This is why your ‘smart’ camera is actually making you a worse photographer

Modern digital cameras take a lot of decisions on your behalf. No, really, a lot. We’ve got used to it and we don’t mind, because it saves us the effort of adjusting a load of settings ourselves. And, to be fair, most of the time the camera does a pretty good job, right? So what’s the problem?

You don’t learn anything. In particular, you don't learn how you can make better decisions than your camera.

"Tell me and I forget. Teach me and I remember. Involve me and I learn." This adage is often attributed to Benjamin Franklin, but most likely derives from Chinese Confucian philosopher Xun Kuang. Regardless, it couldn't be more relevant in a world where tech does so much for us.

You might think, if the camera takes care of exposure, focusing, white balance and more, why do you need to know how these things work? You can just trust the camera, right?

But we are in a world where human knowledge is dwindling and we are becoming increasingly dependent on machine knowledge. It's becoming increasingly difficult to find cameras set up for manual control.

The popularity of some of the best Fujifilm cameras is down to their external manual controls. The only other manual-first models come from the Leica M models, still considered to be among the best Leica cameras despite their decades-old design, and Nikon's retro cameras in the form of the Nikon Zf and Zfc.

Otherwise, you'll find that the latest mirrorless cameras and hybrid cameras are sold on the basis of their AI, automation and algorithms.

The technicalities of photography are not that complicated, but those who don’t understand them or can’t be bothered to try will struggle to get good images consistently. Manual control demands concentration and time. Most worthwhile things do.

It’s up to you whether you decide to control your camera manually for philosophical reasons, or simply to learn more about the technicalities of photography. However, even on a practical level, manual control takes on real importance if you want to maintain any kind of consistency across a series of shots.

The fact is, manual photography is simple. If you learned arithmetic as a child, you’re already equipped. You just have to remember how to do things in your head instead of reaching for an app, asking Alexa or Googling it.

Actually, it’s camera automation that makes it complicated. The very thing we’ve been sold to make photography ‘easy’. It’s the classic marketing strategy – invent or exaggerate a perceived problem and then, when you’ve scared people enough, you sell them a solution.

This is a very annoying thing. Camera makers sell cameras for ‘beginners’ that automate everything, when what beginners actually need is a camera that puts the basics right up front in a clear and simple manner.

It’s also true to say that it’s much harder to override a modern camera manually than it ever used to be to work an old manual camera, but it’s where we are – and we have to get around that somehow.

Manual photography means making an effort. Our cameras make it easy not to think, or do, or learn anything because they can do it for us. So when you use manual exposure and manual focus, it will take longer and you will make more mistakes.

But you will come to understand the principles of photography much more clearly – and you’ll also see just how much dumb stuff your camera has been doing just because you never stopped it.

We’ve all got eyes and brains and hands – let’s use them! That’s how great photography is born.

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Looking for more camera fundamentals? Check out this guide to the exposure triangle. When you're done, you can take the exposure triangle quiz. Plus, here's the latest camera news.