This quote by Henri Cartier-Bresson resonates with me.
I hope that we don’t ever see the day when ready-made photo system, which guarantees good photographic compostions in advance, go on the market. –Henri Cartier-Bresson – “American Photo”, September/October 1997, page: 76
Unfortunately, I think that’s what many cameras have attempted to become today.
Auto-exposure, auto-focus, face-detection the list of auto features goes on.
The result of this is that camera has more to do with creating the photograph than the photographer. What’s missing is the thought process of the photographer.
When you work in an automatic mode you are taking your thought process out of your photography. It’s your thought process that makes your photograph truly yours and visually unique.
If you want to create photographs that are truly yours and visually unique, I think that you’ve got to learn to work your camera in manual exposure mode.
Henri Cartier-Bresson recognized that the process of creating good photography involved the photographer more than the camera.
I want to get more involved in my photography to create better pictures.