Why I Love My SLR
October 17, 2006
Of all my possessions, two things that I absolutely can’t live without are my SLR camera and my laptop. Both help me in two different hobbies of mine – one for picture taking, the other for putting those pictures up on display on this site.
When I began taking pictures years ago, all I had was a dinky little Olympus point-and-shoot, which wouldn’t impress anybody. Compare that to the multi-mega pixel digital SLR’s with changeable lenses where each lens cost more than my entire trip, that the firangi tourists touted. Since my favourite travel destinations were the same as the ones frequented by the firangi crowds, taking pictures without getting an inferiority complex was well nigh impossible.
Later when I began travelling with a spanking new SLR (ok, so it was a creaky, manual Nikon FM-10, but the desi public can’t tell the difference) and hip western attire, it was easy for me to pass off as an imported-maal. Of course the ticket clerks at the Taj Mahal weren’t quite happy after verifying my identity. For those who have not been to India yet, tourist destinations here charge the foreign crowd several times more than the local public for entry tickets. That’s the Indian way of getting back at the mistreatment meted out to our granddads during colonial rule. Yeah!
But the true value of the SLR became apparent immediately after I got my first roll of film developed and printed. I hadn’t made any significant progress in my skills yet. The composition was still atrocious. The exposure was way too high in some pictures, making them appear to be washed out, or too little in others, causing them to have a dull blackish appearance. But in spite of such terrible results, I felt encouraged by the fact that the SLR gave me an opportunity to exercise tremendous amount of control on the exposure and the ability to experiment.
Better Feedback
The SLR gave me immediate and accurate feedback on the scene before I pressed the shutter. I could fiddle with the focusing ring and see results of the change in real time. Pressing the DOF-preview would give a fair idea of the areas of sharp focus. The built-in exposure meter would indicate when the light was too low and needed a larger aperture.
A pet peeve that I have against point-and-shoots is that the viewfinder always shows an image that is slightly off from what is captured on film. Because the viewfinder is not in exactly the same location on the camera as the lens, what’s captured on film is slightly different from what you see. If you cropped too closely in the viewfinder when shooting your best friends wedding portrait, when the prints are returned later you could find that the tops of the couple’s heads have been chopped off. An SLR on the other hand uses a mirror and prism to show the view through the lens in the viewfinder. When the shutter is depressed, the mirror flips out of the way and lets the film capture the same view as what you saw in the viewfinder.
A Personal Style
In photography no amount of reading and looking at pictures taken by others can replace the actual act of taking pictures on your own. You need a feel for the camera, for the controls and for the light, which comes only with practice. A point-and-shoot is a fine camera to begin taking pictures with. But if you can’t understand f-stops and why there are different ISO speed ratings then you stand nowhere. Always depending upon your cameras preset modes is like being an artist who only uses stencils.
With the FM-10, I could refer to pictures taken by other photographers and try to replicate their techniques. These days several cheap magazines carry detailed instructions on how to set up a shot for a great picture. By having an SLR, I was able to execute those instructions and see results of my own as well as experiment within those guidelines to find my own style.
Creative Freedom
A definite differentiator between point-and-shoot and SLR cameras is that in an SLR you can change the lens that best suits your subject. That means you can use a wide angle lens for that sweeping landscape, then immediately swap it for a macro lens for a close up of a rare bug. When combined with a broad array of filters that are available you can be sure that your kit can forever expand and improve.
Of course that does not mean that everyone should cast their point-and-shoot cameras into bonfires and replace them with SLR’s. These days the cheapest point-and-shoots have more electronic wizardry than a film SLR of a few years ago. That means better pictures with lesser effort. Their size makes them convenient for spontaneous shoots of juniors’ first steps. In their new digital avatar they are a very convenient scratch pad before the hefty SLR is pulled out. And when you’re out vacationing and can’t be bothered to lug around an SLR, a pocket sized digital camera is just what the doctor ordered.
Both types of cameras have their advantages. Learning about them will help you strike a balance between convenience and control under different circumstances. Practice often. And don’t be bothered by firangi’s sporting fancy DSLR’s. You are the picture taker and the camera is just your tool. Having a creative mind will make you a much better photographer than buying a top of the line camera.