A great camera makes a great photographer: This is the biggest one, a photographer is his or her skills and the camera is only the tool part. Sure if the technical limitations of a camera come in the way, it’s a good idea to get a better camera, but its the woman/man who makes the photo a masterpiece, not her/his gear or camera. World over, masterpieces have been made on all sorts of cameras, cheap, expensive, film, digital, instant film, you name it!

Only “good light” creates good photos: Sure the magic light is great, we love it! However at odd times of the day, there is life of its own, art of its own. You can use the sharp contrast of the afternoon or the dark skies, even the clouds, to shoot something interesting. The key is to find something that comes at its best under those lighting conditions. An orange bougainvillea creeper looks amazingly different in bright sun lit blue wall and different in magic light. Both have their own beauty. A monument with carved motifs looks pretty different in afternoon sun with all those contrasted shadows.

Pros only shoot in manual mode: I have seen some very good photographers use automatic or no flash auto mode most of the times. No one should shy away from using the perfectly balanced and thoughtfully crafted settings from their camera manufacturer. After all they are made in consultation with pro photographers. Only when a photographer feels there is a special need for a specific setting, would they want to flip to manual.

Pros only use full frame cameras: Full frame cameras are amazing, but they are big and bulky. Crop sensor and micro four-third formats are quite popular and rightly so. They are light and come in high resolution. They are sometimes better in ISO performance when compared to their bigger cousins. Also, their lenses are comparatively cheap and lighter. They not only serve as a second body but primary camera for many professional photographers.

RAW is always better than JPEG: Yes, RAW is ideally better, but not always. When you really do not want to touch up your photos, JPEG is the way to go, true for most editorial and everyday news photographers. These people know their gear and unless they need RAW for print news, most will just use JPG. If you shoot RAW all day, you end up processing everything manually and that is time consuming if you have a lot of photos. For everyday shooting, RAW may not be really practical.

Tripod is always needed for clean shots: Most pros will use a faster shutter to get crisp shots where needed. A tripod is not always needed for professional photography but in some situations. In some cases a tripod is not the only resting tool. I have seen photographers use rocks, tabletops and just the plain old mother earth to rest the camera for some amazing macro or wide angle shots. Image and lens stabilising tech has made handheld shooting much easier, even with high zoom telephotos in some cases.

High ISO is bad: Sure low ISO is clean and desirable. Sometimes, getting a photo is important, so instead of having no photo at all, it’s a good thing to have a noisy one. Also, new technology today has made possible crazy high ISO levels. 1000-5000 ISO today does not produce bad photos at all, with modern cameras. So don’t shy away from shooting a cheetah in the dark with high ISO, it gets a decent photo in dark conditions without disturbing the animal.

So those are my thoughts on 7 of many photography myths, Thanks for reading!

Photo credits: Artistashmita.