I’ve been having camera trouble, and as I’ve struggled through trying to fix what is happening, I realized that having a camera is sort of like having a gun, except for (obviously) the bullets and killing part.
DSLR (meaning Digital Single Lens Reflex) cameras are not quite an easy alternative to film cameras because of all the buttons and programming involved. Somehow I managed to get my camera out of simple mode and into nothing works mode, and my instruction manual got lost. It probably ran screaming because it knew, from the look of me, that I was a newbie and likely to never get through the booklet, let alone program the darned thing. It might have been right.
Two things I did realize are that the camera is stuck on timer mode, and it has no flash. No flash means I have a hot shoe. Not a Prado heel, but a gizmo on which one can mount a separate flash. Until I get a flash, if I’m indoors with my camera, I am in the dark. And I need a new instruction manual.
Wait, you say, you have the Internet, so go online and read the manual. Did you ever try to look like a photographer while toting an instruction manual around on a laptop? And what if the action I need to photograph happens while I’m trying to read the manual to figure out how to set up my camera to take the darned shot?
This is part of where a camera is like a gun. You need to get it out, load it, pull back the hammer and then aim and pull the trigger. The bad guy usually comes with all that done already. Fortunately you may have an advantage if you are in the dark and the bad guy doesn’t know where he’s going.
Just don’t fire off your separate flash which you’ve mounted on your hot shoe. In such a case, have the bad guy take your Prado heels and call your insurance company in the morning.
Camera, you’re fired, because you can’t fire.
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