Meethil on the Net

Gone are the days when peo­ple shifted from their SLR cam­era to a DSLR. Today, peo­ple are upgrad­ing their com­pact dig­i­tal cam­eras with entry level DSLRs. Most of them are upgrad­ing only their cam­era, not them­selves. Upgrad­ing a cam­era is easy – you buy a new one. Upgrad­ing ones self is more daunt­ing a task – it takes time, energy, ded­i­ca­tion and most of all a desire to improve. They sel­dom have a desire to improve, most of them have just a desire to ‘click photographs’.

When they first take a DSLR in their hands they are over­whelmed by the num­ber of but­tons and the choices in the menu. After fid­dling with it and not being able to click pic­tures half as good as what their com­pact cam­era cap­tured, they give up and find refuge in AUTO.

AUTO is a very sim­ple func­tion with a very spe­cific mis­sion. Its func­tion is to get them the best pic­ture pos­si­ble in any sit­u­a­tion. Its mis­sion is to enslave them. Using its sim­plic­ity as a charm it makes them for­get there is a world out­side AUTO that is more adven­tur­ous and fun than that bor­ing four let­ter word. AUTO ensures they get the same kind of bor­ing pic­tures again and again and again. The kind they have grown to like, to love.

They are over­joyed to find the very same AUTO which once sat on the dial of their faith­ful com­pact cam­era that has got them this far. They remem­ber their AUTO, it gave them the best pic­tures. And thats exactly what they want – best pic­ture in every sit­u­a­tion. But who should decides what is best? AUTO or they?  From time eter­nal we have heard, its not the cam­era that makes the pic­ture, its the per­son behind the camera.

By turn­ing to AUTO they are sub­mit­ting them­selves to the cam­era. They are say­ing, ‘The cam­era is a bet­ter judge of pho­tog­ra­phy than I am.’ They are say­ing, ‘The cam­era makes the pic­ture I just tell it to click.’ They are say­ing, ‘The cam­era is the pho­tog­ra­pher, I am not.’ AUTO sat­is­fies them, sat­is­fac­tion kills their desire, and desires death leads to the death of creativity.

If you are using your DSLR on AUTO, kill yourself!

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