Archived posting to the Leica Users Group, 2006/04/03
[Author Prev] [Author Next] [Thread Prev] [Thread Next] [Author Index] [Topic Index] [Home] [Search]That's odd, Larry, because I use an E500 along with my E1 and E330 - and after setting iso - which you'd do an an M6 or a hand held meter, I put focus on single autofocus, the meter on the mode I want - it's usually on matric, the camera on manual - and go. I virtually never change the focus poont, have literally never tried one of the many "modes." Oh, right, I do sometimes adjust white balance - instead of putting a filter on. Pick up the camera and go shoot - you'll have a lot more fun that way. :-) ___ Sent with SnapperMail www.snappermail.com ...... Original Message ....... On Mon, 03 Apr 2006 18:17:59 -0400 lrzeitlin@optonline.net wrote: " "As a DSLR neophyte I was astonished by the number of decisions I had to make using my new Olympus E-500 once I ventured out of the AUTO mode. " "In more than 50 years of Leica RF camera use all I had to attend to was focus, lens opening, and shutter speed. And these were pretty well determined by the nature of the picture and the light level. The only real degrees of freedom in using the camera were film and lens selection. Once you mastered the basics and learned to thread the film into that narrow loading slot, you could devote the rest of your attention to scene selection and composition - that, and which single malt scotch you were going to order at the pub. As I recall, my Leica M manual had 48 pages, and six of those were devoted to loading and unloading the camera. The CL manual (which I still have) had 32 pages, mostly pictures. " "The Olympus "easy to use" DSLR has five selectable modes of automatic shooting and 15 different scene modes for a full range of pictorial s "ituations. In addition there are four different "advanced" modes offering various degrees of automation down to full manual control. There are three focus modes, fixed, continuous, and manual. When using automatic focus there is the possibility of selecting several focus sensor modes. Exposure metering can be by spot or scene averaging. The built in flash can be selected as a fill in, full illumination with varying intensity, or turned off altogether. And, of course, picking ISO speed can be left to the camera's massive electronic brain, or set manually. Noise control can be in or out by user choice. The scene can be imaged in vivid color, natural color, muted color, grayscale, or sepia. I can set the form of image capture from RAW through various degrees of JPEG compression, or both at the same time. Naturally I can change the pixilation from super high quality to Web quality in a dozen different steps. And that's only on the picture taking side. There are many different way "s I can display the image that I can't yet comprehend. The Olympus manual is 215 pages, dense with print too small for my aging eyes to read. All in all, the camera offers over 1000 possibilities for picture taking. " "Now I realize that I performed many of these functions unconsciously with my film cameras but I was never aware of making so many of the decisions up front. Except for scene selection and composition very little of my prior experience transfers to the DSLR. My God, the thing has 15 buttons on the back and menus three levels deep displayed on the LCD. " "I suppose that in time it will all be clear to me, but with the loss of 300,000 brain cells a day, I hope that it will happen before I'm reduced to a gibbering idiot. If the long awaited digital Leica ever comes out with no more controls than an M3, I'll buy it in a minute. " "Failing that, I might buy an ergonomics textbook for the engineers at Olympus. " "Larry Z " "_______________________________________________ "Leica Users Group. "See http://leica-users.org/mailman/listinfo/lug for more information