Museums, paranoia, draconian copyright laws and more
Last week Rachel and I went to London and while we were there we visited several museums. I came away feeling disappointed and slightly angry at my experiences. Let me explain: It seems that no matter which museum we visited, they all had a problem with our camera. It's a Canon point and shoot camera (not a fancy SLR) and takes pretty nice outdoor photos...however, taking photos in museums is a different story. First of all, museums are typically dark places, certainly dark enough to warrant the use of flash. But using flash in a museum is bad for two main reasons: Most exhibits are inside glass cases. When you take a photo and the flash fires you end up with a lovely picture of the flash reflected back at you off the glass instead of the object you're trying to photograph. Flash washes out the subject and can create shadows. If you're too close you'll get most of the flash reflected back at you, if you're too far away the flash won't make much difference and yo