Shooting in program mode

I have always read, and believed that program mode leaves to many decisions to the camera, and not enough to the photographer. Personally, I have never used it.

I saw an interesting video from a French photographer who believed that today's DSLR's are sophisticated machines, and that program mode can be quite good. He preferred it to other shooting modes in many cases.  He was reviewing a Nikon D500.

Anyone out there using program mode, and if so, when do you find it useful?

I will admit that when I had a Nikon film cameras, I usually used P mode when taking indoor flash pictures involving people with a Nikon flash mounted on the camera. It was just easier to let the camera make the decisions about f stop, shutter speed, balance flash output, etc for pictures of things like kids birthday parties. Flash was used as the main light source in these situations. For fill flash I used A mode.

With digital cameras and with Nikon flashes designed for digital cameras, I use A mode. That does not mean that P mode would not do a good job where flash is used as the main light. I just might try some tests.

Never P mode for me, but when I’m not actually using my camera I often leave it set to manual with auto-ISO (Nikon D800 option - you choose the aperture & S/S, the camera picks the ISO for whatever metering mode you have set). It’s like P mode in a way. I leave it set like this whenever there’s a likelihood that I may have a photo op with no time to choose settings. I did it often last year when I had an occasional bobcat visitor in my yard - I’d sometimes see the cat for mere seconds as it ran across my yard. I often left a window open to shoot out of, and had the camera next to the window ready to turn on and shoot. Not having to take time to choose manual settings allowed me shots I would not have gotten otherwise. If my camera didn’t have auto-ISO with manual I’d probably leave it in P mode for the circumstances I described. But for the times when you have time to make all manual settings, that’s the way to go.

Mark Robinson wrote:I have always read, and believed that program mode leaves to many decisions to the camera, and not enough to the photographer. Personally, I have never used it.

I saw an interesting video from a French photographer who believed that today's DSLR's are sophisticated machines, and that program mode can be quite good. He preferred it to other shooting modes in many cases.  He was reviewing a Nikon D500.

Anyone out there using program mode, and if so, when do you find it useful?

I've been shooting Program Mode since Nikon developed and perfected Flexible Program back in the 90's. If you want a faster shutter speed than what your camera has chosen, dial the rear dial to the right. You want better depth of field, dial the rear dial to the left. It's like a combination of Shutter Property and Aperture Priority all rolled into one. However, some cameras, including Canon will not hold the shutter speed and Aperture YOU have chosen when the camera goes to sleep. Therefore, many Canon shooters are often frustrated and I suggest should stick to Aperture Priority or Manual. Nikon, Olympus and my newest favorite, Lumix cameras all hold the shutter speed and aperture you manually select when in Program even when the camera goes to sleep. Much more info here if you are interested http://naturalexposures.com/photography-program-mode/

danieljcox wrote:

Mark Robinson wrote:I have always read, and believed that program mode leaves to many decisions to the camera, and not enough to the photographer. Personally, I have never used it.

I saw an interesting video from a French photographer who believed that today's DSLR's are sophisticated machines, and that program mode can be quite good. He preferred it to other shooting modes in many cases.  He was reviewing a Nikon D500.

Anyone out there using program mode, and if so, when do you find it useful?

I've been shooting Program Mode since Nikon developed and perfected Flexible Program back in the 90's. If you want a faster shutter speed than what your camera has chosen, dial the rear dial to the right. You want better depth of field, dial the rear dial to the left. It's like a combination of Shutter Property and Aperture Priority all rolled into one. However, some cameras, including Canon will not hold the shutter speed and Aperture YOU have chosen when the camera goes to sleep. Therefore, many Canon shooters are often frustrated and I suggest should stick to Aperture Priority or Manual. Nikon, Olympus and my newest favorite, Lumix cameras all hold the shutter speed and aperture you manually select when in Program even when the camera goes to sleep. Much more info here if you are interested http://naturalexposures.com/photography-program-mode/

Thank you for your response and information Daniel. I will read your article with keen interest.

I use A mode with 3D color matrix metering (using Nikons) almost exclusively and have suggested using it when I have taught wildlife workshops since the ‘90s. My fellow instructors (landscape specialists) thought it was sacrilegious to suggest using anything but manual. I feel that with most wildlife images, shallow depth of field is my most important consideration, so I use f4 mostly, which also gives me the fastest shutter speed for my chosen ISO. For a faster shutter speed, it’s easy to change ISO. For more DOF, it’s just a matter of rolling the dial to get a smaller(opening, not number) aperture. When I want to change exposure, I use the exposure lock button after spot metering off a desired object. Nikon’s metering system is really good. One of my friends who really believes you have to use manual mode decided to check the histogram on my shots and found it was spot on.  Too many times the action or lighting changes rapidly and I would lose a lot of unique shots if I was fooling around with manual to adjust to varying conditions, e.g. lighting, fast moving action and BG’s. I say use what works and don’t worry about what others may suggest. If that means manual, program, or A or S, do what makes you comfortable and don’t let anybody make you feel that their way is the only way. We can easily become closed minded and fall into a rut, never even considering trying something different. New technology opens a lot of new opportunities that were not available or accepted before. Don’t be afraid of experimenting. That’s the best way to learn what works best for your style of shooting.

Joe