A liberating experience

[jbq]

After the lunar eclipse 2 weeks ago, I left the meter of my FE on all

night by mistake (it was dark when I put the camera back in the bag,

and I went straight to bed as soon as I got home without checking my

equipment). When I checked the next morning, the batteries were dead

(no meter, no LED, no shutter response).

 

Yesterday afternoon, I decided to go for an experiment in "zero

settings" camera. I loaded a roll of superia 400, set my shutter

speed to M90, mounted my old miida 135/2.8, set the aperture to f/22

(sunny 16 told my that I was overexposing by 1.5 stops, but I decided

that the film latitude would be enough, especially since it was late

afternoon), and I went on to shoot the full roll (27 picture total, I

guess Fuji is generous in how much film they put in their rolls).

 

It was a very liberating experience. I didn't have to worry about

zooming, about shutter speed, about aperture, about depth of field.

All I had to do was compose, focus, and shoot. It felt even better

than matrix-metered program-mode auto-focus all-automatic-everything.

It was purely non-automatic. It was literally a no-brainer, point and

shoot.

 

If you're bored, if you're tired of worrying too much about all those

settings and all the things that can go wrong, just do what I did.

Wait for a sunny day, load cheap color negative film, mount a prime

lens, select your smallest aperture, pick your shutter speed

accordingly (sunny 16 overexposed 1 or 2 stops, i.e. sunny 11 or

sunny 8), and go ahead. It's insanely fun.

 

I'm already loooking forward to repeating the experiment with another

lens, I have a 50mm and a 28mm waiting for me.

 

Interestingly enough, it looks like my batteries have actually

recovered and are still somewhat good (the meter seems accurate when

compared to my other cameras), but I'm glad I thought they were dead.

[greg_barnett]

Sounds positively wonderful... Recently I have taken to using my F4 in M mode always, and only taking with me one lense... my 55 micro which I use for macro work and pretty much anything else... and my tripod.

 

I find the experience of not deciding which lense to use or how far to zoom in or out very liberating too. It seems the less we have to decide the more enjoyable photo taking can be. Or maybe its because my job is making decisions all the time so it's a damn nice change to stop doing that. Next time I'll try your suggestion on not touch the shutter or aperture once set. :-)

[conrad_hoffman]

This is the Nikon forum, and I love shooting with my Nikon stuff, but you've just made a strong case for also playing with older meterless full manual cameras. Lots of fun doing just what you've described with Kodak Signets, Retinas, even the venerable old Argus, plus dozens of others. A Nikon RF would be nice, but out of my price range. Lots of full manual SLRs too. That little chart of "cloudy bright" and other conditions works rather well.

[rick_gray]

Less IS more ...Rick Gray

[mskovacs]

Recently did the close to the same thing. My "new" Nikon F Photomic FTn with a dead meter, a 50/1.4, Superia 400 and my kids at the beach on a sunny day.

 

OK I had the full range of shutter speeds and apertures available but I followed sunny f/16 and guessed well when the clouds started moving in. Got great shots.

[gordon_checknita]

I do this too! Example: Nikon EM which has an M90 setting. I adjust the aperture so that I get a 1/90sec shutter speed when looking at a mid-grey object in direct sunlight. Then I switch to M90 and leave it there. I adjust the aperture according to how I estimate the light has changed. It is easy especially if you allow your estimates to err on the over-exposure side. If you use a 28mm prime lens and shoot at f/11 or smaller aperture you can set "infinity" on the left DOF mark and then see the shortest in focus point in feet based on the right DOF mark. Now you dont't have to focus either!