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Comment by Tloewald | Hacker News Reader

Is this the same SLR simulator I saw a couple of years back? Can't tell because it's Flash.

Seems to me like DSLRs don't really need simulators. Pick up a DSLR, dial it to P or green or whatever, and go. It's simpler and more responsive than a point and shoot, just bigger and heavier. (My four year olds love using my smaller DSLR and have less trouble using it than a small P&S.)

Anyone wanting to learn the fine points of photography can learn them at their leisure once the key point — using a DSLR is EASIER than using a point and shoot — is absorbed, and simulators that overload the user with information are probably counter-productive.

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I see value in this. I have seen many people frustrated because their camera's automatic functions did not produce the image they wanted, and they have no idea how to change the settings to get a better image. It almost always boils down to an understanding between shutter speed, aperture, and simple settings such as exposure compensation.

For these people, this kind of simulator could be really helpful. It might be a little better if there was more explanatory text after you press the shutter. For example, I saw "overexposed" once; maybe that message could be more along the lines of "Your image is overexposed. Try decreasing your aperture, decreasing your shutterspeed, or adjusting exposure compensation."

It seems like there's a balance between the different settings on a camera that can't really be captured well with independent sliders.

I imagine a control that indicates the trade-offs (and when they're ok) as you tweak it would educate users in a better way than experimentation. Stay "inside the envelope" and your picture is probably ok. You can get outside it if you know what you're doing.

i saw a suggestion a few years ago for a mode that would just let you set depth of field directly, picking an aperture and shutter (and possibly iso and comp too) appropriately given the lighting. after all, what most people want most of the time is either a narrow depth to isolate a subject with bokeh or a wide depth to show something in context.

Isn't that basically what Aperture Priority mode does?

Yes, for people who understand how aperture relates to depth of field. But there seem to be a good number of people who understand what depth of field is, without understanding how to control for it using aperture.

Depth of field is controlled by aperture, focal length, and distance to subject. The degree to which the subject is actually isolated from the background is also very important. This simulator manages to bury one aspect of this information and ignore the rest.

All else being equal, to increase subject isolation:

* Get closer to the subject

* Increase focal length ("zoom in")

* Increase aperture operning (smaller aperture number)

* Increase separation between subject and background

Each of these things is equally important. (But all else is not equal, so if you're determined to stand in one spot and not change your composition, just increasing aperture size is your only option.)

Yes, this is indeed the case! I shoot with a prime, so the ability to change the focal length doesn't really come to me. But I think it's very important that you brought up specifically the fact that the distance spatially between the camera, the subject, and the background are very important!

japhyr, the paid iOS and desktop versions of this have much more descriptive feedback (what to fix, etc)

Where it has value, I think, is giving people a reference for the number of important variables. Modern DSLRs are covered in controls and symbols and modes, etc. and I believe for a beginner it can be quite overwhelming. Having just these key factors in mind when shooting could plausibly give a beginner the right set of variables to focus on without being distracted by all the other fluff.

That being said, I absolutely agree that the only way to learn photography is to get out there and shoot.

>> the only way to learn photography is to get out there and shoot.

Mostly agree, but I see there as being two parts of photography.

The art, which is seeing, composing, etc. For that, you do have to just get out and shoot.

The craft, which is knowing what settings to use and when. You can learn this by trial and error by "just going out and shooting", but having someone teach you, reading about it, or using an app that demonstrates what happens with a settings change will not only save time, but make the time spent shooting that much more productive.

I think this applies to a lot more than photography. Directly, I have knowledge of how it applies to both dancing and music as well, especially jazz. You definitely have to get out there and do it, but you have to spend time deliberately refining your ear, and deliberately refining your technique.

For dancing, it's much the same, you need to get out there and do it. But there is also a lot of time spent deliberately refining your ear for the music, your feeling for the beat what position your body should be in and how a lead should feel. Each play into the other but if one is neglected, it's hard to progress.

While I agree, there is no shortcut to simply picking up a camera and getting a few thousand shutter actuations to learn whats what (and most definitely not on green box mode if learning is the intention), some demonstrations like pulling two instances of this up and putting distance/focal length at opposite extremes in each to show the compression of the compression of the backdrop work very well.

Dialing it to P teaches you nothing, since the camera is picking the exposure settings for you.

If you're really going to learn via shooting, you need to bracket your shots, line them up side by side in an app like Lightroom or iPhoto and look at the metadata to see what changed in the scene from the setting changes. Most people aren't going to bother doing this.

If an app like this is done properly, it would let you see the DOF and exposure changes more coveniently than post-shot chimping can.

If you learn to use the P setting on modern cameras it's actually all there, only more convenient (the control dial in P mode trades shutter speed for aperture). I happen to live in A mode most of the time, mostly because I'm forgetful.

There's an even better mode one Pentax DSLRs where one dial acts as a P dial and the other controls ISO.

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