Metric system, USA and Photography

US system has ounces as in weight and fluid ounces for volume thats just begging for mistakes to happen.

1liter = 1000 cubic cm

Pounds are a weight, which depend on gravity, therefore are only consistent on the surface of the earth. Gram measures mass and is consistent everywhere except maybe inside of a black hole.

5280ft = 1 mile vs 1000 m = 1 km
16 fl oz = 1 pint vs 1000 ml = 1 L
etc.

The metric system just makes more sense, except maybe keeping the less used prefixes straight.
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Ok yes you got me. Its based off the same system the Imperial system was but different. I guess its called the US Customary System here. I didn't really know that until I googled it for this post.
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BA baracus said:

I find having an interest in photography where the metric system
seems to prevail (because everything is made in Japan) has me getting
more accustomed to the metric system at some level.

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As a Canadian we're in the middle (literally)...Canada converted to metric back in the 70's, but the US still has a lot of influence.

Speed, distance, environmental temperature, volume, and weight are all metric (with imperial on international products). However lengths, oven temperatures, building products, are still in imperial measurement.

You complain about having both sets of measurements on your lenses, well we have both sets of measurements on our cars, miles & km. The cars slated for sale in Canada have the km in large white numbers, while miles are smaller numbers in a different colour (blue or orange). On cars slated for sale in the US however it's the other way around, miles are large white numbers and km are smaller coloured numbers.

Ron Poelman said:

We went metric years ago and the cumbersome,
pedantic adopted Metric measures still confuse plenty.

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Multiplying or dividing by 10, 100, etc, is easy enough once you free yourself from old, cumbersome units.

Ron Poelman said:

Hectapascals, anybody ?

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Yes, 1022 here today. ;-)

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Best regards,

Bruno Lobo.



http://www.pbase.com/brunobl

People can manage to confuse things by throwing in different units even when using all-metric measurements.

Leonard Migliore said:

Now if they had used liters/100km, it wouldn't have worked.

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Take your car mileage (oops, fuel economy) example. In Europe and presumably other places already gone metric, it is stated as liters/100Km. In Brazil, we use Km/liter.

For instance, an economical car might do some 15 Km/l, which equates to about 6.7l/100Km. To add to the confusion, the two methods are reverse-proportional: higher is better in one, lower is better in the other.

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Best regards,

Bruno Lobo.



http://www.pbase.com/brunobl

As China rise as the biggest market the Imperial Standard of measures will fade out of the market and usage for good.

You'll see the US with no choice but to accept the metric system once and for all.

Part of the metric resistance has been stupid pride and sheer ignorance.

I know Ralph Nader will change it if he were elected president.

Brunobl said:

Brunobl said:

We went metric years ago and the cumbersome,
pedantic adopted Metric measures still confuse plenty.

Click to expand...

Multiplying or dividing by 10, 100, etc, is easy enough once you free
yourself from old, cumbersome units.

Click to expand...

Yes, that's true. But in many real world situations it doesn't always help things much because the the thing being measured doesn't end up at a nice even number. Which is easier, 1 inch or 25.4mm? Of course, 25mm is easier than .98 inches as well.

In the end, the metric system is generally easier. But it is only easier in certain circumstances. Further, if you've grown up using U.S. Standard, the benefit isn't as great. And further still, we have calculators all over the place these days and seldom have to do the math in our heads anyway.

--
Jay Turberville
http://www.jayandwanda.com

the Europeans use 11mm,13mm,15mm on the auto fasteners ,the Asians use 10mm,12mm, 14mm on theirs. and the Americans use funny numbers like 3/8,1/2, 9/16.

it's fun to be a mechanic.

For me the worst thing about imperial measures is trying to understand fastener sizes. I could sit there all day trying to work out which is bigger - 3/8" or 7/16". Working out which thread or socket to use is a nightmare, while the metric system makes everything so much easier. It's plain to see that 5mm is smaller than 5.5mm which in turn is smaller than 6mm.

Amy

I agree it is a pain and i come from the UK. Here we had a leader who some might remember called Margaret Thatcher. She decread that we would go metric.....if we wanted to, but we didn't have to. So, the intelligent ones did and stick-in-the-muds didn't. Still to this day TV stations love filming some 90 year old half blind old lady that says she just can't buy a kilo of potatoes because she doesn't understand it. Every now and then a barrow boy goes to prison for still weighing their veg in Lbs and Ozs.

Meanwhile i was in engineering and prototyping of new industrial designs for 21 years starting in the late seventies. ALL of our technical drawings were metric, except those for American companies. All design in the UK is metric. Feet and inches and Lbs and Ozs are incredibly difficult to work in. The US would gain a lot by going metric, our kids here don't even know what an inch is.
Jules

Craig Gillette said:

Not really. I find very little of my exposure (no pun intended) to
metric comes from photographic pursuits. I see focal lengths given
in metric values but that's not new and my prints and printing, even
matts and frames, etc., is done in inches.

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A photograph is a secret about a secret. The more it tells you the less you know. Arbus.

Tim in upstate NY said:

jinjimbob said:

The US does not use the Imperial system, its uses its own.

For example, a US pint is 20% small than an imperial pint, the same
for a gallon.

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I remember those Imperial gallons that the Canadians used years ago.
Now that really was confusing. . . for everyone on both sides of the
border. At least now, there isn't more than one gallon. Imagine
having liters and Imperial liters!

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I think they use litres in Canada and we use liters in the US, almost the same.

I wonder why engine sizes here in the US use liters though.

Jay Turberville said:

Jay Turberville said:

Jay Turberville said:

We went metric years ago and the cumbersome,
pedantic adopted Metric measures still confuse plenty.

Click to expand...

Multiplying or dividing by 10, 100, etc, is easy enough once you free
yourself from old, cumbersome units.

Click to expand...

Yes, that's true. But in many real world situations it doesn't
always help things much because the the thing being measured doesn't
end up at a nice even number. Which is easier, 1 inch or 25.4mm? Of
course, 25mm is easier than .98 inches as well.

In the end, the metric system is generally easier. But it is only
easier in certain circumstances. Further, if you've grown up using
U.S. Standard, the benefit isn't as great. And further still, we
have calculators all over the place these days and seldom have to do
the math in our heads anyway.

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Sure but the biggest problem is to maintain two systems.

Many costly mistakes has been attributed to the confusion that arise when the two systems are mixed by accident.
The US is probably the only big market that still uses the Imperial system.
Is wayyyyy overdue the switch to metric system.

EU, Canada, China, Latin America, Russia, etc all use metric system as the distance standard.
People will use to it faster than most think.

Photato said:

Sure but the biggest problem is to maintain two systems.
Many costly mistakes has been attributed to the confusion that arise
when the two systems are mixed by accident.
The US is probably the only big market that still uses the Imperial
system.
Is wayyyyy overdue the switch to metric system.
EU, Canada, China, Latin America, Russia, etc all use metric system
as the distance standard.
People will use to it faster than most think.

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Think 1998 Mission: Mars Surveyor failure.

"What amounts to a high-school math error sealed the orbiter's fate. Engineers had failed to convert rocket thrust calculations provided in English units into NASA's standard metric units. The orbiter approached Mars at too low an altitude and was lost. The program's polar lander also crashed; a faulty software system made the rockets turn off too soon."
http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=5257061

At a price tag of $193.1 million dollars.
http://www.solarviews.com/eng/morb98.htm

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http://www.pbase.com/soenda

it is so simple it ain't funny but still, it confuses people. However, the imperial system that is about as illogical as it CAN get, is simple to them...go figure.

Metric is all about zeros, add a zero here and then and you're done

The sad part is that most americans that I know have NO clue how to handle the imperial system and they're pretty much doing what I did years ago when learning languages. Instead of LEARNING the grammar, I just learned it all by heart. It worked but I had no clue as to why...
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George with the (big) rack

they're still fighting it over in the US

Hell, you don't even have to learn it, just f'ing adopt it

Besides, they are kinda using it now. 1 and 2 liter coke bottles
--
George with the (big) rack

That doesn't mean that it's not, it's just HOW they use it. The measurements STILL are the same. One liter or one km is still the same thing.

The Swedes express 10km's as a mil (as in mile) but it is NOT an american mile, it is TEN KILOMETRES. Makes little sense but that's how they express things. How far away do you live? 20 mil (200km's).

The Spaniards do the same thing with their currency or USED to before the EURO.

They would express (at least in the south) prices in 5 pesetas increments. Ie, 5 cents or pence if you wish.

One DURO equals 5 pesetas. Veinte duros is 20 five pesetas coins which equals 100 pesetas. Mil duros was 1000 x 5=5000.

Makes absolutely no uckign sense at all but they ALL used it and everyone knew what it was.
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George with the (big) rack

Funnily enough, the Swedes that are metric express their tire and wheel sizes for bicycles at least in inches and the bicycle frames are expressed in inches too AND so are the tv screens, hehehe.
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George with the (big) rack

Lindsayhunter said:

it is so simple it ain't funny but still, it confuses people.
However, the imperial system that is about as illogical as it CAN
get, is simple to them...go figure.

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It's largely a matter of familiarity. We've been using American Standard* units for our entire lives, so we have an intuitive grasp of them. We haven't been using the equivalent metric units, so we lack the same degree of familiarity.

The interesting thing is that there are plenty of applications where Americans have used metric for a long time, and in those areas metric feels natural. If you described the energy in food in BTU instead of calories, the size of a pill in grains instead of milligrams, or the power consumption of a lightbulb in horsepower instead of Watts, most Americans wouldn't understand what you were talking about.

I find that these things can even vary depending on specific context. I'm a scientist, so I do most of my work in metric. When I look at something in the lab, I mentally judge its size in metric units. That's true even if it's something mundane like the length of a wire that I'd think about in American standard units if I were at home. The only exception is for things like fasteners, where our equipment is designed in American sizes rather than metric. Again, it's all a matter of context.

Not Imperial, thank you. Some Imperial units- notably the pint and gallon- are different from their American counterparts.
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As with all creative work, the craft must be adequate for the demands of expression. I am disturbed when I find craft relegated to inferior consideration; I believe that the euphoric involvement with subject or self is not sufficient to justify the making and display of photographic images. --Ansel Adams

Amypics said:

For me the worst thing about imperial measures is trying to
understand fastener sizes. I could sit there all day trying to work
out which is bigger - 3/8" or 7/16".

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I agree, that starting from scratch metric is easier. No debate. But once you learned the language, it isn't. As soon as I read your sentence above I had already visualized the relationship as quickly as I could read the words. Once you are familiar with it, it becomes automatic - like language.

--
Jay Turberville
http://www.jayandwanda.com

Lindsayhunter said:

Hell, you don't even have to learn it, just f'ing adopt it

Besides, they are kinda using it now. 1 and 2 liter coke bottles

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Yes, but 12 oz and 16 oz sizes are common as well. All the fountain drink sizes are in ounces and the same goes for dairy products. Liquor seems to be a mix. But not beer. Headphone jacks are metric. Tire sizes are metric. Lots of nuts and bolts are metric. But temperature isn't. Computer screens are sold based on inches. Same goes for television sets. But we do engage in 5K and 10K runs in order to remove inches and pounds.

That was one of my main points. Most things are a mishmash here.

Lindsayhunter said:

--
George with the (big) rack

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--
Jay Turberville
http://www.jayandwanda.com