The other day a friend of mine asked why I like taking photos with my Leica (manual focus and exposure) and Nikon (big dslr).
“Isn’t it hassle, to take the photo, then goto to your mac and upload. then post online”
The answer is yes. It’s far more easier to take a pic with my phone and post from there. I love sending photos to Tumblr, Twitter and Foursquare from my phone. It’s a breeze and I often will do that.
But the fast majority of the photos I take are with my Leica and dslr.
For me, it just slows things down. A lot. And that feels like a feature, not a bug.
When you shoot with a dslr or a manual camera (or any other “unconnected camera” for that matter), you take your time making the photo. And then you wait to see it. I avoid chimping. I’ll wait to review my snaps. Sometimes I’ll wait a few hours or a day. Sometimes longer.
And then when I do sit down, I’ll sometimes find something wonderful my phone could’t have captured.
Don’t get me wrong. It’s true, the best camera you can possibly use is the one you take with you — which is increasingly our mobile phone.
But as I get older, I’m trying my best to appreciate and respect delayed gratification. So much so that getting back to film might be the next thing on my list.
There is likely a lesson about delayed gratification for startups — but I’ll save that for a future post.