Value of manual controls -- give me examples to help me understand

I recently bought a Minolta F300, and I'm starting to have pangs of doubt in thinking perhaps I should have bought an S400 for a more compact size and perhaps better pictures under some circumstances.

However, I'd have to give up a lot of manual controls, including manual focus.

Can you please help give me some examples of how/why manual controls are helpful? Real life examples, please, not theoretical stuff. I figure since there has been so much debate here between the S400 and S45 -- with the main difference being manual controls -- that there'd be some good hard reasoning to be shared

About the only thing I've heard that the manual-control type cameras excel at natively is sports photography... the ability to capture fast action by manually controlling the shutter speed and/or aperature.

What else is there?

It seems that with the S400, since you're able to adjust ISO and white balance and select night shot (long exposure) and since the camera has pretty sophisticated auto focusing capabilities, almost any type of shot is covered.

Help me understand the value of manual controls, please

Regards,
Adam

Adam Lasnik said:

Help me understand the value of manual controls, please

Click to expand...

It's kinda' like if you had a car with no speedometer or gas pedel...but the car was really good at judging what speed you should be going, and it'd automatically set the speed for you. I imagine such a car would be frustrating to drive. I'd feel the same way about a camera that didn't allow me to control the shutter speed and aperture.

mango said:

mango said:

Help me understand the value of manual controls, please

Click to expand...

It's kinda' like if you had a car with no speedometer or gas
pedel...but the car was really good at judging what speed you
should be going, and it'd automatically set the speed for you. I
imagine such a car would be frustrating to drive. I'd feel the
same way about a camera that didn't allow me to control the shutter
speed and aperture.

Click to expand...

Mango, I understand where you're coming from theoretically speaking, but as I noted in my original post... I'm looking for CONCRETE, REAL LIFE examples.

For instance:

"I recently was at [such and such an event] and wanted to get a shot of [something]. An automatic camera [would have mistaken done / did mistakenly do something other than what I wanted] whereas with a camera with manual controls, I was able to do [something] to make the picture come out perfectly."

Control just for control's sake -- while exciting for some people -- doesn't mean a thing to me. I want to be able to take sharp, colorful, pleasing photos of people, places, and things (sometimes moving, sometimes not, sometimes in bright light, sometimes not) and not have to spend a lot of time fidgeting for the shot or messing around with photoshop afterwards.

If that means manual controls are particularly useful in some circumstances, I want examples!

Adam Lasnik said:

mango said:

Adam Lasnik said:

Help me understand the value of manual controls, please

Click to expand...

It's kinda' like if you had a car with no speedometer or gas
pedel...but the car was really good at judging what speed you
should be going, and it'd automatically set the speed for you. I
imagine such a car would be frustrating to drive. I'd feel the
same way about a camera that didn't allow me to control the shutter
speed and aperture.

Click to expand...

Mango, I understand where you're coming from theoretically
speaking, but as I noted in my original post... I'm looking for
CONCRETE, REAL LIFE examples.

For instance:

"I recently was at [such and such an event] and wanted to get a
shot of [something]. An automatic camera [would have mistaken done
/ did mistakenly do something other than what I wanted] whereas
with a camera with manual controls, I was able to do [something] to
make the picture come out perfectly."

Control just for control's sake -- while exciting for some people
-- doesn't mean a thing to me. I want to be able to take sharp,
colorful, pleasing photos of people, places, and things (sometimes
moving, sometimes not, sometimes in bright light, sometimes not)
and not have to spend a lot of time fidgeting for the shot or
messing around with photoshop afterwards.

If that means manual controls are particularly useful in some
circumstances, I want examples!

Click to expand...

I understood that you wanted examples and that I didn't offer any. The reason I didn't offer any was that I usually don't need manual control...however, I still want it...and it was that desire I was trying to convey. Here are a few examples of when I used Manual where other modes would have been difficult to manipulate to get the results I was looking for...

wanted to get long exposure to get tree-lights bright.
http://www.pbase.com/image/9828759

had to use manual to get exposure correct
http://www.pbase.com/image/6517429

Manual mode allows you to control where you shoot between these two extremes...
http://www.pbase.com/image/2310872
http://www.pbase.com/image/2310883

Had to fiddle a bit to get exposure correct
http://www.pbase.com/image/5042509

The take home message...I rarely use Manual mode. When I do, it's usually in low light situations. However, I wouldn't give up the manual option. Getting these kinds of shots would be very frusterating using exposure compensation...it's much easier to just choose your settings while looking at the LCD output to judge the exposure results...

Wow, what awesome shots, Mango... thanks for sharing!

So a couple of the takeaways I got from that is that manual controls are especially handy:

• in low light situations
• in framing action shots

One thing I'm curious about: How did you get the light to shine so bright in some of those pics without causing motion blur with the people? Wouldn't it have to be a long exposure, and thus susceptible to the people moving even a tiny bit?

Adam Lasnik said:

I recently bought a Minolta F300, and I'm starting to have pangs of
doubt in thinking perhaps I should have bought an S400 for a more
compact size and perhaps better pictures under some circumstances.

Click to expand...

Adam ! Replying primarily because it was so good to see you after a long time.

AND I am using an S400. It's my first digital camera.

There is more manual control than I expected. There's a manual-mode setting, more or less, with options to lock an ISO speed-equivalent, bracket exposures, using longer shutter speed, etc. Also, I've been experimenting with the overall effectiveness of the 9-point evaluative focusing and using also, the center-weighted and spot-metering options (the latter works very well in some difficult lighting situations).

I like that I can lock the exposure and focus separately for my main interest while being able to freely frame things without messing up the exposure.

When you press the shutter half-way down you'll see the effect of your focusing choices and you can change them at that point.

I was giong to buy the S45 until the S400 came out and I knew I'd carry the S400 around everywhere a bit more easily -- the S400 fits my very small purse a lot better.

For detail in auto-exposure close-up, I was surprised at the good results as seen in the first photo at http://andrys.com/elph/day2

If, you click on the first, medium, enlargement of that first photo, it brings up the 2272x1704 version.

For a tiny camera, that's something. There are also a couple of nice shots from inside, behind a window, of the bay during a striking display of clouds over the bay at http://andrys.com/elph/day3 but one of them is shot with telephoto so suffers from the usual.

The shots on those pages are mainly my experiments in trying to learn how to use my camera under different lighting situations at work.

Anyway, good to 'see' you again ! Remembering Prodigy in '89 (!)

• Andrys

Mango

I really like your photos, especially the pumpkin.

However, I found that with the S400 I can see in the LCD the effect of the brightness setting I decide to use depending on what I choose for exposure setting. I can change it to just about anything, while in the camera's "manual" mode, by locking the exposure where I where I want to, based on the effect I want. The exposure can be locked separately from the focus locking.

I'm still experimenting with it and am only in the first week but was amazed at how much control there actually is in manual mode with this little thing.

• Andrys

--
http: andrys.com/elph/day2

Adam Lasnik said:

One thing I'm curious about: How did you get the light to shine so
bright in some of those pics without causing motion blur with the
people? Wouldn't it have to be a long exposure, and thus
susceptible to the people moving even a tiny bit?

Click to expand...

With the S400 you'd go into 'manual' mode and aim your camera at a darker spot of interest until you see the pumpkin's eyes be overbright.

This lets you move the camera to lock the exposure at some area in between or, if you just get the people right, then the pumpkin's eyes will be 'too' bright, the effect wanted.

What Mango did will be much more technical

Actually, you can achieve the same results with a Canon point and shoot..

mango said:

Here are a few examples of when I used Manual
where other modes would have been difficult to manipulate to get
the results I was looking for...

wanted to get long exposure to get tree-lights bright.
http://www.pbase.com/image/9828759

Click to expand...

Just force the flash off in this case.

mango said:

had to use manual to get exposure correct
http://www.pbase.com/image/6517429

Click to expand...

Use -EV to reduce brightness

mango said:

Manual mode allows you to control where you shoot between these two
extremes...
http://www.pbase.com/image/2310872

Click to expand...

Hold a neutral density filter in front of the lens, lock down ISO to 50 or so.

mango said:

http://www.pbase.com/image/2310883

Click to expand...

P&S would have most likely given the same shot, trying to keep exposure time at a minimum to offset camera shake.

mango said:

Had to fiddle a bit to get exposure correct
http://www.pbase.com/image/5042509

Click to expand...

Another case of just using -EV to get the desired brightness. Lock ISO down at 50 if still too bright.

mango said:

The take home message...I rarely use Manual mode. When I do, it's
usually in low light situations. However, I wouldn't give up the
manual option. Getting these kinds of shots would be very
frusterating using exposure compensation...it's much easier to just
choose your settings while looking at the LCD output to judge the
exposure results...

Click to expand...

I disagree about exposure compensation - it is so simple to use for realtime evaluation of image brightness simply by pressing + or -.

IMO, the real only value of manual controls is to:

a) control depth of field (e.g. blur the background or foreground) :
http://www.pbase.com/image/15105742/original
http://www.pbase.com/image/15105741/original
http://www.pbase.com/image/15124780/original
http://www.pbase.com/image/15124782/original

and b) force the camera to use the lens at it's sharpest setting. For example, images taken at the middle aperture settings (typically F4-F5 or so) tend to be sharper than using the widest (F2.0/2.8) or smallest (like F11) apertures.

The other important control is long exposures, but the Canon P&S already has this feature in "nightmode".

Otherwise, the brutal truth is that most bad pictures are attributable to user error and lack of skill rather than the camera missing any controllable parameter which would have helped the user get the shot.

I just got my S400 two days ago (my first digicam) and am I glad that I got it instead of a camera with manual controls such as the S45, S50, or F300. I read reviews for six months before making my decision and I waffled back and forth many times whether to get the manual controls or not. Now after only two days of testing out the S400, I have discovered a reason to not get the manual controls, and this is a reason that is seldom discussed in these newsgroups.

One can talk until he is blue in the face about the advantages of having manual controls, but the reality of using a digicam (versus a film camera) tells me otherwise.

Reality check: I live in the Arizona sunshine. I immediately discovered that on a bright sunny day (as is almost all Arizona days), it is not all that easy to see the LCD monitor (and the S400 has a pretty bright screen). This makes it pretty hard to set a lot of the manual controls such as exposure compensation, white balance, etc. Also because of the bright sun, it isn't all that easy to review the picture and be able to judge if you need to retake it using different settings. Therefore with most snapshots taken under bright sunshine, I figure to just Point (using the optical viewfinder) & Shoot, and hope for the best. By having a 4MP DC and using superfine compression, there is lots of room to crop as needed. If the picuture isn't just right, I will do what I can with it in post processing. With many snapshots, one does not get a second chance - so you P&S and be done with it. By the time one sets shutter and/or aperture, the photo opportunity may be long gone. Let's face it - it is not as easy nor as fast to set these manual controls on a digicam as it is with the old fashion film SLR.

If I were to get a camera with manual shutter/aperture controls, I would insist on being able to see these settings on the small monochrome LCD screen which is easier to read. I know the G3 and other higher end digicams do this but I am not sure if the F300 does ( the F100 does not).

Sure, there will be situations where the maunal controls are nice, but I figure for basic snapshots, P&S will work for 99% of the shots, or I at least hope it does. I love the size of the S400. I wouldn't trade the size for the ability to use manual controls which I would seldom use.

Bob

Adam Lasnik said:

I recently bought a Minolta F300, and I'm starting to have pangs of
doubt in thinking perhaps I should have bought an S400 for a more
compact size and perhaps better pictures under some circumstances.

However, I'd have to give up a lot of manual controls, including
manual focus.

Click to expand...

I don't know anyting about the camera's you mentioned, but here's the scoop on manual.

Autofocus can be fooled. Auto focus is slow too. POINT: Photography is about capturing a moment! If you're prefocused at a given distance, the moment won't be lost due to autofocus.

Autoexposure can be fooled. Back lighting can undo the exposure. POINT: Photography is about light! You gotta correctly expose the important thing in your frame, not the whole frame.

Manual operation is a must have for those really tough shots. Fast action, wide EV range scenes, and sometimes even 'normal' scenes can be lost to automation.

Jet fighter pilots don't put their planes on autopiliot when they engage.

Cruise control is only good for freeway driving.

When the chips are down and the going gets tough, manual operation can save you lots of time and possibly grief. Most of the time, autofocus and autoexposure (make sure you get BOTH aperature and shutter priortiy) will do the job for you, but when you have a difficult, fast moving subject, or a wide rang of EV's in a shot, only you can decide what is best. Don't leave that decision up to a machine, or you will be very sorry.

Hi Adam,

Manual controls are good for much more than just sports photography. One of my favorite types of photograpghy is macro, and here manual controls are essential. I also love infrared photography, and here two, manual control is required for best results. You had asked for concrete examples, so I'll try to provded some.

One immediate example that springs to mind regarding the benefits of having manual control is the ability to stop down your aperature for increased depth of field. At close camera-to-subject distances and high magnification, depth of field is extremely limited, so the ability to set my aperature down to F8 (the smallest I can get on my S30) is essential. Here is an example. I simply could not get both the close and far sides of this jester focused simultaneously with an aperature larger than F8. The camera's auto-defaults would not do it.



Conversely, the ability to manually open up your aperature for shallow depth of field is also possible. This allows you to selectively blur backgrounds, for example, to emphasis your subject. Here's an example:



Another example related to macros is manual focusing. Most digital cameras seem to have trouble autofocusing at least some of the time. This seems especially true for me when I am shooting extreme macros through, say, up to four stacked close-up lenses. Here, autofocus simply does not work at all., and the ability to focus manually is essential. Here are two examples that would not have been possible without manual focusing:





I can think of many more reasons for having/wanting manual control (focus correction for infra-red, motion effects, long exposures, setting aperature at the one where your lens is maximally sharp), but I hope this this at least helps a little.

Regards,
Brian

Adam Lasnik said:

Can you please help give me some examples of how/why manual
controls are helpful? Real life examples, please, not theoretical
stuff. I figure since there has been so much debate here between
the S400 and S45 -- with the main difference being manual controls
-- that there'd be some good hard reasoning to be shared
Help me understand the value of manual controls, please

Click to expand...

--
Brian
Gallery: http://mywebpages.comcast.net/spiritmist/My%20Web%20Gallery/index.htm

the best recommendation i can give is you have to think about how you will shoot... if you just want quick snapshots of people at parties, and that's it, then you will be fine with an automatic camera... i find that this is what i use for this kind of situation... i don't want to think too much about my camera when i am out shooting... when lighting gets tough, then i will go little by little adjusting stuff manually, until there's a situation that requires me to shoot in full manual mode... but if you're thinking of getting more into photography, then just get a camera with full manual contol... manual control allows you to shoot in difficult lighting conditions... and/or allows you to be more artistic with your shots...

Adam Lasnik said:

Wow, what awesome shots, Mango... thanks for sharing!

So a couple of the takeaways I got from that is that manual
controls are especially handy:

• in low light situations
• in framing action shots

One thing I'm curious about: How did you get the light to shine so
bright in some of those pics without causing motion blur with the
people? Wouldn't it have to be a long exposure, and thus
susceptible to the people moving even a tiny bit?

Click to expand...

And for narrow DOF, just put the camera in macro mode and that'll do the job:

The other night, we had some strong storms pass through TX. I wanted to capture some lighting shots. I wanted to get bolts of lightning but not have the sky washed out from reflected light in the sky.

I had my camera on a tripod behind a glass window on our second floor.
I set it to ISO 50 - To reduce noise
Manual shutter - 5 seconds - to let in enough light but not to much
Apeture F8 - I wanted clear depth all around

Manual Focus - Infinite - Did not want camera to try and focus on glass in front of it

From there I set my intervalmeter (I think is what it is called) to 99 shots at 1 minute apart (wish there was smaller time intervals) and left it in the dark room to do it's work.

Out of all the shots taken, 3 had captured some nice lightning strikes. I have only had my camera for 2 weeks but I love the manual settings. It allows for artistic shots.

I got some of my kids with slow sync setting that I think was awesome. Especially the bright one of them togethor. Ghosting effects and clear foreground and motion blur background are great as well.

http://imageevent.com/sniper226/skatenight

You can't do that with auto settings! The best part is, if you want point and shoot, you can do that as well. The only time I go point in shoot is if I am trying to capture the moment and don't have the time to experiment.

Oh, if anyone has tips on shooting lightning, I am all ears. I'm still a newbie.

-Doug

Jared, Not wanting to argue. However, I maintain that manual controls are nice. I go back to my car analogy...It's like the difference between having a temp gague, tach, and manual transmission. You don't generally need the information that these gages provide...but if you find yourself pulling a heavy trailer up a steep hill, you can't afford not to have the temp gage.

Jared Hunter said:

Actually, you can achieve the same results with a Canon point and
shoot..

Click to expand...

Well...this is why I said in the original post that sometimes it's easier to simply dial in the shutter, aperture, & ISO settings rather than to fiddle with trying to trick the camera into doing what you want.

Jared Hunter said:

mango said:

Here are a few examples of when I used Manual
where other modes would have been difficult to manipulate to get
the results I was looking for...

wanted to get long exposure to get tree-lights bright.
http://www.pbase.com/image/9828759

Click to expand...

Just force the flash off in this case.

Click to expand...

Actually...this was a very tricky photo...& I wasn't too pleased with the result, but still used it for a Christmas card. The problem was getting the tree bright enough...I ended up using a long exposure with a flash. This photo would have benefitted from a faster lens. There's substantial motion blur from the subjects, and the color balance is pretty funky as the light source is mixed incandescent/flourescent/flash/tree lights.

Jared Hunter said:

Jared Hunter said:

had to use manual to get exposure correct
http://www.pbase.com/image/6517429

Click to expand...

Use -EV to reduce brightness

Click to expand...

I suppose...but this was one of those cases where the actual exposure needed is hard to predict. It was much easier to stick it in manual mode and adjust the exposure until it looked the way I wanted on the LCD, then bracket with abandon. I think I shot between 3 sec and 1/2 sec...don't remember which one was used here. However, in this range (3 to 1/2 sec), you'd have to fiddle with EV comp in both regular mode and slow shutter mode, since the camera (S30) will select a max shutter of 1.3 in P mode.

Jared Hunter said:

Jared Hunter said:

Manual mode allows you to control where you shoot between these two
extremes...
http://www.pbase.com/image/2310872

Click to expand...

Hold a neutral density filter in front of the lens, lock down ISO
to 50 or so.

Jared Hunter said:

http://www.pbase.com/image/2310883

Click to expand...

P&S would have most likely given the same shot, trying to keep
exposure time at a minimum to offset camera shake.

Click to expand...

Sure ND filter would work, but isn't it nicer to simply be able to control the aperture and ISO, and let the camera adjust the shutter speed?

Jared Hunter said:

Jared Hunter said:

Had to fiddle a bit to get exposure correct
http://www.pbase.com/image/5042509

Click to expand...

Another case of just using -EV to get the desired brightness. Lock
ISO down at 50 if still too bright.

Click to expand...

Actually, this was taken in P-mode with a substantial -EV bias, the default exposure was overexposed...sorry for including it in this series, as it's not really a manual mode example.

Jared Hunter said:

Jared Hunter said:

The take home message...I rarely use Manual mode. When I do, it's
usually in low light situations. However, I wouldn't give up the
manual option. Getting these kinds of shots would be very
frusterating using exposure compensation...it's much easier to just
choose your settings while looking at the LCD output to judge the
exposure results...

Click to expand...

I disagree about exposure compensation - it is so simple to use for
realtime evaluation of image brightness simply by pressing + or -.

IMO, the real only value of manual controls is to:

a) control depth of field (e.g. blur the background or foreground) :
http://www.pbase.com/image/15105742/original
http://www.pbase.com/image/15105741/original
http://www.pbase.com/image/15124780/original
http://www.pbase.com/image/15124782/original

and b) force the camera to use the lens at it's sharpest setting.
For example, images taken at the middle aperture settings
(typically F4-F5 or so) tend to be sharper than using the widest
(F2.0/2.8) or smallest (like F11) apertures.

The other important control is long exposures, but the Canon P&S
already has this feature in "nightmode".

Otherwise, the brutal truth is that most bad pictures are
attributable to user error and lack of skill rather than the camera
missing any controllable parameter which would have helped the user
get the shot.

Click to expand...

I get the feeling that you'd advocate against owning a knife sharpener, seeing as serrated blades don't need sharpening...and against the sale of flour, since good-quality baked goods are available for cheap. Obviously, the market agrees with you...sort of. Most cameras for sale don't let you know or control in what shutter speed and aperture will be used for a particular photo. However, there is clearly demand for cameras that do offer this level of sophistication. If you don't know or care what settings are used, that's fine. However, as this thread indicates, many people want, use, and value having specific control over the basic function of their camera.

Adjusting the EV versus making manual adjustments to aperture & shutter are simply different methods of getting to the same place. Personally, I like having the option of getting there either way.

cheers

andrys:

Andrys said:

AND I am using an S400. It's my first digital camera.

I like that I can lock the exposure and focus separately for my
main interest while being able to freely frame things without
messing up the exposure.

Click to expand...

What do you exactly mean by being able to lock the exposure and focus separately? Don't they both lock when you press the shutter 1/2 way? Or do you mean that you can use center metering for expsoure and 9 point for autofocus? Or use center point for focus and use evaluative for expsoure?

I have to admit - I have had the S400 for 3 days and haven't read all the manual yet, but I do love the camera.

Bob

I think it's just stupid for people to buy a F300 and not knowing what they could do with it in real life.

Adam Lasnik said:

I recently bought a Minolta F300, and I'm starting to have pangs of
doubt in thinking perhaps I should have bought an S400 for a more
compact size and perhaps better pictures under some circumstances.

However, I'd have to give up a lot of manual controls, including
manual focus.

Can you please help give me some examples of how/why manual
controls are helpful? Real life examples, please, not theoretical
stuff. I figure since there has been so much debate here between
the S400 and S45 -- with the main difference being manual controls
-- that there'd be some good hard reasoning to be shared

About the only thing I've heard that the manual-control type
cameras excel at natively is sports photography... the ability to
capture fast action by manually controlling the shutter speed
and/or aperature.

What else is there?

It seems that with the S400, since you're able to adjust ISO and
white balance and select night shot (long exposure) and since the
camera has pretty sophisticated auto focusing capabilities, almost
any type of shot is covered.

Help me understand the value of manual controls, please

Regards,
Adam

Click to expand...

I used to own one of those fantastic (but fragile) little Olympus 35mm XA cameras. This was a very compact camera with slightly unusual controls.

Manual focus only, which was done by matching up superimposed images in the viewfinder (a la Leica I believe?), and aperture priority only. Aperture could be set to a specific setting, or set to fully automatic. Limited exposure compensation in the shape of a backlight compensation button that overexposed by +1.5EV.

What used to amaze me was how you could work around the limited controls to have pretty much the flexibility you'd have in a totally manual setup. Main way of doing it was by changing the ISO setting, to give you more exposure control. (Obviously this has a different effect to changing the ISO setting on a digital camera).

It strikes me that cameras such as the S400 are similar to this. There isnt full manual control, but you can adjust exposure compensation to a large degree, can change metering and focusing methods, and adjust white balance. The only weak point could be the limited aperture control (as there isnt really a "real" aperture as such, although the macro mode does seem to blur backgrounds very well so in practical terms you're not missing out on much.

My point is that while you can't manually control these cameras using the same methods as, say, a manual SLR, there are workarounds you can use that will give you the same results most of the time. Yes, it means a lot of time spend experimenting and getting used to the camera, but isnt that part of the fun?

I believe that "manual controls" in themselves arent a great issue, what is much more important in these small cameras is lens sharpness and how steadily you can hold them.

Adam Lasnik said:

I recently bought a Minolta F300, and I'm starting to have pangs of
doubt in thinking perhaps I should have bought an S400 for a more
compact size and perhaps better pictures under some circumstances.

However, I'd have to give up a lot of manual controls, including
manual focus.

Can you please help give me some examples of how/why manual
controls are helpful? Real life examples, please, not theoretical
stuff. I figure since there has been so much debate here between
the S400 and S45 -- with the main difference being manual controls
-- that there'd be some good hard reasoning to be shared

About the only thing I've heard that the manual-control type
cameras excel at natively is sports photography... the ability to
capture fast action by manually controlling the shutter speed
and/or aperature.

What else is there?

It seems that with the S400, since you're able to adjust ISO and
white balance and select night shot (long exposure) and since the
camera has pretty sophisticated auto focusing capabilities, almost
any type of shot is covered.

Help me understand the value of manual controls, please

Regards,
Adam

Click to expand...

Here are the two biggest reasons for me:

(1) For indoor shots, auto sets shutter below 1/50th of a sec, causing people to blur if they move. Manual/Shutter priority fixes that.

(2) On canon S45, controlling the flash and preflash so people do not blink

Adam Lasnik said:

I recently bought a Minolta F300, and I'm starting to have pangs of
doubt in thinking perhaps I should have bought an S400 for a more
compact size and perhaps better pictures under some circumstances.

However, I'd have to give up a lot of manual controls, including
manual focus.

Can you please help give me some examples of how/why manual
controls are helpful? Real life examples, please, not theoretical
stuff. I figure since there has been so much debate here between
the S400 and S45 -- with the main difference being manual controls
-- that there'd be some good hard reasoning to be shared

About the only thing I've heard that the manual-control type
cameras excel at natively is sports photography... the ability to
capture fast action by manually controlling the shutter speed
and/or aperature.

What else is there?

It seems that with the S400, since you're able to adjust ISO and
white balance and select night shot (long exposure) and since the
camera has pretty sophisticated auto focusing capabilities, almost
any type of shot is covered.

Help me understand the value of manual controls, please

Regards,
Adam

Click to expand...