Wow, you've got a really good camera! You must be able to take amazing photos!
I'm sure most of us have heard this at one time or another? The "You have a good camera" line, and while it's true that an expensive camera in the right hands can take an incredible photograph, an expensive camera in the wrong hands is nothing more than a glorified paper-weight!
Let's think about where and when we started photography, and as I don't have a secret direct line into all of your collective brains, I'll use myself as an example. I was about 17 when I really fell in love with capturing an image and preserving it, I didn't have a camera at all, instead I had my mother's camera but only when she wasn't looking. It was a Pentax SLR with two lenses and a big heavy black leather case. I loved that camera, I worked out how the metering worked by trial and error and I taught myself how to change lenses and how to look after it. Mother eventually stopped taking photos and gave it to me. I didn't have it long before I noticed fungus growing in the lens and I had to sell it before it was to far gone. I ended up with a basic, entry level Nikon SLR with a 50mm f1.8 lens (See, even back then I had a fifty!)
I loved taking it along with me and taking photographs everywhere I went. Starting with regular off the shelf color film, 36 exposures and loads of fun learning about light and how to capture it! In the right hands that camera took an amazing photograph, mine were not those hands. It wasn't full manual, I couldn't afford the Nikon FM at the time, but it certainly did the trick. I had the Nikon for a few years and then, eventually, I upgraded to a Canon EOS 50E (The one with the "Eye Control" ) and that's where it all started! "Wow, you must be able to take amazing photographs with that camera!" and the truth was that I took "interesting" photographs, strange photographs, but certainly not "amazing photographs!" I used Ilford XP2 almost all the time due to its ease of developing at the shop around the corner, I loved it like a brother but then, like any other kid, I sold it when I ran out of money! (Unlike my brothers, I still have them!)
A couple of years along and I started down the digital path, a Canon Ixus A5, then a Canon Ixus 300 (From Digitalrev!) I missed the "great camera" line between those two - as they looked almost the same despite being very different cameras. Then I upgraded to the Canon Powershot Pro 1 and it all started again! "Wow, that must take amazing pictures!!" It was an 8MP camera with a "bendy screen" and in the early days of me and digital, it took horrid photographs! - Let's back up just a bit, I took horrid photographs! I could have been taking photos with the Powershot A5 or a Canon 1Ds Mk3 and the composition of this image would still be hilarious! I mean, does the witches hat on the phone booth that I've cut out of the image make the shot or what!
So the story continues, from the Powershot Pro 1 to the Canon EOS 30D - Almost nothing changed with my photography, the images didn't immediately become National Geographic style photos and I wasn't immediately called up to shoot for Rolling Stone magazine! I continued on trying to work out what I was doing wrong. Well, things started to look up, not when I bought the Canon EOS 5D MkII, but a while before that! I started paying attention to my settings and my framing and my timing and my surroundings and guess what! My images started to take a turn for the better!
My final (So far!) camera purchase was the amazing Canon 5D MkII and whilst it's not immediately made my images world class, it's certainly made them BIGGER! and it's forced me to purchase larger hard drives and a faster computer.
So where does that leave us?
I'm not saying don't buy that new camera. In fact, I am a gear hound and LOVE new equipment as much as the next person, but whilst I write to you and say that it's not the camera that makes the photo, it's the person using the camera, every time I read an article like this, that's where the authour leaves it «It's not the camera, it's the photographer» - Well, I have to say that sometimes it can be the camera and having good solid equipment can sometimes be the difference between the photo and not getting the photo!
Sure, I have no doubt that Gijsbert Hanekroot would take a better music photo than me with him using a camera phone! But imagine if all he had to use was a camera phone and I had my trusty Canon 5D Mk II, the composition and the styling of the image would be different, and who's to say his or mine may be more to your taste, but there is one thing for certain, the image taken on the higher resolution camera would be more flexible in terms of usage. Try printing a camera phone picture on a bill board (Yep, I'm aware there are 8mp camera phones) that little lens, those horrible electronics that process the image – they all make for a big difference.
So, a couple of things for you to remember next time you see someone with a flashy, expensive camera – they may not know how to use it and it may as well be a paper weight, BUT, on the flip side of that coin, they may use that camera to the absolute edge of its ability and when they upgrade, the extra features and use of a better more fully featured camera will benefit them greatly.
With that in mind, maybe it's time you had a look at the new Canon 7D!
Great article.
Yes I whole heartedly agree, it's not what you have got, but it's how you use it (as the lady said)!!
I have 35+ years experience as a professional industrial photographer and used just about everything from a Kodak Brownie 127, through Sinar 4x5 and 10x8, Hasselbald, Nikon and Leica. Every camera has the potential to take RUBBISH pics under the control of a poor photographer, likewise any camera can take the WOW pic, if used by someone who knows how to use it. Just like my landscaps taken on the 127 back in the 1960's. Its not how much you pay or how many bells and whistles it has. I see toomany 'paperweights' sold by so-called dealers to the unknowing or the 'must have' punter here in the UK
I loved taking it along with me and taking photographs everywhere I went. Starting with regular off the shelf color film, 36 exposures and loads of fun learning about light and how to capture it! In the right hands that camera took an amazing photograph, mine were not those hands. It wasn't full manual, I couldn't afford the Nikon FM at the time, but it certainly did the trick. I had the Nikon for a few years and then, eventually, I upgraded to a Canon EOS 50E (The one with the "Eye Control" ) and that's where it all started! "Wow, you must be able to take amazing photographs with that camera!" and the truth was that I took "interesting" photographs, strange photographs, but certainly not "amazing photographs!" I used Ilford XP2 almost all the time due to its ease of developing at the shop around the corner, I loved it like a brother but then, like any other kid, I sold it when I ran out of money! (Unlike my brothers, I still have them!)
