Originally posted by pete-tarmigan
No auto-exposure either. Maybe not even auto-aperture lenses, i.e., having to practise stop-down metering for every shot.
A lot of those shots were probably taken without metering, If you practiced the sunny 16 rule and had tons of experience you don't really need the camera to tell you what shutter speed and aperture you need to use for every shot. I have worked with a few people that were walking light meters. Amazing how well they could tell what settings to use without metering. Negative film has a pretty wide exposure range.
If you had to meter, it really wasn't that hard on many cameras. Press a lever to meter first shot. Just fire away for subsequent shots. If lighting conditions change you tweaked the aperture ring accordingly. Since you hand was already on the lens. focus and aperture adjustment were easy to do. If you grow up on manual focus then it is not any slower than auto focus for many shots. If you used the DOF scale on a lens and found that at f16, everything form 12 feet out was in focus, then you just set you focus to 12 feet and fired away.
Everyone on this site who has never used an older manual film camera should take one and try walking aournd the neighborhood with a roll of film in it and give the sunny 16 rule a try. You may be surprised at the results.