We have added a number of photos taken on a tour of the Vatican today. We head off to Istanbul on the morrow. I will miss Rome; we have not touched contemporary culture aside from cuisine. But I digress…

Finally, I’ve weaned myself from auto and semi-auto and I”ve gone full manual for photos. What I’ve learned in the past few days doing this is: typically you will not learn the subtitles of lighting and shadow taking photos in auto mode. The camera selects the “best average exposure” for the shot. By going to manual, you chose the exposure. If the shot is not the best (typically far from it at first), you adjust aperture or shutter speed to bring the shot closer to perfect. Today’s cameras have a wonder built-in light meter. Us it to manually toy with aperture and shutter speed and you can become very good at guessing the correct exposure for any lighting situation. Of course there are cases where very high dynamic range makes taking photos extremely challenging.

Just today I was repeatedly taking photos of a relatively uninspiring scene. Some passers-by actually commented on how strange/weird/crazy that was or how shoddy the scene. I had found a very very difficult lighting situation and was playing with how different camera settings interact with the light, depth of field, and under/over exposure for parts of the scene. It was fun for a while.

For many auto and point and shoot is everything you want in a camera. Have fun and enjoy. For those looking to improve their photography, move to full manual and watch your skill set grow.

Ron