How about a digital body with minimal menus?

[splitimageview]

The features, functions, and capabilities of today’s computers that have attached or attachable lenses demand a modern UI, not just an antiquated menu system.

Sure, there are cameras with minimal menus, but why have menus at all?

Imagine if smartphones used buttons and menus; would there be hundreds of millions in use?

 

[Out to Lunch]

Work with what is available. Alternatively, write letters to the camera producers. Good luck with that. Cheers, OtL

 

[splitimageview]

If camera manufacturers had ‘used what’s available’ they may have offset much of their market shrinkage by offering smartphones...maybe it would be Nikon and Canon selling millions instead of Samsung. And their higher end cameras would have modern UI.

 

[Godfrey]

The Olympus OMD-EM1 menus drove me nuts. Add to that the worst control locations of any camera I've ever used and I was climbing the walls half the time. The only reason I kept using it was because the lenses were excellent and the files were beautiful....

The Olympus E-M1 menu system is complex and deep, but has a solid logic behind its organization. Understanding that logic is the trick: it takes study and time, practice. Personally, I find its ergonomics very good if a trifle cramped for my hands, but that's beside the point.

A short cut I learned is to avoid trying to read the whole instruction manual from beginning to end ... The instruction manual is written by a team of writers, not the engineers who designed the menu system, and it isn't laid out the best way for educating me, IMO. What I do is to go directly to the appendix that lists all 197 commands and their default settings, and then, with instruction manual and camera in hand, I experiment with the groups of settings that make sense that I might want to alter them from the defaults. The command organization is revealed this way. Once I understand what does what, then some of the interactions become obvious.

Once I have the camera set up the way I want it to behave, I create my own listing of the commands with my settings for them, rather than the defaults. Unfortunately, Olympus does not provide a way to save a configuration to the SD card and then re-import it, so whenever the camera needs to be reset you have to manually input all your changes. But with a configuration list like this, it generally takes about ten minutes (because you will likely never make changes to all 197 defaults simultaneously... 🙂 ).

I like the camera and it is a fine performer, that's why I've been reluctant to sell it.

About 17 or 18 years ago Leica made the Digilux-2 with a ring around the lens for focus and aperture and a normal conventional shutter speed dial and people liked them but no one copied them.
...
PS I've often wondered why you can't set the thing up for all time and then save the settings as your default on a SD card but there you are...

Leica has done this the best with their M, SL, and CL cameras (I have no experience of the S system cameras...). Why no one else "gets it" they way they do is an interesting question. And Leica does provide exactly that functionality: configure the camera, save that configuration to a user setting (up to four or six or seven of them), export that setting to the SD card. Now you can import that setting from the SD card to any body of that model type. It's brilliant.

The problem is that many 'film shooters' believe that a camera is a camera and never bother to read the manual of their brand new digital camera. Learn and adapt. As we speak, Leica and Fuji offer the best 'classic' camera design and feel.

It is true: As a technical writer and engineering support person in my career, over the years, it has always astonished me how many of the questions delivered to my desk were simple evidence that the user never bothered to even look at the instruction manual that I worked so hard to make readable, logical, and understandable. More than 90% of the answers to all the questions I ever got were a simple matter of going to the manual and copy-pasting the information there into a reply. In the remaining 10%, most of the reasons for the confusion were more likely to be that a particular bit of information was missed in the manual: I used to collect those cases and add them to the proposed revision list for the instruction manuals. Actual bugs and errors in operation were usually the 1 to 2 percent of the incoming questions.

Human nature, I guess.

....Imagine if smartphones used buttons and menus; would there be hundreds of millions in use?

Smartphones do use buttons and menus, and there are at least hundreds of millions in use. ?? Not sure I get your point.

Work with what is available. Alternatively, write letters to the camera producers. Good luck with that. Cheers, OtL

Yup. I do that regularly. And, happily, I can report that some noticeable and significant fraction of my bug reports and queries do seem to be acted upon. I've built solid relationships this way with support personnel at several companies over the years 😀

G

 

[splitimageview]

Smartphones do use buttons and menus, and there are at least hundreds of millions in use. ?? Not sure I get your point.

I don’t know of any smartphones where one has to drill down thru pages of text menus, ala digital cameras. If there any any, they aren’t really that ‘smart,’ I suppose. 🙂

Such a system is not by any means a modern UI.

Remember the old T9 text input system? “Text on 9 keys?” Digital camera menus aren’t quite that tedious, but they get pretty close. 🙂

 

[Out to Lunch]

Godrey, good for you! Whenever I got stuck with the myriad of options, I'd go back to the manual to solve the problem, and/or ask RFF members for advice. It always worked out. I prefer the Fuji layout and design and I have no complaints. All this said, I have stopped buying gear mid-2018, and there are no new challenges. So far, I am happy with what I have. Cheers, OtL

 

[shawn]

This thread is a perfect illustration of the problem of designing a UI.

There are complaints about old UI ('text menus', 'DOS') and there are complaints about unknown icons.

Personally, I prefer with a *well organized* text menu with a logical control/navigation scheme. Fuji, Nikon and Sigmas for example. Of those I prefer a top down menu system (like Fuji or Nikon) as I feel it makes navigating the menus easier and you move right/left in/out of options. Visualizing this as a flow chart makes it easier to understand.

Sony is the complete opposite of this. Their menus are not organized at all. It really looks like they just put options into the menus wherever and it isn't even consistent between very closely related cameras. Their left/right main sections and then moving down into the options is more confusing as it takes a different button press to select the option. I always tend to go down to the option and press right to try and go into the option but end up swapping pages.

When I had an Olympus OMD EM5 I thought the menus were OK but they didn't really handle contradictory menu options very well. You could set options that would be overruled by others with no feedback about this which could be confusing.

The Leica M240 has a pretty basic menu system but I don't think it is particularly well done either. Very easy to change an option and not commit it, some options hidden in weird places and inconstant use of buttons for selections.

There are cameras that have allowed them to store settings on a flash card but that doesn't work well when you switch cards or format them. They is why many let you save a group of settings into a C1, C2 or whatever state.

Having said that I can work with any of these menus systems. I think the real trick is to understand what sorts of things can typically be changed/configured on a camera and then figure out how to do it for whatever camera I'm using.

Shawn

 

[JoeV]

I like my older Panasonic G5. The body is smaller, lighter and less angular than the more current Panasonic offerings. I use the 7Artisans 25mm F/1.8 lens, effectively a small, nifty and fast “50”, and keep the viewfinder uncluttered and the flippy screen folded in. Thus the more complex menu items are hidden from view - unless I need to access them.

It’s also really nice using the EVF in Dynamic Monochrome mode, seeing the live view in B/W.

I don’t mind a full-featured camera, the key is customizing the display and buttons to make it as minimal as possible.

Also, I find the Panasonic menus rather straightforward.

 

[BWF]

Sony menus are horribly organized but the custom menu solves most problems. I forget about all the other menus and features over time.

Other than Nikon and Panasonic, I’ve found most menus plain bad. It’s like almost nobody thought about it or something is lost in translation. Perhaps it’s a feature not a bug to the manufacturers though because learning a system requires work and keeps people locked in, as long as no other major maker is offering something much better. Or it’s just such a low priority and ingrained into so many different camera firmware versions.

 

[splitimageview]

If manufacturers are going to use a menu system, they should at least organize it so it can be reasonably intuitive...on Fuji for example, a commonly used feature is to PREVIEW EXPOSURE IN MANUAL MODE.

Basically this needs to be disabled in situations where it’s too dark to see what you are shooting, and you want the viewfinder to brighten up, so you can frame the photo. For example, when shooting flash in a room with very low ambient lighting. You don’t want the viewfinder to preview the exposure, as it’ll be too dark too see anything.

This function is set on the Fuji X-H1 under the ‘wrench’ menu (that’s five button clicks down after pressing the menu button, and after pressing the ‘left’ button.)

Then click the right button to enter the top level of the wrench menu.

Then click down twice to SCREEN SET-UP.

Then click right.

Now you’re on the SCREEN SETTING sub-menu. There are three pages here.

Click down 8 more times...

You’ve finally reached PREVIEW EXP/WB IN MANUAL MODE.

Right click once and choose one of three options:

PREVIEW EXP/WB
PREVIEW WB
OFF

This is a feature that, for many shooters, needs to be enabled/disabled frequently, so it can be assigned to a function button (with a few hundred mode button presses...ok, I’m exaggerating here.) But there simply isn’t enough physical room to place programmable function buttons all over the camera...and not every function is allowed to be assigned to a button...

I own the largest Fuji forum, and this is a very common question that people post about.

“I’m trying to use flash but I can’t see anything in the viewfinder! Help!”

First question to Fuji: why is this buried in the SCREEN SET-UP menu? That’s far from an intuitive location...

And of course the very design of a menu system UI requires lots of button presses.

I’ve been out in the field shooting and actually missed important shots as I was furiously button-pressing, working through the menus trying to choose a specific option appropriate for the situation...inevitably missing the proper location, and having to hunt, starting over from the top menu multiple times...

A modern UI would take far less time due to being more intuitive and enabling the user to go directly to the option as opposed drilling left, right, and down through menus and sub menus...

If a function is used often enough, even if it can’t be assigned to a button, the user will eventually remember where it is in the menu system, but there still is no getting around all those button presses...

And for those functions that are very rarely used, it’s just an exercise in frustration running through page after sub-page in a fruitless hunt for that silly setting...

 

[waynec]

Do camera's need Siri?

 

[robert blu]

The menus question is another theme which appears on a regular basis (together with the complain Leica prices!) ! Answer and comments are again more or less the same.

Of course if you need and advanced camera with multiple functions and possibility you have to study and learn it in tha camera manual or on any book or tutorial you cvan find. Than possibly attache it to an user preset and or store on a card. Than you are ok, unless by accident you touch somethiny you should not, buttons or menu's option.

But I go back to the initial point from the OP, is a simple camera with a simple menù actractive? For simple photographers of course 🙂

Iso, WB, (not necessary if you shoot raw) maybe focus options. Something like the Leica MD but at a different price level. And with a LCD screen. Why not? Than you need only aperture, shutter speed and focus controls.

Personally simplicity is a key word which is one of the reasons for which I stay mainly with Leica. But my wife PanaLeica D-109 which is a camera not aimed to pro or much evoluted photographer has a menù which starts with 5 pages , each of which has from 4 to 9 sub pages each with many options...and many of these are not well described/explained in the more than 200 pages manual...

But to each his own 🙂 it's so nice to have different points of view!

 

[shawn]

A modern UI would take far less time due to being more intuitive and enabling the user to go directly to the option as opposed drilling left, right, and down through menus and sub menus....

How exactly would a 'modern ui' allow one to go to any option on the camera directly without having to move through sub menus? It takes about 3 seconds to get to the setting you are talking about if you don't have it configured somewhere else.

On the Fuji if you have often needed functions set them to buttons, the Quick menu, My Menu or configure a Custom setting.

You example of Preview Exposure is a good example of a logical menu setup. You want to set a screen option. From the menu tree

Setup -> Screen Setup->Preview Exp WB in Manual Mode. Right where it should be.

What are common settings to you won't be common settings to someone else.

That is exactly why the Fuji has a 'My Menu' setting. And you can add the Preview Exp WB in Manual Mode' to that menu. Once you configure 'My Menu' when you press the Menu button you go to 'My Menu' first. If that is your most used option set it to #1 in My Menu,. Press Menu and you are at that option.

Or assign it to a button. Press and hold whatever button you want to assign it to and then just select that option in the pop up list. Now press that button and you toggle between that option being on or off.

The whole point of Fuji's menu design is so that you don't need Fuji's menu design once you understand what you want to configure and how to set it up.

Shawn

 

[JeffS7444]

With Sony cameras, pressing the "DISP" button repeatedly will cycle you through different finder info displays, and each of these displays is user-configurable. Olympus offers something similar by pushing the "INFO" button cycling through the different screens in a round-robin fashion. If you always want to see the same information, I suppose you could configure each of the screens identically.

I use features like histogram and electronic level a lot, so I'll typically set up the camera something like this:

Screen 1: Rule of 3rds grid
Screen 2: + Histogram
Screen 3: + Electronic level

And yes, the EVF and rear-panel LCD can often be configured independently of one another.

Some Sony features like HDR and Panorama are only available in JPEG mode, and that's a fuss. But I've stopped using those in-camera features because Lightroom does it better, and it allows me to work with raw files.

 

[v3cron]

Why not ignore all of the functions that your Sony has that your Minolta doesn't, set it up like a film camera, and save that as a preset? It's a bit paradoxical to complain about the menus, but then insist on using all of the buried features that were never needed in the good ol' days.

 

[splitimageview]

That is exactly why the Fuji has a 'My Menu' setting. <snip>
Or assign it to a button.

Yes, of course, I mentioned button assignment. The My Menu system is also an improvement, but it's ultimately simply menu relocation; it's still a menu.

I suppose there are a handful of shooters who actually read the manuals closely and spend hours in advance configuring things, anticipating in advance what functions are likely to be encountered in the field that require quick menu access.

A modern UI could take many forms.

Using the PREVIEW EXPOSURE IN MANUAL MODE example, how about this, simply stealing from iOS?

In iOS, there are many options under the Settings app on an iPhone. When you click on the Settings app, at the top of the window, there is a search bar.

Instead of scrolling down through the Settings app and manually hunting, one can just type in the search bar.

Just type in the first few letters: "PREV..." and all the options that have those letters will appear.

Such a search looks like this on iOS:

I used this exact method a couple of days ago when I wanted to enable Wi-Fi calling on my iPhone. It took me directly to Settings/Phone/Wi-Fi Calling. This eliminates the time that is wasted scrolling or button pressing. One can go directly to the option, without having to remember what menu or sub-menu or page the option resides.

I'm sure there are many other solutions, this is just the first one that popped into my head.

It should be straightforward to integrate this sort of system into a digital camera; just use Android. I doubt Apple would license iOS. 🙂

Siri was mentioned above; voice recognition is another possibility, one could simply press a button to enable voice recognition and say "PREVIEW" and it would bring up a list of possibilities. The voice recognition would need to work without internet access, unlike Siri, of course. And then the camera manufacturer would need to anticipate what search words people would likely to use for certain settings.

Seems like moving away from ancient menu systems is no-brainer. Smartphones have been on the market for well over a decade, why hasn't this already been done?

 

[shawn]

Of course My Menu is still just a menu. So are the results of a search.

My Menu (or equivalent in any other system) lets a user configure their camera to present as simple a menu as they want and with exactly what they want on it.

A search option only works if one knows what to search for. Still could be useful. For cameras without a touchscreen I'd think *much* slower than just going through the menu tree. And remember, even with your example above ios still very much has a menu tree. It is just graphical in nature and the search is just giving you another sort of menu to work through as a sort of shortcut.

My understanding is earlier Sony A7s ran on Android (or some form of it). To get the speed improvements in the III series cameras they moved away from it. Running a OS on your camera is going to impact battery life, likely slow it down (Sony A7 example) and increase cost as you now have to have the hardware to support that too. A speech interface would be hysterical to watch in action as some photographer at a wedding is trying to whisper commands to their camera. And again, you have to know what you can do first. Otherwise you have no idea to even ask the camera to disable exposure preview.

Like it has *always* been, the photographer needs to know their equipment.

Shawn

 

[splitimageview]

No photographer (or smartphone user) can possibly remember all the options.

A well-designed system allows the user to customize, as well as to find things quickly.

There is simply no reason for camera manufacturers to not improve the UI; it’s in their best interest to make their products as easy to use as possible. Seems like that would be a great way to differentiate one’s products against the brands still mired in decades-old menus. 🙂

One could even have a system that offers a menu-based system and an app-based system and let the user choose their preference, or even a completely user-configurable system. One doesn’t speak to Siri if the situation isn’t appropriate; that doesn’t mean Apple doesn’t offer the feature; rather, they offer several options, and let the user decide what’s best.

 

[David Hughes]

Something I miss from film days is that dial around the rewind knob where you set the film speed and could override is by + or - ½ a stop over about 2 or 3 stops either way. Alas, them days have gone along with using AA batteries in cameras...


It was useful because you look at whatever you're taking and think about dropping a stop or so from the meter reading; even in P mode it worked, usually.



Regards, David

 

[35photo]

The problem is that many 'film shooters' believe that a camera is a camera and never bother to read the manual of their brand new digital camera. Learn and adapt. As we speak, Leica and Fuji offer the best 'classic' camera design and feel. Cheers, OtL

No question about it! I rarely use my menus once every is set I never really touch em only to format a card...