Manfrotto tripod and a bag to put it all in.:woot:

Now this is the bit I'm struggling with.
I know I now have to take lots of shots to practice using all the gear and software. All those camera and flash settings:geek:, again, not a problem, I'll get there eventually.
The bit I'm really struggling with is the fact that I can rattle off as many photo's as I like and it won't cost me a penny and I won't end up with sheaves of useless prints cluttering up the place.

I've got to learn to unfreeze my bum and just start shooting. This time I'm doing it for fun so I don't need to think of the maket before I take a shot. If I sell a few then, hey-ho, it's a bonus.

I have joined a local camera club too so, along with this forum, I've no shortage of advice but I can't believe how strong my resistance is to 'just taking pics':thinking:
 
Beauty of digital is that you don't have to take pics. I've wasted so many shots just finishing a roll of film off :) If you do take loads of the same thing they can end up cluttering your hard drive anyway so I still think only taking a picture of something you want to keep and look at again is actually not a bad idea.

Going somewhere with loads of things to shoot soon gets you over the hurdle of being careful. I went to a zoo the first week and shot about 300 photos which was several years worth of previous film activity. I think there were two rolls equivalent just of meerkats. I would have never done that with film ever.
 
I think you will eventually loose the "trigger happy" attitude. To be quite honestly - it's not that much of a big deal - enjoy the flexibility it offers you. I suppose you could get a small card like a 512mb and then you would only get around 50 or so pictures to "truly" limit yourself? I'm just getting back into the whole lark myself, actually!
 
eastangler said:
Twenty plus years ago I did freelance photography, mainly stock agency medium format transparency.
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The beauty of doing it as an amateur is that if the shots aren't up to anything you can just pretend it never happened!!!
Enjoy you new camera.
 
I made the switch to digital ten years ago and found it difficult to change from the make every shot count to appreciating the option of shoot anyway. Digital does need some culling though, the worst is motorsport at 8 frames a second, lots of similar, now which is best ...hmmm
 
I think we've all struggled with the conversion from film. From making every shot count to not having to worry too much. Just enjoy it. Go out and rattle off as many shots as you like. Don't worry about it. Then when you get home just delete all the rubbish. Once you've got the hang of things then you'll slow down and revert to taking only shots with potential. Agree about motorsport; you've just got to accept that's the way it is.
 
I decided to convert myself to digital from film about eight years ago. I still suffer from the old "don't waste money on unimportant shots" habit film days. I now will quite happily go for a photowalk and return with a few hundred photos, but I still haven't really adjusted to using the camera as a notetaker, photographing street names, backing off from a lighting setup to photograph the setup as well as the subject, photographing the problematic lighting in a cathedral as well as struggling to take shots in it, the kind of things I might previously have jotted in a notebook. I've got used to the idea that shots cost nothing, but I still seem to have a mindset that it's an expensive camera which should not be prostituted into taking casual snapshots, notes, etc..
 
I think that this is a hangover that all film to digital converts have. Another thing that I still fail to do sometimes is to remember to pay attention to the rear screen. I have often ended up with underexposed shots by not glancing at the histogram.:confused:
 
Remember the days when professional studio photographers used Polaroid backs on their cameras, so they could check the shot was OK before trying to capture it on roll film? Well, just think of a digital camera as having that facility, only instead of 10 instant Polaroid shots to check the composure and exposure, you've got 100s if you need them! When we were rationed to 8, 12, 16, 24 or 36 exposures we had to try to make sure each one counted, we'd check all the settings and readings and then finally press the shutter button... only to find a week later when the film came back from the lab that someone in the group photo we were trying to take had blinked and had their eyes shut! :banghead: Now you can check straight away, you can bracket exposures with carefree abandon, and take not 'one for Lloyds' but 100 if you want! :)

That's the great thing with digital photography, we can check we have the shot before we move on to the next one. I find the best way to learn is from experience, and with digital photography you get to see the results immediately, without having to wait a week to find out only to have forgotten what settings you used! So don't spare the button, take as many photos as you need to learn and get the shot you want... because after all, you'll have more than likely as not upgraded your camera body before you get near to wearing its shutter out! ;)
 
eastangler said:
The bit I'm really struggling with is the fact that I can rattle off as many photo's as I like and it won't cost me a penny and I won't end up with sheaves of useless prints cluttering up the place.
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I'm going to argue for shooting more not less for the following reasons :D

- You don't have to print every shot, storage space is relatively cheap and you can delete the truly useless pictures.
- When pushing things to the limit of ISO or focus ability maybe firing off more than you're traditionally comfortable with may well help you get that one keeper, or maybe more than one keeper.
- Sometime I've taken shots which I originally very nearly didn't take and maybe thought about deleting but on reflection and after time they're turned out to be some of my favourite pictures.

So, my advice is if you're about to take a shot and then have doubts... take it anyway as it might turn out to be a shot you actually really like :D
 
I think we all did this at first, I even tried to make an effort to not change my shooting style at first.

It wasn't until I grasped the nettle to completely change that I actually got the point of digital. And at that point I improved hugely.
 
Phil V said:
I think we all did this at first, I even tried to make an effort to not change my shooting style at first.

It wasn't until I grasped the nettle to completely change that I actually got the point of digital. And at that point I improved hugely.
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When I first went digital I did stupid things... perhaps the most stupid was that I used to set my ISO before going out and shoot at it all day and then it hit me that I could change my ISO between shots :D With film I used to shoot a lot of gigs so I had ISO 1600 film so of course I set my digital camera ISO to 1600. Believe it or not :D It is IMO one of the biggest advantages of digital and yet it didn't immediately occur to me... but in my defence I never read anything about digital and just bought the camera and jumped blindly in.

Oh, and one piece of advice I'd give to anyone going digital with APS-C or MFT or some other non FF format is to include the crop factor in your thinking and adjust the aperture and shutter speeds as appropriate.
 
Thanks for all the comments. The other thing that I've realised with digital is that many shots that would have been ditched in the past can now be used to make sfx and composites in Photoshop.
Being a part-time gamekeeper, fly fisherman and now adding Photoshop into the mix perhaps I should buy my wife an appointments book for when we can meet up every six weeks or so:naughty:
 
eastangler said:
Being a part-time gamekeeper, fly fisherman and now adding Photoshop into the mix perhaps I should buy my wife an appointments book for when we can meet up every six weeks or so:naughty:
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Mmm, the underlying reason for the present may be becoming clearer. ;) :LOL:

eastangler said:
The other thing that I've realised with digital is that many shots that would have been ditched in the past can now be used to make sfx and composites in Photoshop.
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It is amazing what can be done to save and/or enhance a file out of the camera. I always say to people it can be as big a hobby as you want it to.

Nothing wrong with being economical with taking pics btw, but there is no need limit oneself with digital, and trying to be experimental and open to trying things is one of the great benefits of digital over film. I came on leaps and bounds once I got my first digital camera. :)
 
Hmm, I'm still more of the "make every shot count" mindset... to the point I sometimes (frequently?) miss shots because I quit to soon, started too late, or just missed the timing.
 
simon ess said:
I've never quite understood this [looking at EXIF exposure data].

Apart from, maybe, when first learning, what help is this?
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It's not just about exposure. Aperture also controls depth of field, shutter also freezes motion (or doesn't), plus EXIF will tell you whether or not flash was used and how, whether or not image stabilisation was on, what lens you were using at what focal length, and if you're lucky :) exactly where you were when you took the photograph. When trying to debug exactly what went wrong with a particular photograph, how to improve similar shots with that lens in the future, some of these details can be extremely useful. I first learnt how to use a camera more than fifty years ago, before any kind of auto had been invented. All settings were fully manual, yet today I still consult the EXIF sufficiently often that when I'm using one of those annoying software packages that truncates or even omits the EXIF data, I make a point of restoring it.
 
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Ok, if it works for you.

Personally, I know how aperture affects DOF and how shutter speed affects motion.

I know if I used flash or not

I still don't get it but, as I say. if it works for you.
 
My biggest hangup from film is changing the ISO. I used to put that fixed ISO roll in and that was it, it could be pushed in development but not by too much.
Now I sometimes forget that I can easily change it!
 
simon ess said:
Ok, if it works for you.

Personally, I know how aperture affects DOF and how shutter speed affects motion.
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So do I, but DOF depends on subjective impression of sharpness, which is affected by microcontrast and also how the quality of bokeh affects the transition between in focus and out of focus. So different lenses (and different lighting conditions) can have more or less apparent DoF than would be expected on theoretical grounds from aperture and focal length.

I know if I used flash or not
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So do I, at the time. But since I'm careful to use flash in such a way that it isn't obvious from the image that flash was used, a year or few later I may well have forgotten. Plus some of the sites on which I publish some of my images insist that certain details from the EXIF are supplied with the image.

The most unexpectedly and very helpful use of my EXIF recently was when I wanted to enter a flower portrait taken in a large botanical garden in a competition. The rules demanded that the latin name of the flower be supplied. I hadn't a clue what the flower was, but I knew that there would have a detailed label beside it. But I couldn't where where in the several acres I had shot the flower. The GPS data in the EXIF took me to the exact spot.

Years ago I nailed a plagiarist with EXIF data. He claimed his photo looked just like mine because she'd arrived where I'd taken my shot from only seconds after I'd moved away, thereby getting a shot that looked just like mine. She'd removed the EXIF data, cropped it and processed it to look a bit different. Luckily there had been several photographers in the vicinity, one of whom happened to have taken a photograph showing the culprit some minutes away from where she'd claimed to be to get the look-alike shot. The presence of the same church clock in some photographs allowed calibration of the clocks of the cameras involved.
 
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