Camera manufacturers are always trying to convince us that the equipment we use will determine whether we're able to capture good images or not. This shouldn't come as a surprise to anyone, as camera manufacturers are trying to sell us more equipment.
What's truly disturbing is how many photo industry professionals buy into the hype. It's amazing how many times I've seen photo magazine articles mention how a certain feature is "required" or "needed" to capture a great picture. If a fast-shooting, "professional-grade" camera loaded with fancy features were really necessary to create great images, camera companies such as Leica and Hasselblad would have gone out of business years ago.
To that end, I decided to write an article detailing how I used a Nikon Coolpix P7000 to make some candid images of my nephew Sean. You read that right.
I used a point-and-shoot camera.
What many people fail to realize is that many of the features found on today's professional cameras have made it into today's entry-level SLRs and point-and-shoot cameras. In this case, I made use of the TTL flash capabilities -- a feature which has actually been available on point-and-shoot cameras for many years now.
This picture was made using a Nikon P7000 point-and-shoot camera using a Nikon SU-800 Wireless Speedlight Commander and two Nikon SB-800 flashes. The SU-800 allows the camera to provide wireless, automatic TTL flash control just as it does on the bigger, more expensive professional cameras.
The first flash was placed at the far left side of the room and the second was located to the right of the camera. No umbrellas or sofboxes were used to soften the light. Instead, I used the small, white diffusion dome which Nikon supplies with the SB-800.
What's amazing about this setup is how little effort was involved. The P7000 has a manual mode that works similar to that of an SLR, so it was easy to set the camera to expose the image as if I were using one of my more expensive "professional" cameras. For this example, I used an exposure of 1/100th second at f/5.6 with the ISO set at 400. After I dialed in these settings, I simply configured the flashes to work in their "remote" mode, set the SU-800 to control them and pressed the shutter button.
What makes this story even more amazing is that no compensation was required to get the correct exposure. It came out perfect using the default settings. Normally I would have to dial-in some compensation to get the right exposure with the Nikon wireless flash system.
The morale of this story is that it you really don't need an expensive "professional" camera to make great images. The affordable, entry-level and point-and-shoot cameras produced today are more than capable of making compelling images. Many of these cameras even have the same features found on professional-grade SLRs as well as the ability to use the same accessories. Some even have features that aren't found on professional cameras, like the ability to use wireless flash without the need for a device like the SU-800.
Many people have a complex about the equipment they use and worry that their equipment is inadequate for making great images. They couldn't be more wrong about their situation.
One thing that you'll notice about the world's greatest photographers is that none of them obsess over their equipment and they all have the same philosophy:
It's not what you use. It's how you use it.
Happy shooting!
