We tend to mistake technological adaptation for professional maturity. As cameras grow more “helpful,” they quietly relocate our attention from seeing to supervision. We stop making decisions and start managing a system.
Here, I do not look at a camera as an instrument, a set of specifications, or a lifestyle object. To me, a camera is a working environment. It is a space that shapes attention and assigns responsibility.
What matters is not what a camera can produce under ideal conditions, but what it demands from the photographer the moment it is switched on. The stress that follows is not a rite of passage. As it becomes familiar, it is often reinterpreted as a sign of professional maturity. In practice, it reflects a predictable outcome of engineering decisions photographers have been expected to absorb.
Learning the Interaction
A modern camera rarely waits for intention. It greets you with choices, confirmations, warnings, and overlays. You are asked to decide before perception has a chance to settle. This interaction functions as an entry fee. The interface does not judge the photograph; it evaluates the operator. It creates a low-level anxiety that the correct decision exists somewhere nearby, embedded in the interface rather than in the act of seeing.
I know this contrast from experience. A camera I used without stress was a Canon PowerShot G5 in 2004, almost 20 years before I found my camera for professional work. The interface made its assumptions explicit and limited. The manual was short. The camera did not expect me to become someone else in order to use it. It stayed within its role. That absence of pressure was not simplicity for its own sake; it was functional clarity.
Then I bought a Fujifilm X-E1, and my interest began to fade. I bought it because it was beautiful, but the interaction was not. The menu discouraged intuition. In automatic mode, the camera revealed a predefined visual logic about how images should look, and those assumptions felt misplaced. Using it required me to operate a system rather than observe a scene. Most of the time, the camera stayed on a shelf. I assumed the problem was my choice, not the system. I moved up to a top-tier Fuji, expecting that higher-end optics would resolve the friction. They did not. I was still negotiating with an interface that promised control while converting each decision into a checkpoint. Then came Canon.
How Pressure Becomes Normal
The menu felt heavier, but the relationship changed. It became workable. Industrial. I used the camera professionally and got consistent results. The pressure did not disappear; it settled. Stress became normalized as a condition of operation rather than resolved. This is the point where discomfort stops being questioned and starts being treated as a professional condition. The issue was never whether the camera could perform. The issue was the cognitive cost of staying present while it did.
This shift is easy to misread. When photographers stop complaining about interfaces, it looks like growth. In many cases, it is an adaptation to a defect. The industry advanced rapidly in sensors, autofocus, and computation, while interface architecture remained largely unchanged. New features were layered onto old logic. The cost of that stagnation was transferred directly to the photographer.
When Efficiency Replaces Presence
The mechanism is straightforward. Modern cameras increase the number of actions while shrinking the space of actual decisions. You adjust more and decide less. Responsibility loses a clear address at the moment of failure. When something fails, authorship becomes unclear. Was it your intention, the autofocus system, or an automated correction applied without notice?
Autofocus sits at the fault line. You believe you chose the point; the system believes it assisted. When the result disappoints, there is no single place to locate authorship. These systems are not broken. They are remarkably efficient. That efficiency is purchased with the photographer’s presence. Automation does not make the work lighter. It shifts where the effort lives. You are no longer deciding; you are watching the system decide.
When an error has no clear address, visual decision-making becomes defensive. You choose angles, distances, and light where the camera–lens system is least likely to fail. Risk fades—not because ideas disappear, but because photographing shifts from exploration toward quality control. Much of contemporary photography looks safe and cautious for this reason.
By cognitive logic, I mean something very concrete. The camera gradually trains attention to verify the system before engaging with the scene. Menus and overlays pull attention inward. Decisions migrate from perception into interface confirmation. You are not freed from thinking about the system; you are assigned responsibility for monitoring it.
Where Responsibility Returns
The issue is not complexity. Complexity can be honest. The problem is the absence of a clear boundary. The camera never states where its responsibility ends and the photographer’s begins. It offers assistance while quietly narrowing outcomes. Systems designed to help often feel oppressive not because they do too much, but because they redistribute cognitive load rather than reduce it.
I found calm only after encountering a different engineering ethic. Leica does not attempt to correct me. It draws a clear line and stays behind it. Nothing is adjusted without my consent. That clarity removes suspicion. I no longer wonder what the system did while I was not looking.
At the other extreme, I use a Polaroid. It does the opposite, openly. It makes all the decisions at once. Color, character, and mood arrive as a single fact. There is no promise of neutrality and no illusion of control. Polaroid does not simulate choice; it removes it.
In both cases, the internal dialogue with the interface disappears. With Leica, nothing steps between me and the scene. A Polaroid does the opposite. It delivers a finished result, and I either take it or leave it.
When photographic equipment is treated as a working environment rather than a feature set, the stress we accept as inevitable becomes visible as contingent. It is not built into photography. It grows out of engineering logic that was never revisited. Cameras shape more than images. They shape how photographers think, how they approach error, and how responsibility is assigned. The question is not which brand to buy. It is what kind of cognitive role a camera assigns to the person using it.
38 Comments
I can't help thinking that you've overthought this one.
I don’t rule that out. But I was trying to describe, in the least confrontational way possible, something many photographers quietly feel.
Being forced to navigate 700 menu options, as I did in my last Canon camera, isn’t a sign of control. It’s friction. Manufacturers keep adding features while ignoring a basic question: how much decision-making should happen before you even start seeing?
This menu example is just one visible case. More subtly, any technology changes how we work with the camera. In fine-art practice, especially, the workflow can drift away from being author-driven and start aligning with the assumptions built into the tool.
That shift is easy to miss. And it isn’t always a good one. But it’s also not something that matters to everyone.
It's not that hard to make a complicated camera really simple. Two ways. Default to auto-everything, and you've got a point & shoot. Or, set focus to manual, exposure to manual, set ISO manually. Minimize info displays in the EVF. Shoot RAW. Ignore all the other menu settings.
Yes, setting up my cameras to make them work exactly the way I want to work took weeks when I moved to my current platform. So much to learn. But, that's because there are so many things I want my cameras to do that were never possible 30, or 20, or even 10 years ago.
In my case, I solved it more radically. I switched from Canon R3 to a Leica M11 as my main camera and kept the SL3 as a secondary body, mostly for harsh conditions and cold weather.
TBF, I can relate to a yearning for simplicity. I have at times thought back to my time with a Pentax 67 and manual-focus Contax 35mm film cameras and noted the vast difference in complexity. I've spent many, many hours over the past six years getting familiar with my Sonys' menus, buttons and dials and felt like I was learning to program a computer.
However, I've never felt that this was a distraction from image making. Rather, the effort I've put into mastering my new tools has been in service of achieving my intended results with maximum efficiency and minimum distraction - because event work is hectic and flexibility is key. I make some decisions for myself - where to focus, depth of focus, white balace (in processing) - and I allow the camera to calculate exposure and select a motion-stopping shutter speed appropriate for my chosen focal length (I loves me that Minimum Shutter with Auto ISO feature). The key is that I can predict and verify the camera's decisions on-the-fly and dial in corrections in mere seconds if needed, all without taking my eye from the viewfinder. One great example is the ability see in the EVF the image just shot immediately after capture to verify flash exposure and check for blinks in a lit group portrait without lowering the camera. No more attendees scurrying off before I've got the shot.
Offloading some of the calculations to the camera allows me to devote more of my attention to what's happening in front of me rather than looking down. Using identical cameras makes it easier to operate purely from muscle memory. Using three bodies with primes encourages me imagine in advance exactly what I want the image to look like before I reach for the one with the right lens. And, making custom banks of settings lets me switch instantly from, say, shooting a stage with ambient light to making a flash-lit portrait. I've now got a kit that facilitates my vision and lets me get more and better images than I could ever hope to working manually.
I learned last year, at the age of 61, that I have ADHD, which makes shifting my attention from shooting to managing a camera and doing math in my head discombobulating. Having predictable and instantly verifiable automation lets me live in the viewfinder and keep my attention where it should be: on my subject. Interestingly, I've also learned that three other event shooters I work with have ADHD. My guess is it's more prevalent among photographers than the general population.
Exactly, Jacques. My point too: How hard can it be to simply use what you need and ignore the rest?
Are you sure you’re ignoring it, rather than adapting to it? That’s really the key question of the article.
And if you’re genuinely confident that you’re consciously ignoring it, then that’s actually a good thing.
I'm not exactly what the "it" is that you're asking if I ignore. If "it" has anything to do with camera features and menu settings, yes, I'm sure that I am immune from the impact of technology. And able to ignore the ramifications. I am a technology skeptic. How can I have adapted from something that I don't even know exists? I only have a very vague idea of computational photography and what it is, or how it works. I'm certainly not clamoring for Nikon to pull those features from an iPhone for my benefit. After all, I use a 13 year-old camera. I have no interest in newest, latest or greatest. I worked with the first camera that I bought in 2003 the same way I do now, other than being afforded greater resolution for making much larger prints. If I had started my photographic journey with large format film and darkroom work, I'd probably still be doing it that way now. As I said, as long as I've got an accessible button for focus, aperture, shutter, and ISO (and Photoshop), I have all the tools necessary for making a picture. Advancements in technology from the last 20 years have had zero impact on the way I approach photography, other than the aforementioned megapixels.
What has had the greatest impact on my photography (the "it" that I never ignore) over the couple decades I've been doing this, is a deep appreciation of the work of those masters of photography who have come before me. I have a nice collection of books of Ansel Adams, Edward Weston, Edward Steichen and others who I study religiously. I've said many times before that nothing is entirely unique. No doubt their images have deeply impacted my approach to photography. Creativity originates from a mind exposed to all of that which has come before us. In that sense, I have adapted, or adopted, their work as the type of image which resonates most strongly with me. Not saying a pin hole camera would work for me. I love the image quality and fine detail from my D800. Quality is different than features though. The tools may change but great photography never changes or goes out-of-style. So it's very easy for me to ignore the tools, the menu structure, the clutter; and focus solely on the photograph.
I think I understand your position: influence only exists through conscious use. If you don’t know a feature and don’t use it, then it doesn’t affect you.
What I’m writing about is something different. Influence can also happen through environment and habit. That environment also produces confidence. And confidence changes behavior. Certain decisions start to feel safer, repetition becomes easier, and some choices begin to feel obvious. Adaptation doesn’t require permission or awareness. Knowing or not knowing a feature isn’t a condition for being affected by it.
That’s the trade-off for speed and universality.
I can't possibly imagine what that has to do with camera functions. It's not like whether we wear eyeglasses or not. It's not like choosing between photography and billiards. Photography assumes we have a camera, and all we're talking about is how to use it. The question posed by the article asks a simple question of whether we are better off approaching photography by using some, all, or none of our camera's computational functions. I didn't know there could be so many "layers" to that question.
As I said in my earlier comment, I think Mr Gries has overthought a relatively esoteric issue.
When a seemingly simple question produces strong reactions, it often suggests that something deeper is being touched. Whether one chooses to engage with that or ignore it is, of course, a personal decision.
The article isn’t about camera functions in the technical sense. It’s not about whether to use some, all, or none of them. That’s a practical question, and it has practical answers.
What I’m looking at is a broader shift in how photographic practice evolves as technology evolves. Not in terms of features, but in terms of perspective and future direction. My hope is not that readers look backward at what they’ve done successfully, but forward at what may change next.
I’m not claiming authority over this question, and I don’t expect everyone to accept my framing. Critical responses are useful. I’m working through these shifts myself. These texts aren’t dogma. They’re part of an ongoing attempt to think the issue through.
You say: "The article isn’t about camera functions in the technical sense."
Yes it is about camera functions in the technical sense, Alvin. That's exactly the context from which virtually every response (other than yours) was made to this article. I did some quick calculations and out of the 22 reader replies, at least 17 were making a direct statement about how camera functions are used for that person. White-balance, exposure compensation, manual, automatic, file formats, etc. Those are all camera functions that folks here are writing about. And when I wrote three paragraphs, plus pictures, explaining how new camera technology has no impact on my approach to photography, you still insist that I'm missing your point. That, respectfully, is so really annoying.
For you to say that the purpose of the article was something different or greater than what you emphasized in your text, well... all I can say is that if you want to channel the discussion into a different direction, write about it in that manner from the beginning. Because... every time myself or someone else responds to your article, we're hit with you saying something such as... "What I’m writing about is something different." You're driving at something beyond the moment at hand, but everyone else is thinking about their camera menu items in their workflow today. Numerous sentences in your article specifically refer to camera functions, period. You're trying to drive a discussion into a realm that nobody else appears to recognize or want to go. So comments continue to repeat along the same lines... that you established in the original article.
And the reason you think "a seemingly simple question produces strong reactions," is that we, the readers, get frustrated with this pattern of discussion. We make a seemingly simple comment, and you reply "I don’t rule that out. But I was trying to describe..." or "I completely agree with you. But my intention here was to dig a bit deeper." Fine... but make it clear from the original text or we're going back and forth endlessly, wandering around without a common destination.
I see leaning on personal examples for the sake of clarity may have narrowed the frame instead of opening it. I’ll likely avoid that in future texts to prevent the discussion from collapsing into specifics.
It's the examples though that help people understand what you're trying to say. From my perspective, the breakdown occurs, not because of examples, but because the broader text and subsequent comments appear to contradict your examples. In other words the examples send a clear message, the remaining text and comments do not. Readers rely on specifics to both understand your message, and articulate a response. They provide clarity when the idea that you begin with is vague. Without specifics, many readers will gain absolutely nothing from your article. If you want to emphasize long term influence from camera design, say so. Too many short sentences trying to make a grand statement individually (which characterize your writing style) can be counterproductive in communicating a central idea or thought... like a busy photograph without a clear subject or place for the eye to rest.
Duplicated in error.
I personally don't relate to this. I started out on a manual film camera and just carried that mindset over to digital (as much as possible). I much prefer manual lenses and shooting in full manual because I am doing 100% of the work and not letting any automated features make some of the decisions for me. Yes scrolling through endless menus and working with ever more sophisticated features is very tedious but at least with RAW files, I can just set the WB to auto and carry on making life harder for myself with manual everything 😉. To be honest, everything you mention in this article, everything you are frustrated with just sounds awful and I'm glad I chose to opt out of any of that.
Ditto - except that I keep the white balance a constant. If it varies from shot to shot it can make for tedious work in post when correcting a sequence or series.
If you're shooting raw, the WB when shot makes absolutely no difference except what the image looks like when first opened (IF the raw conversion app is set to use in camera WB settings at the time the image was shot). If you apply a specific color temperature and WB correction with your raw conversion app, it makes absolutely no difference what the WB when shot was.
I'm very aware of the process of a raw workflow. I'm also aware that I can process a batch of images in LRC all to have the same white balance.
I simply find it less cumbersome later if, for example, when I'm shooting a sequence - that they all have the same WB. Auto WB can change the colour temperature simply by panning the camera through several degrees. I usually set them to 5600K for exterior work.
I dunno, man. I mean, I'm all for shooting all-manual - with primes, even - in the early stages of learning photography basics. And, I agree that defaulting to automation without understanding how and why a machine reacts to input discourages the development of creative control. But, I cannot agree that automation is inherently disempowering.
I shot all-manual film cameras from 1980 through 2002. I now shoot events with modern cameras and take advantage of every automation they offer. Thanks to AF, AE and features like Minimum Shutter with Auto ISO, I am able to coax from the camera the results that I want far quicker and more efficiently than I could 20 years ago. I verify the focus point via the viewfinder, just as I did with the split prism in my Yashica FX-3 and Pentax 67II. I control depth of focus by choosing distance, focal length and aperture. I decide whether motion is frozen or blurred by nudging the camera toward faster or slower shutter speeds. I have WAY better control over exposure (via the EC dial) and color (via RAW processing) than I ever did with a Sekonic L-408 meter and CC filters. And, I don't have to have one camera loaded with ISO 400 and another with ISO 3200 just to shoot a lit stage and an unlit audience at an event. I make the tools serve MY intention. The foundation for this is not avoiding automation but understanding it.
If that's too much work, one can always just set the camera to all-manual and carry on.
I completely agree with you. But my intention here was to dig a bit deeper. What I’m trying to look at is how our intentions adapt or change as camera capabilities change.
Take depth of field as a simple example. Thirty years ago, blur was mostly seen as a mistake, unless you belonged to the Japanese are-bure-boke school. With the arrival of autofocus, blur gradually turned into an artistic effect, and many people started using it.
The better the autofocus became, the shallower the depth of field could be. As a result, today shooting a portrait at f/1.4 with focus on a single eye is, in most cases, a cliché and bad taste. But the camera allows it. Twenty years ago, doing this consistently was considered a very high level of skill.
Intentions only change if you allow or want them to. What's desirable in photography certainly evolves over time. Soft creamy focus and deep black shadows were highly desirable in fashion photography in the 1920s, not because sharp lenses hadn't been invented yet, but because that's what fashion advertising wanted. Whether the cart or the horse comes first, though, is open for debate. Does new technology drive new ways of working, or does the demand for a new way of working provide the driving force behind new technology? I suspect more of the latter. Someone decides we need something that does not exist, so we go about inventing it. Camera capabilities adapt to specific needs expressed by the marketplace. Individual features may not all be of interest to you, but they fulfill a need somewhere. Technology does not force you to see photography as a singular style or result, nor should it demand that you use all of its menu items and features. I can appreciate that much of what is built into a modern camera is overkill for some people, and I would not buy it if I could have the choice, but it's also no reason to leave the camera on the shelf.
I think framing it as a fully conscious choice may be an oversimplification. In practice, our intentions often adapt in ways we don’t actively notice.
Psychological adaptation tends to happen quietly. We usually recognize it only after the fact, once someone points it out or we step outside a familiar workflow. That doesn’t mean technology “forces” a style or a result, but it does shape habits, expectations, and defaults more than we like to admit.
My aim in this text isn’t to argue that people lose agency or that technology dictates outcomes. It’s simply to draw attention to these subtle shifts for those who might be interested in noticing them. If someone isn’t, that’s perfectly fine too.
Sometimes I have to extract one or two sentences from your article in order to get a decent understanding of exactly what you're trying to say.
And you said...
"Then I bought a Fujifilm X-E1, and my interest began to fade. I bought it because it was beautiful, but the interaction was not. The menu discouraged intuition. In automatic mode, the camera revealed a predefined visual logic about how images should look, and those assumptions felt misplaced. Using it required me to operate a system rather than observe a scene. Most of the time, the camera stayed on a shelf."
Nothing much there about long term trends and subtle shifts. Maybe if we read between the lines, but you're clearly making a statement blaming the camera features for stress and loss of interest. Your article was far more personal to you than decades-long general trends. And that's what has drawn fire from several of the comments.
So I persist in saying that all that's necessary for regaining control is to ignore the menu settings, take it off automatic (why you would have it on automatic from the start is beyond me) and focus solely on observing your scene as you would like, no matter what the camera is in your hands.
I think this is where we’re approaching the issue from different angles. What you’re describing is a perfectly valid strategy: taking a complex question, simplifying it, and moving on. For many people, that works well. It preserves a sense of control and keeps the process straightforward.
I’m wired a bit differently. I tend to stay with the more complex question instead of resolving it early. That’s what this text is doing. I’m not saying your approach is wrong, just that I’m looking at a layer that comes before the practical solution.
It’s a bit like wearing good glasses. You can be completely confident that you’re ignoring them. When they fit well, they disappear from attention. And yet they still change how you see. You see better and more precisely, and that inevitably affects your decisions. Distances feel clearer, details become easier to trust, and you act differently because of it.
Cameras work the same way. When you have fast autofocus, stabilization, and speed, the field of what feels possible expands. That doesn’t force a style, but it does shift preferences, because choice and experimentation expand along with capability.
We’ve already seen one of these shifts over the last five years, as cameras improved dramatically. And now we’re standing in front of the next one.
You say: "I tend to stay with the more complex question instead of resolving it early." No kidding... yes, you certainly do. That's why the number of comments goes sky high in your articles and we go around in circles, the point of the article changes, another layer is added, while resolving virtually nothing.
"our intentions often adapt"
Your message might have more resonance if you speak for yourself rather than projecting onto others.
Make that 50 years ago. 30 years ago, I was using selective focus with an 85mm f1.4 on a manual-focus Contax RTSIII.
Welcome to digital world, things change fast. But again look back at film... I started with the Canon Ftb and it had a light meter inside and with a needle that went up and down with the amount of light then you had another needle with a round circle on it that you would adjust the aperture to have the needle somewhere in the circle but knowing results you could have the needle near the top or middle or low getting three different capture like todays HDR shots but not able to mix all just different results, Also you can have the film speed set for the film or increase the setting to get a different image as long as the developer had the speed you set.
Even back to the big box glass plate cameras using a flash powder one had to know the open lens time to get a good image.
All and all photography is a thinking sport or a mad scientist of light and all tools need to be known inside and out!
There are so many genres of photography and the makers of cameras are putting all they can into the little box to sell to the most. Why is video so important and why is it added to a still camera do most ever use it? Again so much so little time. A reason most just keep doing what they do and fail to buy a 600+ book showing and explaining all there is in the little box vs that big sheet of paper in the many languages that only a small section covers yours.
Many complain of this and that but never look for instructions on line under makes site just not able to adapt to changes!
Most never use a cameras auto selection where the camera programed with decades of knowledge has been put on a little bitty chip to make the perfect image hands and mind free. Sony had two sets of auto when it came out with the a7's few even used any of it for every other photographer said to use manual and all tried but failed mostly having to do many captures just to learn again and again, light has speed and changes at every shutter push one mind may not be that fast to change a setting the reason for so many option to dial in to get that micro second capture of light!!!
Photography, as the act of using a camera, is one of the simplest forms of work there is.
To me, the difficulty of photography has never been in how to shoot, but in creating the conditions to shoot. Finding the moment. Working with light. Building a composition. Recognizing a subject. Choosing a point of view. Placing yourself in the right context at the right time.
None of this lives inside the camera. The camera only records the outcome.
Operating a camera is unskilled labor in the strict sense. Anyone can learn it in a month. That is why photography competitions are often won by people under twenty. Not because they possess decades of experience, but because experience with the box itself is irrelevant.
The myth of photographic labor lives inside the camera. The real work happens around it. Skill is not about mechanics or electronics. It is not about decades spent mastering a device. It is about how you see, and whether you can place yourself inside a context.
"Anyone can learn it in a month"
Again, the undefined "it". Maybe they can learn what YOU do in a month. NOBODY starting from scratch could learn to do what I do in a month. Maybe I could teach the toolbox in a year with daily instruction.
I admit that possibly I have no experience with a "modern" camera (aka mirrorless), but my camera, a Nikon D800, isn't exactly an Instamatic either. There are numerous menu items that I've probably not given much thought, beyond setting up the camera out of its box, or never at all. It has video capabilities that I've never touched. But how all of that complexity buried deep in camera settings might curtail my enthusiasm for photography is beyond my imagination. I feel like the problem could very well be in your mind, not the camera system.
The act of operating a camera for any sort of fine-art, or slow paced photography is no more complicated than choosing a lens, and knowing how to set aperture, shutter, ISO and focus point. They're buttons on the outside of the camera, totally distinct from internal menu items... I can adjust them blindfolded. Shooting RAW eliminates any particular in-camera decision regarding color. Operating those basic functions of a camera is child's play. How stressful can that be? On the other hand, knowing where to stand, which elements to include in the frame, which to exclude... those are the aspects of photography which distinguish one image from another. That's where the real experience and creativity in photography reside... as it has since the invention of the camera. Nothing ever changes.
I get your point, and I agree that basic camera operation hasn’t changed much.
But we’ve already seen how a technological shift can radically change shooting habits without changing the fundamentals. The move from film to digital didn’t alter aperture, shutter, or ISO either. What it changed was pace, risk tolerance, feedback loops, and how photographers relate to mistakes.
AI seems to be doing something similar now. The mechanics may look familiar, but the surrounding habits and expectations shift. And that, in turn, affects how and why images are made.
The article you wrote described your personal response to modern camera technology. Not how some unidentified 29 year old photographer from South Africa would approach photography. You spoke of stress from camera features which distract you from the art of image making.
We're re talking about you, and me. The long term general trends in technology, grossly generalized, may change the way photographs are made, but there are no laws which state you or I must conform or abide by them, or use any of the newer features. In that case you're being dominated by both the machine and the popular opinion for what looks best and how to go about making it. My suggestion is to ignore all the noise, and use the tool that best serves your need. If it's a Leica, fine. I would like to have the money for that, but even without it, there's no reason that ignoring a bunch of menu settings should have any impact on my thoughts and approach to photography. They're only a distraction if I allow them to be. In reality, all of these complicated menu settings are buried out-of-sight while using my camera, so they're pretty easy to ignore. They certainly don't demand how and why YOUR images are made.
I don't use Leicas but come from film and my first SLR (1983) was entirely manual. For me the transition to digital was very easy and I don't need many set ups.
Mostly since 1999 when I first shot with digital backs, I shoot tethered. So basically the camera set up is all manual and very simple. Yet I am not sure how often people shoot tethered or avoid it at all cost. It's kind of instinctive to me. I also early on, shot digital backs on view cameras, which are also very simple in function as long as one understands the reasons for using such camera.
I just wanted to point that while digital does place many or very few set ups inside the device, analog was never totally simple. Technical cameras were actually much more impressive to the novice than digital is today. However, with some practice they were second nature. But yes it was forced on you unless you lined up perfectly the planes to their default position. Basically zeroing everything.
What defines the lens we use to read this is probably marked by perspective and interpretation. In reality, digital is identical to analog in regard to the actual use and intention, but neither is simpler than the other even if they appear radically different.
Digital adds internal configuration, but the act of photographing remains the same. Complexity is not new, only its location has changed. Fluency reduces friction regardless of medium. In the end I think that "older" photographers were forced into fluency in order to exist and they may have adapted or transited well to digital from that experience. Not all did, because many did not take the time or were not exposed to learning the skills in full. At that time the substrate was so costly, it forced the photographer to become fluent fast for survival. For many the training was simple with intended directions for a specific end result. Those probably did not adjust well to digital. Avoiding positive film, not learning to print or process film left them short at adaptation. In fact, cognitively, it was probably easy for novices to jump to digital from scratch. For many photographers with decades of experience but limited knowledge it became unbearable to truly adapt and face a new type of competition at once.
May be what's happening here, with all these replies, is a generational shift. When the entire generation with a "photography life experience" similar to mine is gone I am pretty certain that my perspective will simply cease existing, vanish. That's just plain normal.
Thank you for the thoughtful and generous comment. I agree with what you’re saying. Fluency has always reduced friction, whether in analog or digital. And you’re right: complexity isn’t new, only its location has changed.
What interests me is exactly this moment of transition. When the location of complexity shifts, practice shifts with it. That doesn’t invalidate prior experience, but it does reshape the field.
I also think you’re right that there is a generational dimension to this. Each generation internalizes a different technological baseline as “normal.” When that baseline changes, perspectives inevitably diverge.
I’m not trying to argue against experience. I’m trying to document the shift while it’s happening.
That “supervisor” analogy is great! I'm totally going to use that. When the tech handles the “Act” part of the process so well, it’s incredibly easy to get lazy with the “Observe” and “Orient” phases. We end up reacting to what the sensor sees instead of actually authoring the story ourselves.