Don't you think that now, in the age of the digital cameras, some of the camera settings/measurements are obsolete or too much technically-orientated and should be changed? The actual digital cameras suffer of a kind of technical camera-superbia, IMO. The use of the new technologies are capable to make cameras more user-orientated, and they should do it.
Let me be more specific.
ISO - It appeared in the film era as a necessity for matching the exposure with the standardised film sensibility. As a side effect, when using a higher ISO film you usually got bigger granulation. Now, in the digital age, the correct exposure is, in most cases, handled by the camera. The effect of higher ISO is, still, a bigger granulation leading to a reduced enlargement capacity of the resulted digital file. But there is no direct measurement of how much a specific image can be enlarged. That makes the camera makers to join an "ISO competition" - higher and higher ISO-capable cameras are offered, but the enlargement capability of the equally high-ISO images produced by different cameras is different. Quite a mess.
Wouldn't it be more logical and helpful for us, the photographers, to have a standardised measurement of the enlargement capability of the produced file instead of the abstract ISO setting? When we make a photo we could instantly set it to be A3 enlargeable, for instance, and the camera will count the other exposure requirements in accordance.
EXPOSURE SPEED - Was used in the film era for counting the correct exposure and it has the side effect of image being blurry if the speed was not accorded with the subject movement and the FL of the lens. In the film era the relation between exposure speed and image blur was straightforward. It is not anymore - the new image stabilisation systems makes it difficult to count the minimal necessary speed in different situations. I think that a new standardised measurements system that will let me know directly what's the maximum enlargement I could make taking in consideration the stabilisation system, the FL of the lens, the needed exposure and the type of the photographic subject (static-dinamic subject) would be more helpful . The setting could be only the "dynamic of the subject movement" and the exposure speed would be counted internally in accordance with all the other settings.
DIAPHRAGM - The only thing that is visually important when changing the diaphragm is the change in the DOF. A standardised DOF system, clearly showing the front and back DOF a certain diaphragm will produce in accordance with the FL of the lens, the intended enlargement and the pixel density of the sensor would be, IMO, more useful and photographic-orientated than the diaphragm setting.
SENSOR MEGAPIXEL COUNT AND SENSOR DIMENSIONS - The relation between the MPX count and the possible enlargement and quality of the image is not clearly established. A phone-camera with many MPX often produces low definition images. The relation between resolution, sensor dimensions, color quality and the possible enlargement is not directly and clearly revealed in the digital cameras of today. The introduction of standard measurements of "color quality" and "sharp enlargement" instead of MPX count would be, IMO, more useful for us (but, I am afraid, not so for the camera companies). Wouldn't it be better that when you buy a camera you would know it is capable of, let's say, A2 sharp enlargements with "n" color quality level than that it has "x" MPX?
I mean, the camera settings in the digital age could and should be more oriented to the aesthetics of the final photography and not so technical as it is now. Of course such a change can't be made suddenly. I'm too accustomed with the actual sistem of measurements, as most of us, but I think the time has come for a new and more aesthetics-oriented standardised system of measurements to be introduced, first as an option to the actual system in the camera menus.
Let me be more specific.
ISO - It appeared in the film era as a necessity for matching the exposure with the standardised film sensibility. As a side effect, when using a higher ISO film you usually got bigger granulation. Now, in the digital age, the correct exposure is, in most cases, handled by the camera. The effect of higher ISO is, still, a bigger granulation leading to a reduced enlargement capacity of the resulted digital file. But there is no direct measurement of how much a specific image can be enlarged. That makes the camera makers to join an "ISO competition" - higher and higher ISO-capable cameras are offered, but the enlargement capability of the equally high-ISO images produced by different cameras is different. Quite a mess.
Wouldn't it be more logical and helpful for us, the photographers, to have a standardised measurement of the enlargement capability of the produced file instead of the abstract ISO setting? When we make a photo we could instantly set it to be A3 enlargeable, for instance, and the camera will count the other exposure requirements in accordance.
EXPOSURE SPEED - Was used in the film era for counting the correct exposure and it has the side effect of image being blurry if the speed was not accorded with the subject movement and the FL of the lens. In the film era the relation between exposure speed and image blur was straightforward. It is not anymore - the new image stabilisation systems makes it difficult to count the minimal necessary speed in different situations. I think that a new standardised measurements system that will let me know directly what's the maximum enlargement I could make taking in consideration the stabilisation system, the FL of the lens, the needed exposure and the type of the photographic subject (static-dinamic subject) would be more helpful . The setting could be only the "dynamic of the subject movement" and the exposure speed would be counted internally in accordance with all the other settings.
DIAPHRAGM - The only thing that is visually important when changing the diaphragm is the change in the DOF. A standardised DOF system, clearly showing the front and back DOF a certain diaphragm will produce in accordance with the FL of the lens, the intended enlargement and the pixel density of the sensor would be, IMO, more useful and photographic-orientated than the diaphragm setting.
SENSOR MEGAPIXEL COUNT AND SENSOR DIMENSIONS - The relation between the MPX count and the possible enlargement and quality of the image is not clearly established. A phone-camera with many MPX often produces low definition images. The relation between resolution, sensor dimensions, color quality and the possible enlargement is not directly and clearly revealed in the digital cameras of today. The introduction of standard measurements of "color quality" and "sharp enlargement" instead of MPX count would be, IMO, more useful for us (but, I am afraid, not so for the camera companies). Wouldn't it be better that when you buy a camera you would know it is capable of, let's say, A2 sharp enlargements with "n" color quality level than that it has "x" MPX?
I mean, the camera settings in the digital age could and should be more oriented to the aesthetics of the final photography and not so technical as it is now. Of course such a change can't be made suddenly. I'm too accustomed with the actual sistem of measurements, as most of us, but I think the time has come for a new and more aesthetics-oriented standardised system of measurements to be introduced, first as an option to the actual system in the camera menus.
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