And if you are using "fill flash", you will get photos that don't look flash or wash out when you shoot a picture indoors.
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And outdoors, you can remove the shadows...
The automatic settings for the flash aren't going to do this.
Posted on 11/10/2009 12:49:57 PM PST by a fool in paradise
Where did that phrase ever come from, point-and-shoot? What camera doesn’t point and shoot?
Going back at least 10 years, some professional sports facilities had a prohibition on any camera lens that was deemed “professional” (I think if it went beyond 80mm).
You point the camera and shoot. Everything else is “covered”.
- Light setting (aperature)
- shutter speed
- “film speed”
and focus
Basically it means no manual focusing. Older cameras are point-focus-shoot, the modern age of digital you can just push the button and it’ll probably wind up in focus.
“You point the camera and shoot. Everything else is ‘covered’”
Yes, well, once everything is “covered” by professional photographers with “real” cameras, they proceed to point and shoot. It is the inevitable end of all photography. Unless you don’t bother to point, and I’m sure there’s been an Accidental Photography movement at some point in the age of Modern Art.
Anyway, the point is, “point-and-shoot” is bad nomenclature. Better to call it automatic photography, disposable photography, or perhaps something like fast-food photopgraphy.
Not really. The old style was get all your presets, point, focus, shoot. The new style has no presets and auto-focuses, so the only 2 steps left are point and shoot.
“Basically it means no manual focusing. Older cameras are point-focus-shoot, the modern age of digital you can just push the button and it’ll probably wind up in focus.”
But once they manually focus, the big boys proceed to point and click, do they not? Yes, they do. I understand the point is to highlight how previously disposable, now multi-use, camera operators only have to point and shoot.
However, that’s not what the lazy, dare I say stupid, appelation “point-and-shoot” technically signifies. How about we call it autofocus photography? Or, more to the point, Easy-peasy photography?
You can set your focal range so that the entire picture foreground, background, and central subject are all in focus. Or when the “non-essential” details go out of focus (by choice).
The more control the photographer has in making the image, the more he is directly responsible for it.
You can set up an autoshooting webcam in the back of the venue and grab frames out of thousands of unattended shots and come up with some interesting images. But the human input was strictly “editor” at that point.
No. You point first, then you focus, then you shoot, and IF your object stays relatively stationary so your focus is still good you can keep shooting, but if they move you need to re-focus.
We used to call to call it auto-focus. But even auto-focus cameras needed to have the various presets (speed, apperature, etc) done, the modern age of digital doesn’t have that. It’s point and shoot.
“The new style has no presets and auto-focuses, so the only 2 steps left are point and shoot.”
Exactly. Both types of cameras necessarily involve pointing and shooting. Hence, pretending you can distinguish the latter by its pointing and shooting quality is silly. If there were some way to highlight the fact that you ONLY point and shoot (while there are actually other things involved, zooming for instance, but nevermind), I could live with it.
As it is, they’ve for some reason managed to choose the two things fancy and disposable/clockradio-type cameras have in common. Namely, their pointing and shooting qualities.
There you go, talking all about “focus”. So I ask, why not rename so-called “point and shoot” photography autofocus photography, since that seems to be the sticking point?
But with the new cameras those are the ONLY steps, where as with the old ones there’s steps before and after point. You can distinguish, point and shoot cameras the ONLY steps you need to take to have a nice in focus picture are the pointing and the shooting, non-point and shoot cameras take extra steps.
Because to change the focal length (HOW MUCH of the image is in focus at once) you either have to change lenses or change the aperature (how much light is coming in) AND the corresponding shutter speed.
are you a professional photographer or avid amateur with a chip on his shoulder about us uneducated masses being able to take decent photos with simple equipment at low prices?
>>It’s also about “controlling” the image.<<
Yep. You’ll notice in the amateur example Bono has a bit of a gut.
It’s only a sticking point for you. Even my 100% technically non-inclined mother-in-law gets that point and shoot cameras require no actions besides pointing and shooting which clearly distinguishes them from non-point and shoot cameras which require additional steps including but by no means limited to focusing. There is actually a clear and rather obvious difference between auto-focus cameras and point and shoot.
“No. You point first, then you focus, then you shoot, and IF your object stays relatively stationary so your focus is still good you can keep shooting, but if they move you need to re-focus.”
You can add all the extra steps you want, but here’s what I’m pulling out of your post: fancy camera operators shoot after they point. That is, they point and shoot. Therefore, they, too, use point-and-shoot cameras. You add in this extra step, namely focusing, which for the purposes of the discussion I could care less about. Why? Because it hardly matters that people used to have to focus their cameras. It doesn’t change the fact that people still have to point and shoot, just like they did in the past.
You focus on focusing, so why not make that the focal point of what so-called “point and shoot” cameras should be called? As you say, easier cameras used to be called auto-focus. Why did that stop? Apparently, from your version of events, because they became more automatic. Which, forgive me, seems like more of a reason to call them automatic than previous auto-focus cameras.
And if you are using "fill flash", you will get photos that don't look flash or wash out when you shoot a picture indoors.
<
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And outdoors, you can remove the shadows...
The automatic settings for the flash aren't going to do this.
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