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Shooting everything in manual exposure mode isn’t the badge of honour you think it is

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Shooting in one manual mode is one of those “You’re not a real photographer if you don’t…” kinds of things. It has been for years and it’s a constant debate whenever you jump into photography groups on social media. And while I personally believe it’s important to understand how to shoot in manual mode, I don’t think actually shooting in manual mode all the time (or even most of it) is essential.

That’s the topic explored in this excellent video from Pixel Village. After having somebody recently show them their work and regularly pointing out that images were shot in all manual mode, he dug a little deeper into why this photography felt it was so important to mention. His answer was basically that his photographer teacher was perpetuating the “You’re not a real photographer…” myth.

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Watch this complete guide to manual mode to take your landscape photography to the next level

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Landscape photography is something that most of us do at some point. Even if we’re not particularly interested in landscape as a topic, we often take our cameras with us when we go on vacation and want to be able to capture that beautiful scene that’s laid before us.

Newer photographers can often feel quite disappointed if they leave their cameras to figure things out for themselves in automatic modes and manual mode can seem overwhelming, but it’s really not that difficult to get to grips with, as Mads Peter Iversen demonstrates in his latest video.

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Which exposure mode should you be using with your camera?

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It’s the age-old perpetual question. And it’s one seen daily in photography forums and groups on social media. What camera mode should I use? And, well, it’s not really an easy question to answer. There are those who are of the “manual, always or you’re not a real photographer” persuasion, but there are times when the other modes work extremely well.

In this video, Mike Smith takes a look at the different shooting modes offered by cameras and offers up some tips as to when might be the right time to use each. And while the names might be slightly different for some brands, these modes are consistent throughout pretty much all brands and types of interchangeable lens camera from 35mm SLRs, through DSLRs to mirrorless.

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Here’s why you need to learn and understand manual exposure

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The whole manual vs auto thing for me isn’t really much of a debate. And whether you prefer to use auto or manual, you’re still going to need to understand the underlying principles of photography and how your camera “sees” a scene in order to get the most out of it and the best possible images you can that achieve your vision.

Coming to you from Paul at Photo Genius, this video compares the differences when shooting multiple scenes using both manual and auto exposure controls. It’s a good illustration of why automatic isn’t perfect for everything (or potentially even most stuff, depending on what you like to shoot) and how understanding manual can get you that control you need.

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The three things you need to know if you’re new to shooting in manual mode

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Shooting in manual isn’t some magic bullet that will make all your shots perfect, no matter what some photographers might want you to believe. But there are things you need to understand in order to be able to use it effectively. Those three things are ISO, aperture and shutter speed.

In this video, photographer JoshinCincinnati walks us through the three basics of manual mode exposure, what they mean, and the implications of changing each.

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This is why I choose to shoot in manual exposure mode

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At quite an early age I can remember being a very visual person. I would love to look through magazines, books and television. I would sit with my grandmother and watch old black and white movies. The funny thing is that as much as I enjoyed looking at visually pleasing images I was and still am a terrible sketch artist/ painter. There wasn’t a camera around for me to use. The only camera around was a Polaroid camera that my mom had, and I wasn’t allowed to touch.

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A Closer Look at iOS 8’s new Camera

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https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Yjupb6Cl9rE

Apple’s new iOS software‘s been in beta mode for about a few weeks now, and that’s been plenty of time for developers (and tech enthusiasts) to get familiar with the features iOS 8 has to offer. One area iOS 8 brings the most improvement to is the Camera app itself, and we now have a much better idea of what the features it comes with are like.

Over on YouTube, you can check out a number of videos that go over how the camera utilizes time-shift and manual exposure. As expected, Apple implements the features so they can be used in the easiest way possible. The time-lapse is started up by swiping to its respective panel and simply pressing record. As for the manual exposure, the controls are activated when you tap to focus; the exposure then gets adjusted by swiping up and down.

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