[PStamler]

On the day mixing consoles introduced automation, they became devices that needed manuals. On some consoles, even doing simple assignment of channels to a 2-mix bus is something that takes multiple steps and a manual to get right. These consoles will do all kinds of tricks that simpler consoles won't do...but in consequence, mixing a vocal mic with two guitar mics requires a lot of steps before you start pushing faders.

We have an SSL Duality at our university. No way anybody can use it without a manual. It's the nature of the beast.

Peace,
Paul

[William Sommerwerck]

"Ron C" wrote in message
...

I used to do a lot of photography back in the film/manual camera
days. I recently bought a digital SLR and was blown away by all
the automatic crap and figuring how to work around it. The controls,
their operations, and their layout /should have/ been a piece of cake.
I spent a lot of time reading the manual.

And you've probably forgotten half of it.

One approach is to pick a configuration that works for /you/, then save it as
a Custom setup.

By the way, if you read the manuals closely, you'll see that the people
writing them know next to nothing about photography.


Then I jumped into Photoshop CS6. Yeeps!!! It's complex, highly
nuanced, and comes with no manual what-so-ever. Heck, it doesn't
even come with a basic help file.

Adobe's attitude towards its users strikes me as downright arrogant. Their
Website is virtually useless in helping you decide which product will best
meet your needs. Adobe knows about this, and doesn't care.

There are British "magazines" (available at well-stocked newsstands or Costco)
that go through Photoshop's features step-by-step. Surprisingly, they /aren't/
very well-written.

By the way, I've yet to figure out how to play the non-Adobe instructional
DVDs that came with the software. Does anyone out there know?


Steep learning curves, but I'm now doing things I'd never dreamed
of doing with film and darkroom technology.

It shouldn't be that hard. But nobody cares.

It's ludicrous that such an expensive piece of software doesn't come with a
dozen instructional DVDs.

[Frank Stearns]

Ron C writes:

-snips-

Hmm, I'm going to guess DAWs fall in to that category.
I tried Pro Tools lite and never quite got the hang of it.
Thank goodness don't mix enough to need to dive in.

Yes, the old lite PT was rather odd. It's the first PT I saw and the hatred was
immediate and perhaps mutual. As far as I could tell, the thing was pretty broken.
And I don't mean "crippled for demo" - it just was, well, weird.

Two years later, when I was forced to use PT (newer version) much of the interface
seemed to make a lot more sense. And this was in spite of the many design
requirements in a tool of that complexity with some UI needs in conflict with
others.

While there are a few dopey things, it appears PT has progressively improved in the
newer versions. Haven't seen 10 (or is 11 now), but folks I trust have
said 10 is pretty good.

YMMV

Frank
Mobile Audio
--

[Neil Gould]

Don Pearce wrote:
On Wed, 19 Jun 2013 15:31:23 -0500, "Neil Gould"
wrote:

Don Pearce wrote:
On Wed, 19 Jun 2013 07:58:30 -0400, "Arny Krueger"
wrote:


"PStamler" wrote in message
...
On Tuesday, June 18, 2013 12:56:04 PM UTC-5, William Sommerwerck
wrote:

When you buy a product with a lousy user manual, it's for one
reason and one

reason only -- the manufacturer doesn't care.

Or doesn't want to spend the money. They look at the competition,
which provides poor manuals and sells lots of product, and figure
they can get away with doing the same.

In writing reviews of products, I make a point of reviewing the
user manual as well as the physical product.


In this day and age, someone selling something that requires a user
manual is an interesting concept.

I'm going to agree with this, at least in my major field, RF and
microwaves. I frequently get hold of a new piece of equipment - some
sort of generator and analyser - and am asked by the manufacturer to
assess it. If the manual has to come out of the shrink wrap, the
product has, as far as I am concerned, failed. I know exactly what
the thing should do, and I expect the sequence needed to achieve it
to be logical to the point of intuitive.

If the equipment that you receive has fairly well-established or even
standardized modes of operation and connections, that's one thing. I
can't say that the same holds true for digital audio mixers beyond
some rudimentary gozintas and gozoutas. Everything in between is
based on a design group's philosophy that presumes a lot about what
the purchaser really wants to do. The higher the level of
abstraction, such as those mixers with almost no individualized
controls, the more someone will need a manual.

Well there's the thing. Mixing desks have been around long enough. The
big difference I can see is that the kind of equipment I use is
designed by people who actually use it the same way I do (and I have
designed test equipment myself), whereas with audio, a great deal (not
all, I know) of the design work is done by people who have never seen
the inside of a studio.

Some of these items were designed by folks who know a great deal about
studio work, and came up with devices that add a lot of flexibility and
efficiency to the process of recording. In doing so, things that you could
look at and get some idea of what's going where, such as patch bays, gave
way to matrix switching that provide options that aren't practical, or even
possible with the physical alternatives. The problem that I see is that the
purchaser of these things can't determine whether the unit's design
philosophy is compatible with the way they go about their work without
spending a very long time with the units because the good manuals can't be
more than a general reference without turning into a pretty big library.
--
best regards,

Neil

[Scott Dorsey]

Ron C wrote:

I used to do a lot of photography back in the film/manual camera
days. I recently bought a digital SLR and was blown away by all
the automatic crap and figuring how to work around it. The controls,
their operations, and their layout /should have/ been a piece of cake.
I spent a lot of time reading the manual.

Sadly, the later film-based SLRs are the same way. And so are a lot of
mixing consoles.

Your job as an experienced user of cameras but a first-time user of this
model is to figure out how to shut ALL the crap off and set it manually.
You look at the scene, you can guess the exposure and where the shadows
fall with respect to the highlights, you now just need to make the camera
obey you.

There should be a whole section in the front of the manual telling you how
to set it up this way. Then, once you get the hang of doing that, then maybe
later you can investigate the automated modes.

Steep learning curves, but I'm now doing things I'd never dreamed of
doing with film and darkroom technology.

There's no _reason_ for the steep learning curve, though, other than poor
documentation and UI design.
--scott

--
"C'est un Nagra. C'est suisse, et tres, tres precis."

[Mike Rivers[_2_]]

On 6/19/2013 3:56 PM, William Sommerwerck wrote:

Furthermore, if a product /has/ to understandable without referring to
the manual, manufacturers might be disinclined to add innovative features.

Innovation is good, but by the time it gets to market, it needs to be
understandable. Not only understandable to use, but we need to
understand what we might use that feature for. Many times I'll be
looking at a product and think "Why would anyone want to do THAT?"
Sometimes there are useful examples, other times we're just left on our
own to innovate with the new innovation.


--
For a good time, call http://mikeriversaudio.wordpress.com

[Arny Krueger[_5_]]

"William Sommerwerck" wrote in message
...
"Arny Krueger" wrote in message
...

My first 02R96 got me into its manual
pretty deeply any number of times.

What were your reasons for turning to the manual?

Patching internal connections.

02R96s have one of the highest ratios between logical I/O and physical I/O
of any console I know of, with something like 24 physical inputs and 10
physical outputs versus 112 or more logical inputs and at least 66 logical
outputs. All of the inputs and outputs can be patched, which means that they
can be rerouted among the 34 or more inboard physical I/O ports and another
112+ physical outboard I/O ports. There are another couple of dozen ports
that belong to inboard EFX units and follow other rules for routing. Load
this thing up with a bunch of external I/O ports and an Aviom or other
monitoring system and your head will spin for a while after you even just
figure out what it can do.

[William Sommerwerck]

"Scott Dorsey" wrote in message ...
Ron C wrote:

I used to do a lot of photography back in the film/manual camera
days. I recently bought a digital SLR and was blown away by all
the automatic crap and figuring how to work around it. The controls,
their operations, and their layout /should have/ been a piece of cake.
I spent a lot of time reading the manual.

Your job as an experienced user of cameras but a first-time user of this
model is to figure out how to shut ALL the crap off and set it manually.
You look at the scene, you can guess the exposure and where the shadows
fall with respect to the highlights, you now just need to make the camera
obey you.

The first step is to set the camera for Manual, Aperture-priority, or
Shutter-priority exposure. But that's just one step of many.


There should be a whole section in the front of the manual telling
you how to set it up this way. Then, once you get the hang of doing
that, then maybe later you can investigate the automated modes.

I've never seen a user manual with such a section. Japanese-written
documentation invariably focuses on the trees, and ignores the forest.

In order to decide which features you want to use, you'll have to go through
the book page by page and make individual decisions. This can be difficult
when (as is usually the case) you aren't told exactly what the feature does,
or how it works.

For example, Canon has some sort of "lighting compensation modifier" that --
in a professional camera! -- is turned on by default! Not only does Canon
refuse to explain exactly what it does (Canon appears to be afraid a
competitor will steal the idea), but it has an odd side-effect not explained
in the manual. It seems that if you try to manually compensate the exposure by
2 stops (or more), the camera won't let you do it!


Steep learning curves, but I'm now doing things I'd never dreamed of
doing with film and darkroom technology.

There's no _reason_ for the steep learning curve, though, other than
poor documentation and UI design.

That pretty much covers everything, doesn't it?

[William Sommerwerck]

"Arny Krueger" wrote in message
...
"William Sommerwerck" wrote in message
...
"Arny Krueger" wrote in message
...

My first 02R96 got me into its manual
pretty deeply any number of times.

What were your reasons for turning to the manual?

Patching internal connections.

02R96s have one of the highest ratios between logical I/O and physical I/O
of any console I know of, with something like 24 physical inputs and 10
physical outputs versus 112 or more logical inputs and at least 66 logical
outputs. All of the inputs and outputs can be patched, which means that they
can be rerouted among the 34 or more inboard physical I/O ports and another
112+ physical outboard I/O ports. There are another couple of dozen ports
that belong to inboard EFX units and follow other rules for routing. Load
this thing up with a bunch of external I/O ports and an Aviom or other
monitoring system and your head will spin for a while after you even just
figure out what it can do.

This is a "neutral" (not critical) question. Do you see any way the product
could be redesigned and/or the manual rewritten, so that you could
//understand// the patching in a way that would eliminate the need to refer to
the manual? (This might not be possible.)


Ever used a dbx 400X switcher? Several years ago I put three in my home system
so that the front, side, and rear channels could be independently configured.
Though the manual wasn't at all bad, I still went crazy trying to understand
the logic of how it had been designed. And I nearly went blind studying the
schematic to figure out how to disable the interlock that prevented a tape
deck's output from being connected to its input. I eventually got everything
working just the way I wanted -- but had to write an instruction sheet (!!!),
which I sometimes have to refer to.

[Neil Gould]

Scott Dorsey wrote:
Ron C wrote:

I used to do a lot of photography back in the film/manual camera
days. I recently bought a digital SLR and was blown away by all
the automatic crap and figuring how to work around it. The controls,
their operations, and their layout /should have/ been a piece of
cake. I spent a lot of time reading the manual.

Sadly, the later film-based SLRs are the same way. And so are a lot
of mixing consoles.

Your job as an experienced user of cameras but a first-time user of
this model is to figure out how to shut ALL the crap off and set it
manually.
You look at the scene, you can guess the exposure and where the
shadows
fall with respect to the highlights, you now just need to make the
camera obey you.

There should be a whole section in the front of the manual telling
you how to set it up this way. Then, once you get the hang of doing
that, then maybe later you can investigate the automated modes.

Steep learning curves, but I'm now doing things I'd never dreamed of
doing with film and darkroom technology.

There's no _reason_ for the steep learning curve, though, other than
poor documentation and UI design.

I think that one problem is that these new devices, be they "cameras" or
"consoles" appear to be similar to the previous generation items, but they
are completely different. With film cameras, guessing the exposure is about
the film, not the camera, so for a camera without film, what is the basis
for guessing the exposure? It's easy to see that the best use of the
computers in the camera is to make the exposure adjustment based on
information that the user can't have, such things as the sensitivity of the
sensor, system processing delays and such. Shut all of that off, and the
user could literally be in the dark!

Digital consoles are somewhat analogous to this, since few users will know
the particulars of the DSPs being used or of the firmware that ultimately
determines what happens when some parameter is changed. A goood approach to
these things is to have good documentation and to know one's own limitations
with regard to grasping that documentation.
--
best regards,

Neil

[Scott Dorsey]

Neil Gould wrote:

I think that one problem is that these new devices, be they "cameras" or
"consoles" appear to be similar to the previous generation items, but they
are completely different. With film cameras, guessing the exposure is about
the film, not the camera, so for a camera without film, what is the basis
for guessing the exposure?

It's the same. You have a sensor that has some logarithmic sensitivity,
with the height of the straight line portion of the curve measured on the
ASA scale and the slope of the straight line curve measured as gamma.

Digital, analogue, doesn't matter. The shape of the curve can differ
and where each zone falls on a given exposure may differ as a result, but
the exposure methods of the same. And you should have a good grasp of the
overall curve shape in your head.

It's easy to see that the best use of the
computers in the camera is to make the exposure adjustment based on
information that the user can't have, such things as the sensitivity of the
sensor, system processing delays and such. Shut all of that off, and the
user could literally be in the dark!

No, the camera has no idea how I want the picture to look. The camera does
not know that I want the shadows to fall full black zone zero instead of
Zone I. The camera is stupid. It averages the exposure assuming that the
scene is 18% grey across the field. It probably has some intelligence that
knows to block off very black or very white areas from the calculation, or
maybe it draws a histogram of values and sets the average exposure based on
the mode rather than the median grey scale value.

But maybe I don't want that. Maybe I _wanted_ the foreground to be vignetted.
On the other hand, maybe I wanted detail in the foreground and didn't care
that the background blew out. That's my decision. It's not a decision I
want to trust to some piece of software that has no idea what I want the
picture to look like.

What makes the digital camera software so elaborate is that there are ways
to tell the software how you want these things. But for someone with
reasonable experience in visualization, it's easier (though often not faster)
to just set the exposure based on a meter and some simple math. For people
who need to shoot at high speed without any real ability or time to
previsualize, the software can be a great help, but only after they spend
a lot of time learning how to use it.

Digital consoles are somewhat analogous to this, since few users will know
the particulars of the DSPs being used or of the firmware that ultimately
determines what happens when some parameter is changed. A goood approach to
these things is to have good documentation and to know one's own limitations
with regard to grasping that documentation.

This is true. I was very surprised to find that when I set the Q to a
given number on the Tascam digital console, I got a very different curve
slope than I got when I set to the same Q on a Presonus console. (And
not surprisingly the Orban 622 is different than either). But digital
consoles, unlike digital cameras, aren't trying to make artistic decisions
for me.
--scott

--
"C'est un Nagra. C'est suisse, et tres, tres precis."

[William Sommerwerck]

"Scott Dorsey" wrote in message ...

No, the camera has no idea how I want the picture to look. The camera does
not know that I want the shadows to fall full black zone zero instead of
Zone I. The camera is stupid. It averages the exposure assuming that the
scene is 18% grey across the field.

"Full-frame averaging" exposure has been obsolete at least since Nikon
introduced center-weighted metering. * Most cameras supposedly have some form
of "evaluative" metering that takes measurements over dozens of points.
However, I often wonder whether these systems work as they're claimed to. (In
the days before digital, "Modern Photography" ran an article showing that the
evaluative systems of that era simply did not work.) And let's not talk about
automatic white balance, another non-functioning "feature".

* Minolta had a system that prevented a bright sky from underexposing the
image. And Konica had a clever center-weighted system that adjusted its field
of view /optically/ according to the lens's focal length.


What makes the digital camera software so elaborate is that there are
ways to tell the software how you want these things. But for someone with
reasonable experience in visualization, it's easier (though often not
faster)
to just set the exposure based on a meter and some simple math. For people
who need to shoot at high speed without any real ability or time to
previsualize, the software can be a great help, but only after they spend
a lot of time learning how to use it.

A major advantage of digital imaging is the ability to see the image on
camera's screen, and view an exposure histogram.

[Mike Rivers[_2_]]

On 6/20/2013 10:31 AM, William Sommerwerck wrote:

This is a "neutral" (not critical) question. Do you see any way the
product could be redesigned and/or the manual rewritten, so that you
could //understand// the patching in a way that would eliminate the need
to refer to the manual? (This might not be possible.)

Um . . . how do you write the manual in a way that eliminates need to
refer to it? g

I assume you mean eliminating the need to frequently refer to it when
setting up a signal route. The way to do this is (in the manual) is to
first explain all of the internal and external ports - how they're
named, what the go into, and what they come out of. Then explain the
mechanics of connecting one to another using the matrix.

Still, with that many possible gozintas and gozoutas, you may know that
you want to do this or that and simply not remember that there's a port
available at a patch point in the matrix. The way to fix that is to
have a consistent naming system, both consistent within the device and
consistent within the industry. The Behringer X-32, for example, doesn't
have X number of subgroup outputs, Y number of auxiliary outputs and Z
number of main mix outputs, it has sixteen outputs. You can have your
main outputs be 1 and 2, or 7 and 11 if you want. If you only need four
subtroup outputs, that's four more headphone or wedge monitor mixes that
you can find a gozouta for.


--
For a good time, call http://mikeriversaudio.wordpress.com

[Ron C[_2_]]

On 6/20/2013 1:03 PM, Neil Gould wrote:
Scott Dorsey wrote:
Neil Gould wrote:

I think that one problem is that these new devices, be they
"cameras" or "consoles" appear to be similar to the previous
generation items, but they are completely different. With film
cameras, guessing the exposure is about the film, not the camera, so
for a camera without film, what is the basis for guessing the
exposure?

It's the same. You have a sensor that has some logarithmic
sensitivity, with the height of the straight line portion of the curve
measured on
the ASA scale and the slope of the straight line curve measured as gamma.

Well, the problem to solve is determining "some logarithmic sensitivity" of
the sensor & firmware combination, since these factors interact in such a
way that the actual ASA performance of the camera can change with a firmware
upgrade (BTDT).

Digital, analogue, doesn't matter. The shape of the curve can differ
and where each zone falls on a given exposure may differ as a result,
but
the exposure methods of the same. And you should have a good grasp
of the overall curve shape in your head.

All I can tell you about your supposition is that my Nikon, Canon, and Sony
digital cameras do not interpret the same lighting conditions in the same
way except in a very general sense. Sensors and firmware matters. OTOH, my
Leica, Rolleiflex and Olympus analog cameras are much more predictable and
consistent, to the point where the film is the critical factor in the
outcome.

It's easy to see that the best use of the
computers in the camera is to make the exposure adjustment based on
information that the user can't have, such things as the sensitivity
of the sensor, system processing delays and such. Shut all of that
off, and the user could literally be in the dark!

No, the camera has no idea how I want the picture to look. The
camera does not know that I want the shadows to fall full black zone
zero instead of Zone I. The camera is stupid. It averages the exposure
assuming
that the scene is 18% grey across the field. It probably has some
intelligence that knows to block off very black or very white areas
from the calculation, or maybe it draws a histogram of values and
sets the average exposure based on the mode rather than the median
grey scale value.

But maybe I don't want that. Maybe I _wanted_ the foreground to be
vignetted. On the other hand, maybe I wanted detail in the foreground
and didn't care that the background blew out. That's my decision.
It's not a decision I want to trust to some piece of software that
has no idea what I want the picture to look like.

Of course, Scott, but if one is going to be picky enough to want to place
parts of the image in different zones with a digital camera, it is best
determined by using the camera and seeing the results, not by theorizing
about what it should do. And if you do a firmware upgrade, start over.

[...]

Digital consoles are somewhat analogous to this, since few users
will know the particulars of the DSPs being used or of the firmware
that ultimately determines what happens when some parameter is
changed. A goood approach to these things is to have good
documentation and to know one's own limitations with regard to
grasping that documentation.

This is true. I was very surprised to find that when I set the Q to a
given number on the Tascam digital console, I got a very different
curve slope than I got when I set to the same Q on a Presonus
console. (And
not surprisingly the Orban 622 is different than either). But digital
consoles, unlike digital cameras, aren't trying to make artistic
decisions for me.

Oh? Then how would you account for the different results you got from the
same settings on different EQs (yeah, I know that the same thing happened in
the analog world, but it's much easier to understand why)? I'd say that the
differences are due to what the designer thought "sounded good" when
considering down-stream processing, and if so, then they certainly are
making artistic decisions for you.

I'm finding this much more interesting (and maybe even more useful) than
bashing Mr. Sommerwerck's bashing of some basic electronics book.

==
Later...
Ron Capik
--

[Don Pearce[_3_]]

On Thu, 20 Jun 2013 09:36:16 -0500, "Neil Gould"
wrote:

Scott Dorsey wrote:
Ron C wrote:

I used to do a lot of photography back in the film/manual camera
days. I recently bought a digital SLR and was blown away by all
the automatic crap and figuring how to work around it. The controls,
their operations, and their layout /should have/ been a piece of
cake. I spent a lot of time reading the manual.

Sadly, the later film-based SLRs are the same way. And so are a lot
of mixing consoles.

Your job as an experienced user of cameras but a first-time user of
this model is to figure out how to shut ALL the crap off and set it
manually.
You look at the scene, you can guess the exposure and where the
shadows
fall with respect to the highlights, you now just need to make the
camera obey you.

There should be a whole section in the front of the manual telling
you how to set it up this way. Then, once you get the hang of doing
that, then maybe later you can investigate the automated modes.

Steep learning curves, but I'm now doing things I'd never dreamed of
doing with film and darkroom technology.

There's no _reason_ for the steep learning curve, though, other than
poor documentation and UI design.

I think that one problem is that these new devices, be they "cameras" or
"consoles" appear to be similar to the previous generation items, but they
are completely different. With film cameras, guessing the exposure is about
the film, not the camera, so for a camera without film, what is the basis
for guessing the exposure? It's easy to see that the best use of the
computers in the camera is to make the exposure adjustment based on
information that the user can't have, such things as the sensitivity of the
sensor, system processing delays and such. Shut all of that off, and the
user could literally be in the dark!

Digital consoles are somewhat analogous to this, since few users will know
the particulars of the DSPs being used or of the firmware that ultimately
determines what happens when some parameter is changed. A goood approach to
these things is to have good documentation and to know one's own limitations
with regard to grasping that documentation.

But digital cameras do have one distinct advantage. You can fire off
any number of test shots at various apertures and speed, and see
instantly what the result is. The software that came with my Cannon
will even tell me exactly where on an image there is clipping (over or
under exposure). It only took me about an hour of playing before I
understood the manual mode completely, and could set it to give me the
best exposure compromise. Being only 8 bits, the dynamic range is not
all it might be, but I'm sure new generations of sensor will do for
photography what 16 bit digital did for audio - allowed a huge amount
of sloppy level control while still producing a perfectly acceptable
result.

I still use full auto - at events like parties where nobody wan't to
hang around while some geek fiddles with his camera.

d

[William Sommerwerck]

"Ron C" wrote in message
...

I'm finding this much more interesting (and maybe even more useful)
than bashing Mr. Sommerwerck's bashing of some basic electronics
book.

So does Mr Sommerwerck! I'm learning a few things, including that other people
take a similarly dyspeptic view of user manuals.

[William Sommerwerck]

"Mike Rivers" wrote in message ...

On 6/20/2013 10:31 AM, William Sommerwerck wrote:

This is a "neutral" (not critical) question. Do you see any way the
product could be redesigned and/or the manual rewritten, so that
you could //understand// the patching in a way that would eliminate
the need to refer to the manual? (This might not be possible.)

Um . . . how do you write the manual in a way that eliminates
the need to refer to it? g

Excellent question! No grin needed.

There's an old observation that you don't need to memorize what you
understand. You can mentally recreate from basic principles. This is why I say
that principles are more interesting and useful than facts.

Note that I said "This might not be possible". I'm assuming at least some
products can be designed in such a way that their operating principles are
"rational" (whatever that means), and the user can figure out what to do
without having to refer to the book. Similarly, any manual should present use
& operation in terms of broad principles (forest), before getting into the
details (trees).

Unfortunately, microprocessors make it possible for products to have a
virtually unlimited range of features, with little or no logical connection
with each other (other than that they "do something" useful). If you think
DSLRs are complex, you should see Amateur handy-talkies, and similar products.
You'd plotz.


I assume you mean eliminating the need to frequently refer to it when
setting up a signal route. The way to do this is (in the manual) is to first
explain all of the internal and external ports - how they're named, what the
go into, and what they come out of. Then explain the mechanics of connecting
one to another using the matrix.

Still, with that many possible gozintas and gozoutas, you may know that you
want to do this or that and simply not remember that there's a port
available at a patch point in the matrix. The way to fix that is to have a
consistent naming system, both consistent within the device and consistent
within the industry. The Behringer X-32, for example, doesn't have X number
of subgroup outputs, Y number of auxiliary outputs and Z number of main mix
outputs, it has sixteen outputs. You can have your main outputs be 1 and 2,
or 7 and 11 if you want. If you only need four subgroup outputs, that's four
more headphone or wedge monitor mixes
that you can find a gozouta for.

Excellent suggestions.


--
For a good time, call http://mikeriversaudio.wordpress.com

[William Sommerwerck]

One other point...

Smart companies have their technical writers sit in when a product is being
designed. Good writers are aware of designs likely to be difficult to explain
or use.

[Neil Gould]

Scott Dorsey wrote:
Neil Gould wrote:

I think that one problem is that these new devices, be they
"cameras" or "consoles" appear to be similar to the previous
generation items, but they are completely different. With film
cameras, guessing the exposure is about the film, not the camera, so
for a camera without film, what is the basis for guessing the
exposure?

It's the same. You have a sensor that has some logarithmic
sensitivity, with the height of the straight line portion of the curve
measured on
the ASA scale and the slope of the straight line curve measured as gamma.

Well, the problem to solve is determining "some logarithmic sensitivity" of
the sensor & firmware combination, since these factors interact in such a
way that the actual ASA performance of the camera can change with a firmware
upgrade (BTDT).

Digital, analogue, doesn't matter. The shape of the curve can differ
and where each zone falls on a given exposure may differ as a result,
but
the exposure methods of the same. And you should have a good grasp
of the overall curve shape in your head.

All I can tell you about your supposition is that my Nikon, Canon, and Sony
digital cameras do not interpret the same lighting conditions in the same
way except in a very general sense. Sensors and firmware matters. OTOH, my
Leica, Rolleiflex and Olympus analog cameras are much more predictable and
consistent, to the point where the film is the critical factor in the
outcome.

It's easy to see that the best use of the
computers in the camera is to make the exposure adjustment based on
information that the user can't have, such things as the sensitivity
of the sensor, system processing delays and such. Shut all of that
off, and the user could literally be in the dark!

No, the camera has no idea how I want the picture to look. The
camera does not know that I want the shadows to fall full black zone
zero instead of Zone I. The camera is stupid. It averages the exposure
assuming
that the scene is 18% grey across the field. It probably has some
intelligence that knows to block off very black or very white areas
from the calculation, or maybe it draws a histogram of values and
sets the average exposure based on the mode rather than the median
grey scale value.

But maybe I don't want that. Maybe I _wanted_ the foreground to be
vignetted. On the other hand, maybe I wanted detail in the foreground
and didn't care that the background blew out. That's my decision.
It's not a decision I want to trust to some piece of software that
has no idea what I want the picture to look like.

Of course, Scott, but if one is going to be picky enough to want to place
parts of the image in different zones with a digital camera, it is best
determined by using the camera and seeing the results, not by theorizing
about what it should do. And if you do a firmware upgrade, start over.

[...]

Digital consoles are somewhat analogous to this, since few users
will know the particulars of the DSPs being used or of the firmware
that ultimately determines what happens when some parameter is
changed. A goood approach to these things is to have good
documentation and to know one's own limitations with regard to
grasping that documentation.

This is true. I was very surprised to find that when I set the Q to a
given number on the Tascam digital console, I got a very different
curve slope than I got when I set to the same Q on a Presonus
console. (And
not surprisingly the Orban 622 is different than either). But digital
consoles, unlike digital cameras, aren't trying to make artistic
decisions for me.

Oh? Then how would you account for the different results you got from the
same settings on different EQs (yeah, I know that the same thing happened in
the analog world, but it's much easier to understand why)? I'd say that the
differences are due to what the designer thought "sounded good" when
considering down-stream processing, and if so, then they certainly are
making artistic decisions for you.
--
best regards,

Neil

[Scott Dorsey]

William Sommerwerck wrote:
"Scott Dorsey" wrote in message ...

No, the camera has no idea how I want the picture to look. The camera does
not know that I want the shadows to fall full black zone zero instead of
Zone I. The camera is stupid. It averages the exposure assuming that the
scene is 18% grey across the field.

"Full-frame averaging" exposure has been obsolete at least since Nikon
introduced center-weighted metering. * Most cameras supposedly have some form
of "evaluative" metering that takes measurements over dozens of points.
However, I often wonder whether these systems work as they're claimed to. (In
the days before digital, "Modern Photography" ran an article showing that the
evaluative systems of that era simply did not work.) And let's not talk about
automatic white balance, another non-functioning "feature".

They do in fact work as they are claimed, and I described how they work in
the following paragraph which you snipped. But, how they work is not
necessarily how I want them to work.

Most of the digital systems today will generate a histogram of all points in
the image and take the median of that, so large dark or light areas will not
affect the exposure so much.... unless they are greater than 50% of the image
in which case they will.

* Minolta had a system that prevented a bright sky from underexposing the
image. And Konica had a clever center-weighted system that adjusted its field
of view /optically/ according to the lens's focal length.

A lot of engineering was put into systems to allow people who do not really
understand exposure to take photographs. The problem is that if you do
understand exposure, they are often more annoying than not.

What makes the digital camera software so elaborate is that there are
ways to tell the software how you want these things. But for someone with
reasonable experience in visualization, it's easier (though often not
faster)
to just set the exposure based on a meter and some simple math. For people
who need to shoot at high speed without any real ability or time to
previsualize, the software can be a great help, but only after they spend
a lot of time learning how to use it.

A major advantage of digital imaging is the ability to see the image on
camera's screen, and view an exposure histogram.

These are good things, but beware of trying to judge exposure based on the
screen. The camera's screen has very little real dynamic range and you
can have severely blown-out highlights for instance, and not notice it on
the screen. The histogram will tell you the real truth of the matter, but
you have to look at it and use your brain. Letting the software look at it
for you may not be sufficient, but then again it might be. The man behind
the camera should be the final arbiter.
--scott

--
"C'est un Nagra. C'est suisse, et tres, tres precis."

[Scott Dorsey]

Neil Gould wrote:
Scott Dorsey wrote:
Neil Gould wrote:

I think that one problem is that these new devices, be they
"cameras" or "consoles" appear to be similar to the previous
generation items, but they are completely different. With film
cameras, guessing the exposure is about the film, not the camera, so
for a camera without film, what is the basis for guessing the
exposure?

It's the same. You have a sensor that has some logarithmic
sensitivity, with the height of the straight line portion of the curve
measured on
the ASA scale and the slope of the straight line curve measured as gamma.

Well, the problem to solve is determining "some logarithmic sensitivity" of
the sensor & firmware combination, since these factors interact in such a
way that the actual ASA performance of the camera can change with a firmware
upgrade (BTDT).

Yes, and not only that, some cameras allow you to adjust the shape of the
curve with different transfer functions. Many of them hide this under a
million menus under some obscure name. It's important.

Digital, analogue, doesn't matter. The shape of the curve can differ
and where each zone falls on a given exposure may differ as a result,
but
the exposure methods of the same. And you should have a good grasp
of the overall curve shape in your head.

All I can tell you about your supposition is that my Nikon, Canon, and Sony
digital cameras do not interpret the same lighting conditions in the same
way except in a very general sense. Sensors and firmware matters. OTOH, my
Leica, Rolleiflex and Olympus analog cameras are much more predictable and
consistent, to the point where the film is the critical factor in the
outcome.

When you change from the Nikon to the Sony, you are changing from one sensor
to another. This is as dramatic as changing from Tri-X Professional to
Verichrome Pan.

The sensor and associated firmware, or the film and processing, is the
critical factor in the outcome because that's where your transfer curve
is coming from. Of course, the Nikon and Canon have different transfer
curves. If you change the firmware on the Nikon, you'll have a different
transfer curve than you did before. Different films have different curves
as well... and I can take Tri-X in D-23 and make the toe of the curve very
short, or I can put the same film in Diafine and make the toe of the curve
very long indeed. This is what sensitometry is all about.

But maybe I don't want that. Maybe I _wanted_ the foreground to be
vignetted. On the other hand, maybe I wanted detail in the foreground
and didn't care that the background blew out. That's my decision.
It's not a decision I want to trust to some piece of software that
has no idea what I want the picture to look like.

Of course, Scott, but if one is going to be picky enough to want to place
parts of the image in different zones with a digital camera, it is best
determined by using the camera and seeing the results, not by theorizing
about what it should do. And if you do a firmware upgrade, start over.

I'm sorry, I am not a big fan of trial and error. Better to just get it
right the first time. If you use the software to get it right, that's fine.
If you do it manually, that's fine too. But the system needs to be designed
to allow you to whichever you find convenient in a rapid and easy fashion.
--scott

--
"C'est un Nagra. C'est suisse, et tres, tres precis."

[Don Pearce[_3_]]

On 20 Jun 2013 14:13:49 -0400, (Scott Dorsey) wrote:

Neil Gould wrote:
Scott Dorsey wrote:
Neil Gould wrote:

I think that one problem is that these new devices, be they
"cameras" or "consoles" appear to be similar to the previous
generation items, but they are completely different. With film
cameras, guessing the exposure is about the film, not the camera, so
for a camera without film, what is the basis for guessing the
exposure?

It's the same. You have a sensor that has some logarithmic
sensitivity, with the height of the straight line portion of the curve
measured on
the ASA scale and the slope of the straight line curve measured as gamma.

Well, the problem to solve is determining "some logarithmic sensitivity" of
the sensor & firmware combination, since these factors interact in such a
way that the actual ASA performance of the camera can change with a firmware
upgrade (BTDT).

Yes, and not only that, some cameras allow you to adjust the shape of the
curve with different transfer functions. Many of them hide this under a
million menus under some obscure name. It's important.

Digital, analogue, doesn't matter. The shape of the curve can differ
and where each zone falls on a given exposure may differ as a result,
but
the exposure methods of the same. And you should have a good grasp
of the overall curve shape in your head.

All I can tell you about your supposition is that my Nikon, Canon, and Sony
digital cameras do not interpret the same lighting conditions in the same
way except in a very general sense. Sensors and firmware matters. OTOH, my
Leica, Rolleiflex and Olympus analog cameras are much more predictable and
consistent, to the point where the film is the critical factor in the
outcome.

When you change from the Nikon to the Sony, you are changing from one sensor
to another. This is as dramatic as changing from Tri-X Professional to
Verichrome Pan.

The sensor and associated firmware, or the film and processing, is the
critical factor in the outcome because that's where your transfer curve
is coming from. Of course, the Nikon and Canon have different transfer
curves. If you change the firmware on the Nikon, you'll have a different
transfer curve than you did before. Different films have different curves
as well... and I can take Tri-X in D-23 and make the toe of the curve very
short, or I can put the same film in Diafine and make the toe of the curve
very long indeed. This is what sensitometry is all about.

But maybe I don't want that. Maybe I _wanted_ the foreground to be
vignetted. On the other hand, maybe I wanted detail in the foreground
and didn't care that the background blew out. That's my decision.
It's not a decision I want to trust to some piece of software that
has no idea what I want the picture to look like.

Of course, Scott, but if one is going to be picky enough to want to place
parts of the image in different zones with a digital camera, it is best
determined by using the camera and seeing the results, not by theorizing
about what it should do. And if you do a firmware upgrade, start over.

I'm sorry, I am not a big fan of trial and error. Better to just get it
right the first time. If you use the software to get it right, that's fine.
If you do it manually, that's fine too. But the system needs to be designed
to allow you to whichever you find convenient in a rapid and easy fashion.
--scott

The most important point in all of this is to always save files in RAW
format - exactly as it came off ther sensor. All the colour and lens
correction information is still present as metadata, but you have a
true original to work with. If you opt for JPG save even at maximum
quality, that is all lost.

d

[Neil Gould]

Scott Dorsey wrote:
Neil Gould wrote:
Of course, Scott, but if one is going to be picky enough to want to
place parts of the image in different zones with a digital camera,
it is best determined by using the camera and seeing the results,
not by theorizing about what it should do. And if you do a firmware
upgrade, start over.

I'm sorry, I am not a big fan of trial and error.

Who is talking about trial and error? I'm not into the "touchy-feely"
approach from chimping and presuming that the histogram is telling you all
you need to know about the scene. There is no significant difference, for
example, between calibrating the performance of a particular batch of a film
in preparation for employing the zone system and the calibration of the
results that you get from a particular sensor and firmware combination. Once
you have such objective information, it's easier to make artistic decisions.
--
best regards,

Neil

[Scott Dorsey]

Neil Gould wrote:
Who is talking about trial and error? I'm not into the "touchy-feely"
approach from chimping and presuming that the histogram is telling you all
you need to know about the scene. There is no significant difference, for
example, between calibrating the performance of a particular batch of a film
in preparation for employing the zone system and the calibration of the
results that you get from a particular sensor and firmware combination. Once
you have such objective information, it's easier to make artistic decisions.

This is 100% true.

The histogram tells you a lot of what you want to know, and the spotmeter
tool (or whatever Nikon calls it) tells you the rest of it.

But the PROBLEM is getting the camera to shut off all the crap and getting
it to give you that information and to accept your information. The problem
is a UI problem.

An adjustable camera only needs three things to adjust, everything else is
gravy. Four or five if you consider being able to change the sensitivity of
the sensor and the curve shape. But the camera has hundreds of menus and
submenus. Your job is to figure out how to turn all the crap off to begin
with, which is not as easy as it sounds.
--scott


--
"C'est un Nagra. C'est suisse, et tres, tres precis."

[Scott Dorsey]

Don Pearce wrote:
The most important point in all of this is to always save files in RAW
format - exactly as it came off ther sensor. All the colour and lens
correction information is still present as metadata, but you have a
true original to work with. If you opt for JPG save even at maximum
quality, that is all lost.

Good point, that goes without saying. Once you start adding in perceptual
encoding stuff, it gets a lot harder.
--scott
--
"C'est un Nagra. C'est suisse, et tres, tres precis."

[Mike Rivers[_2_]]

On 6/20/2013 1:03 PM, Neil Gould wrote:

All I can tell you about your supposition is that my Nikon, Canon, and Sony
digital cameras do not interpret the same lighting conditions in the same
way except in a very general sense. Sensors and firmware matters. OTOH, my
Leica, Rolleiflex and Olympus analog cameras are much more predictable and
consistent, to the point where the film is the critical factor in the
outcome.

I wonder if their thinking is along the line of "This picture is going
to see a computer soon after it leaves the camera, and there, anything
can be adjusted to the photographer's liking." It's not like with a film
camera where the majority of users (even professionals) sent the film
to the lab. got the prints back, and the job's done. A pro learns his
camera and film well enough so that he knows what the outcome will be
rather than having to fool with a computer program.

Sort of like recording with a DAW compared with recording to tape.


--
For a good time, call http://mikeriversaudio.wordpress.com

[Mike Rivers[_2_]]

On 6/20/2013 12:42 PM, William Sommerwerck wrote:

Smart companies have their technical writers sit in when a product is
being designed. Good writers are aware of designs likely to be difficult
to explain or use.

I was with Mackie when the HDR24/96 was being hatched and I spent quite
a bit of time with the designers. I even found several bugs while I was
writing material for the manual and said "huh? I can't write that it
works like THIS!" Thing is that they weren't working from a detailed
functional spec, so they kept adding things and removing things and it
was only when the marketing department said "We have to ship it NOW"
that they decided they were done. And a lot of the changes required
changes to the user interface so it was fun to keep up.


--
For a good time, call http://mikeriversaudio.wordpress.com

[Neil Gould]

Mike Rivers wrote:
On 6/20/2013 1:03 PM, Neil Gould wrote:

All I can tell you about your supposition is that my Nikon, Canon,
and Sony digital cameras do not interpret the same lighting
conditions in the same way except in a very general sense. Sensors
and firmware matters. OTOH, my Leica, Rolleiflex and Olympus analog
cameras are much more predictable and consistent, to the point where
the film is the critical factor in the outcome.

I wonder if their thinking is along the line of "This picture is going
to see a computer soon after it leaves the camera, and there, anything
can be adjusted to the photographer's liking." It's not like with a
film camera where the majority of users (even professionals) sent
the film to the lab. got the prints back, and the job's done. A pro
learns his camera and film well enough so that he knows what the
outcome will be rather than having to fool with a computer program.

This might be true for casual users, street shooters, or news photographers.
For commercial work and those who have to get things spot on or not get
paid, it's a lot more critical, and requires a lot more control over every
step of the imaging process.

Sort of like recording with a DAW compared with recording to tape.

With the tools used for recording to tape, there were a lot of physical and
technical limitations that have been removed by digital technology. I much
prefer matrix switching to patch bays, for example. DAWs are a different
matter, since they provide several post-production functions in a single
box. Folks can choose the UI that best suits them. I, for one, don't want to
see any pseudo-analog controls on my screen.
--
best regards,

Neil

[Ron C[_2_]]

On 6/20/2013 12:24 PM, Don Pearce wrote:
On Thu, 20 Jun 2013 09:36:16 -0500, "Neil Gould"
wrote:

Scott Dorsey wrote:
Ron C wrote:

I used to do a lot of photography back in the film/manual camera
days. I recently bought a digital SLR and was blown away by all
the automatic crap and figuring how to work around it. The controls,
their operations, and their layout /should have/ been a piece of
cake. I spent a lot of time reading the manual.

Sadly, the later film-based SLRs are the same way. And so are a lot
of mixing consoles.

Your job as an experienced user of cameras but a first-time user of
this model is to figure out how to shut ALL the crap off and set it
manually.
You look at the scene, you can guess the exposure and where the
shadows
fall with respect to the highlights, you now just need to make the
camera obey you.

There should be a whole section in the front of the manual telling
you how to set it up this way. Then, once you get the hang of doing
that, then maybe later you can investigate the automated modes.

Steep learning curves, but I'm now doing things I'd never dreamed of
doing with film and darkroom technology.

There's no _reason_ for the steep learning curve, though, other than
poor documentation and UI design.

I think that one problem is that these new devices, be they "cameras" or
"consoles" appear to be similar to the previous generation items, but they
are completely different. With film cameras, guessing the exposure is about
the film, not the camera, so for a camera without film, what is the basis
for guessing the exposure? It's easy to see that the best use of the
computers in the camera is to make the exposure adjustment based on
information that the user can't have, such things as the sensitivity of the
sensor, system processing delays and such. Shut all of that off, and the
user could literally be in the dark!

Digital consoles are somewhat analogous to this, since few users will know
the particulars of the DSPs being used or of the firmware that ultimately
determines what happens when some parameter is changed. A goood approach to
these things is to have good documentation and to know one's own limitations
with regard to grasping that documentation.

But digital cameras do have one distinct advantage. You can fire off
any number of test shots at various apertures and speed, and see
instantly what the result is. The software that came with my Cannon
will even tell me exactly where on an image there is clipping (over or
under exposure). It only took me about an hour of playing before I
understood the manual mode completely, and could set it to give me the
best exposure compromise. Being only 8 bits, the dynamic range is not
all it might be, but I'm sure new generations of sensor will do for
photography what 16 bit digital did for audio - allowed a huge amount
of sloppy level control while still producing a perfectly acceptable
result.

I still use full auto - at events like parties where nobody wan't to
hang around while some geek fiddles with his camera.

d

Note that the Canon EOS t3 series has a 14 bit per channel
dynamic range in RAW mode. Adding a +/- 3 stop bracket then
gives a 20 bit HDR dynamic range. Too bad prints only have
about 5 bits (5 stops) of dynamic range.

==
Later...
Ron Capik
--

[Les Cargill[_4_]]

Mike Rivers wrote:
On 6/20/2013 1:03 PM, Neil Gould wrote:

All I can tell you about your supposition is that my Nikon, Canon, and
Sony
digital cameras do not interpret the same lighting conditions in the same
way except in a very general sense. Sensors and firmware matters.
OTOH, my
Leica, Rolleiflex and Olympus analog cameras are much more predictable
and
consistent, to the point where the film is the critical factor in the
outcome.

I wonder if their thinking is along the line of "This picture is going
to see a computer soon after it leaves the camera, and there, anything
can be adjusted to the photographer's liking."

I am pretty sure that's the case.

It's not like with a film
camera where the majority of users (even professionals) sent the film
to the lab. got the prints back, and the job's done.

Well....

Ansel Adams' work was more in the darkroom than capturing the exposure.
So it depends.

A pro learns his
camera and film well enough so that he knows what the outcome will be
rather than having to fool with a computer program.

Sort of like recording with a DAW compared with recording to tape.



When I record with a DAW, I record just like it was
tape. A tape with a blindingly fast rewind.

--
Les Cargill

[Trevor]

"Arny Krueger" wrote in message
...
OTOH, computer operating systems are probably among the most complex
things around, and I've haven't read the manual for one since Win95.

What manual? Haven't even seen a manual for any Windows since Win98. But I
bet you've looked it up on the internet when you have a problem, just as you
are expected to do now.
The last thing I do when setting up computers for others is download the
best .pdf guide I can find and put a shortcut to it on the desktop. Saves a
few calls as I'm amazed how many people don't check the internet first, and
of course some can't get that far even when you've already configured
everything for them :-(

Trevor.

[Trevor]

"Neil Gould" wrote in message
...
Tried an Android tablet yet? No manuals and little consistency between
the
basic functions of apps make it a "poke and stroke" environment

Shouldn't that be poke and hope?

("why would a user want or need to exit an app???"). 8-D

Sadly many such concepts are completely unknown by most users. And nobody
seems to know or care what personal information they are freely giving away.
Most Android apps make Google, Facebook etc. seem like bastions of privacy.
Hell they even beat most malware on the PC, but unlike the PC you only get
two choices, accept it or don't use one :-(

Trevor.

[Trevor]

"Mike Rivers" wrote in message
...
On 6/19/2013 7:08 AM, William Sommerwerck wrote:
Are there Web documents that step a raw beginner through the process of
understanding how a mixer is set up and operated?

Apparently not. That's why I see a need for a book.

How hard have you looked? I've found lots, not all of it legit of course,
just as any book you write will probably end up on the net somewhere without
your consent. I know much of my material does. And I'm amazed how musicians
who complain about piracy of their material are sometimes the worst
offenders :-(

Trevor.

[Trevor]

"Mike Rivers" wrote in message
...
And I still can't find service documentation for a lot of the things I
have that need fixing.

True, but I do find a lot more now than before the internet. And I still
have manuals I had to buy at great expense just to fix my own items in the
past, even though the products themselves have long since gone :-(
Some companies would send you a photocopy at minimal expense, but others
charged the equivalent of a few hours wages for a few page leaflet, just to
protect their service dealers, whilst others simply refuse altogether.
Nothing much has changed that I can see.

Trevor.

[Trevor]

"Ron C" wrote in message
...
Then I jumped into Photoshop CS6. Yeeps!!! It's complex, highly nuanced,
and comes with no manual what-so-ever. Heck, it doesn't even come
with a basic help file.

Adobe are happy to sell you all manner of manuals, instruction courses etc.
for *more* money!
Which supports a *huge* industry for third party manuals and how to's.
And Adobe are not alone there in the computer world, in fact it has become
the norm.

Trevor.

[Trevor]

"Scott Dorsey" wrote in message
...
Ron C wrote:
I used to do a lot of photography back in the film/manual camera
days. I recently bought a digital SLR and was blown away by all
the automatic crap and figuring how to work around it. The controls,
their operations, and their layout /should have/ been a piece of cake.
I spent a lot of time reading the manual.

Sadly, the later film-based SLRs are the same way. And so are a lot of
mixing consoles.

Your job as an experienced user of cameras but a first-time user of this
model is to figure out how to shut ALL the crap off and set it manually.
You look at the scene, you can guess the exposure and where the shadows
fall with respect to the highlights, you now just need to make the camera
obey you.

There should be a whole section in the front of the manual telling you how
to set it up this way. Then, once you get the hang of doing that, then
maybe
later you can investigate the automated modes.

Which is the reverse of what the inexperienced user does, and most camera's
are designed to be used by inexperienced people first.
However most DSLR's I have used have a readily apparent manual mode. Those
with only one setting dial can sometimes be a bit trickier to figure out how
to set both aperture and shutter speed though :-)


Steep learning curves, but I'm now doing things I'd never dreamed of
doing with film and darkroom technology.

There's no _reason_ for the steep learning curve, though, other than poor
documentation and UI design.

Not so. It all depends on what knowledge and experience you start with.
Beginners struggle with Photoshop because they have no idea of the concepts.
Hell I know a local newspaper photog who has worked in the field for over 30
years, he had NO idea what "unsharp mask" meant until I explained it to him.
Having used lith film in my own darkroom for years, the concept was second
nature to me, but not many others it seems.
Photoshop makes it easy IMO, since there are a dozen ways to achieve almost
any outcome, depending on your understanding of where to start. Few get the
best out of the program, but any powerful software has lots the average user
never needs, and lots even a power user only needs occasionly.

Trevor.

[Trevor]

"Neil Gould" wrote in message
...
All I can tell you about your supposition is that my Nikon, Canon, and
Sony
digital cameras do not interpret the same lighting conditions in the same
way except in a very general sense. Sensors and firmware matters. OTOH, my
Leica, Rolleiflex and Olympus analog cameras are much more predictable and
consistent, to the point where the film is the critical factor in the
outcome.

Well duh! The film is equivalent to the sensor and associated electronics
in the digital. You *can* put any film you like in those analog camera's
(and get different results) but you can't switch sensors between camera's so
easily. Once you are used to how a particular camera model performs however,
it's the same as understanding how each film type (and it's processing)
performs differently. Far easier of course since you usually keep one camera
body for a while, and you don't have to put up with film processing
inconsistancies or variations in emulsions from one film batch to another,
or variations caused by film storage before and after processing.

Trevor.

[Trevor]

"Les Cargill" wrote in message
...
It's not like with a film
camera where the majority of users (even professionals) sent the film
to the lab. got the prints back, and the job's done.

Ansel Adams' work was more in the darkroom than capturing the exposure. So
it depends.

Exactly! And conversely most digital photographs never see a software photo
editor these days, anyone who spends a few minutes on Facebook etc will soon
see that :-(


When I record with a DAW, I record just like it was
tape. A tape with a blindingly fast rewind.

And less noise, less ditortion, less wow, less flutter, less media cost,
less maintenance cost....... and the ability to edit easily IF you want to
later.
Even with tape there were times we did razor blade edits, and worse yet
lossy dubs to another recorder :-(

Trevor.

[Trevor]

"Scott Dorsey" wrote in message
...
A major advantage of digital imaging is the ability to see the image on
camera's screen, and view an exposure histogram.

Yep, annoys me that people use the derogatory term "chimping" when pro's
often used polaroid backs on their camera's in days of old to check lighting
set ups etc. Nobody called us chimps back then, having such equipment was
considered extremely professional because amateurs could only dream of it
:-)


These are good things, but beware of trying to judge exposure based on the
screen. The camera's screen has very little real dynamic range and you
can have severely blown-out highlights for instance, and not notice it on
the screen.

Many camera's have highlight saturation warning if turned on.


The histogram will tell you the real truth of the matter,

And not always then, some camera's with a single histogram for instance will
not always indicate a single channel overexposure.


The man behind the camera should be the final arbiter.

If your camera doesn't allow that, you simply bought the wrong one, trade it
in on another one. More likely you just need to learn how to use it.

Trevor.

[Trevor]

"Ron C" wrote in message
...
Note that the Canon EOS t3 series has a 14 bit per channel
dynamic range in RAW mode. Adding a +/- 3 stop bracket then
gives a 20 bit HDR dynamic range. Too bad prints only have
about 5 bits (5 stops) of dynamic range.

So true, I miss Cibachrome transparencies. However there are papers and inks
that can do better than 5 stops, on par with Cibachrome prints of old
anyway.
And computer displays and TV's are getting better all the time, they are the
new transparency film/light box combo, and slide night alternatives, but
*far* more versatile.

Trevor.