The Re-Inventon of a Dead Horse

[The_Traveler]

I'm not taking sides-I have respect for both Lew and Derrel's opinions-but I had to like that post for one reason and one reason alone (aside from the whole well reasoned argument thing)...

shooting for Instagram distribution will cause the Earth to break apart and spin into the sun...

This made me laugh WAY too much.

I have no idea what Derrel's opinion might be but mine is as it always is. I shoot and process the way I like.
I don't think it's sensible to be angry at the world of photography if it changes; I will just go on shooting the way I like to.

He might recoil from instagram effects, but he admits that -- in theory at least -- there's no reason an instagram filter cannot support or at any rate not interfere with a good picture. His beef is when you take a bad picture (let us table for the nonce what that might mean) and try to make it good with an instagram filter.

Exactly. Processing should follow the spirit of the image and not take it over or stand instead of good content.
I have no beef with Instagram per se except that it becomes the crutch for too many people.

 

[rexbobcat]

People are always misinterpreting the argument against Instagram.

It's not Instagram itself that I hate. It's the mentality of the people that use it.

Instagram does not make bad photos look better, but I know a lot of people who think otherwise. They think that the fact that they have 10,000 followers means that their photos are automatically elevated to the position of high art, regardless of the content of the photos. It has absolutely NOTHING to do with the double DD's that just happen to be falling out of the photographer's shirt in 60% of all their photos.

It's not the aesthetic and conception of Instagram that I hate, it's the delusions that a lot of users seem to have about how awesome their photos are.

(Plus, there is literally no way not to look silly trying to take a serious photo with an iPhone.)

 

[rexbobcat]

Rotfl.. so if Lew has a beef with taking an inferior picture, doing a quick and dirty edit to it like say, applying an instagram filter, then that's just fine and dandy and the birds are all on people's shoulders singing happy tunes.

Now if I try to make.. hmm.. pretty much the exact same point, albiet badly worded, about many of the bad pictures I see over on Flickr that are run through another filter to convert them from color to B&W - and that it doesn't take a bad image and make it a good one, what happens? Well then it's just fine and dandy, all hunky dorey that I get villified for it - up to and including having Lew, The self appointed gaurdian of such things, declare me a non-person.

Hmm...

Not really trying to open this can of worms again you understand, but the irony is just so amazingly over the top - ok well actually I think maybe irony should be replaced with another word, probably one starting with the letter H in this context.

Lol

I think the word you're looking for is miscommunication.

 

[robbins.photo]

Rotfl.. so if Lew has a beef with taking an inferior picture, doing a quick and dirty edit to it like say, applying an instagram filter, then that's just fine and dandy and the birds are all on people's shoulders singing happy tunes.

Now if I try to make.. hmm.. pretty much the exact same point, albiet badly worded, about many of the bad pictures I see over on Flickr that are run through another filter to convert them from color to B&W - and that it doesn't take a bad image and make it a good one, what happens? Well then it's just fine and dandy, all hunky dorey that I get villified for it - up to and including having Lew, The self appointed gaurdian of such things, declare me a non-person.

Hmm...

Not really trying to open this can of worms again you understand, but the irony is just so amazingly over the top - ok well actually I think maybe irony should be replaced with another word, probably one starting with the letter H in this context.

Lol

I think the word you're looking for is miscommunication.

Actually I think it may have been hypocrisy - I'll have to go back and check my notes. But you are correct, miscommunication was spelled wrong.

 

[Steve5D]

Why the Hell are you guys so damned concerned with what other people are doing?

 

[Derrel]

I have no beef with Instagram per se except that it becomes the crutch for too many people.

Just trying to see how wide are the boundaries of your unthinking prejudice.

yeah...that's what you wrote when robbins.photo said "he" did not like black and white. Yeah...that was on the 11th of this month...

http://www.thephotoforum.com/forum/photographic-discussions/344354-critiquing-judging-3.html

I was to quote you, Lew,"not allowing you to get by with this snide remark unchallenged."

We get it.

 

[robbins.photo]

I have no beef with Instagram per se except that it becomes the crutch for too many people.

Just trying to see how wide are the boundaries of your unthinking prejudice.

yeah...that's what you wrote when robbins.photo said "he" did not like black and white. Yeah...that was on the 11th of this month...

http://www.thephotoforum.com/forum/photographic-discussions/344354-critiquing-judging-3.html

I was to quote you, Lew,"not allowing you to get by with this snide remark unchallenged."

We get it.

Looks like you might end up at my place for Christmas Derrel - so, Ham or Turkey? Lol

 

[robbins.photo]

Why the Hell are you guys so damned concerned with what other people are doing?

Ok granted Steve, as much as I hate to admit it you've got a very valid point.

 

[robbins.photo]

Ham, OR turkey??? Whadda ya mean "or"...how about BOTH!!!!!!!!!! lol

Lol.. both it is. Going to be one serious party over here on the Group W bench..

 

[amolitor]

Why the Hell are you guys so damned concerned with what other people are doing?

Why are you so interested in why we're so interested in what other people are doing?

 

[bratkinson]

I just finished slogging through this entire thread. Now it's time for my 2-cents worth, hopefully without assailing some respondents choice of music, musicians, or where they post their fanatastic photos...

I still have my trusty $30 all metal high quality slide rule I was required to obtain for the college calculus and physics required for an engineering degree in the late 60s. I think I could still multiply 2 x 3 and get 6 as the answer with it. Back in those 'good old days', that $30 was a major investment for a student...probably more like $150 or so today. And those first electronic calculators? My big brother paid something like $150 in 1975 or so that did add/subract/divide/multiply only...not even square root or any trig functions! At those prices, one better know exactly HOW to get the answer to the problem...and use that tool until it could no longer function. I also had the misfortune of having a high school math teacher for 3 of the 4 years and he required everyone to show every step along the way to solve whatever problems he required us to solve. Today, highly intelligent calculators are completely FREE on students' smartphones that cost $5.00 with a 2 year plan. No need to show the instructor all the steps to get the answer...it's all on the smartphone.

What can be learned from all that? The HOW is no longer an issue. Just get the result quickly. The inaccurate-beyond-2 places slide rule has no place in todays world except as a museum piece. We couldn't have had much of a space program if it depended on slide rules. When I was in high school, it was important to me and my friends to know everything there was about a car, and how to tear down and rebuild the engine, transmission, differential, carburettor(s), dash board, and everything else if we wanted a 'good' car, or, at least, as good as our friends cars. Today, who cares? There's so much electronics that does everything in the car and everywhere else these days, understanding the HOW is less and less possible for an individual.

And so it is with photography. In Ansel Adams day, one had to MASTER not only the exposure but the processing and printing as well to be considered a MASTER, with all appropriate honors bestowed upon them. Even being a 'professional photographer' inspired awe and wonder by those who had no clue of what the exposure triangle was or what hypo was or what 'magic' happened in a dark room. It took countless hours of practice to reach the 'proficiency' level. Those who took the time to actually LEARN HOW everything was done perhaps didn't become masters, but at least they knew how to get from A to B.

Today, it's all about computers. The ever-shrinking cost and size of computers has put incredible capabilities in the palms of our hands for next to no cost at all. For $5 and a 2 year contract, you can get a phone, a calculator/computer, a game toy with 5 million games on it, a mini-movie theater, and even a 40mp camera! And if it breaks, or a 'new improved' model comes out, toss that one and get the new one!

As mentioned a couple of pages ago, society has become a throw-away society. Get it cheap, when it breaks, toss it. As a result, people are no longer inclined to think there is any 'value' in something that is so cheap and easy. How many teenagers these days take 'selfies' at McDonalds with their friends and immediately post it on the web...and then completely forget/disregard/don't care about the picture they just sent to the world? There's no percieved VALUE to the picture they just took! They got exactly what they wanted! An instant-gratification picture instantly shared with their 'friends', wherever they are! Was that picture perfectly sharp? Was it properly exposed? Appropriate DOF for the image? IT DOESN'T MATTER! THEY GOT THE PICTURE AND THAT'S ALL THEY WANT! WHO CARES THE LEAST ABOUT --HOW-- THEY GOT IT? They only care that they got the picture and sent it out immediately. Perhaps their 'value' to the picture is to somehow 'elevate' themselves among their web friends that they went to McDs today, and yesterday, and tomorrow, too...

For what it's worth, 40 years ago, my friends and family all showed to me a degree of 'awe' and 'respect' because I knew 'all about computers'. A computer back then started at $1 million and went up from there! Perhaps I once more reached that 'elite' status of having an expensive camera and expensive glass to go with it, and get some degree of 'awe' and 'respect' as a result. And yes, to me, 'absolute sharpness' and technical perfection in the camera and in post are my goals. But who else cares in the least? They get pictures they are more than happy with using nothing more than their FREE smartphone camera.

 

[mmaria]

......

 

[sashbar]

For what it's worth, 40 years ago, my friends and family all showed to me a degree of 'awe' and 'respect' because I knew 'all about computers'. A computer back then started at $1 million and went up from there! Perhaps I once more reached that 'elite' status of having an expensive camera and expensive glass to go with it, and get some degree of 'awe' and 'respect' as a result. And yes, to me, 'absolute sharpness' and technical perfection in the camera and in post are my goals. But who else cares in the least? They get pictures they are more than happy with using nothing more than their FREE smartphone camera.

People have always been craving for some status, "awe" and "respect" or at least recognition, this is human nature and one of the most powerful motivators in life for everyone. And if someone satisfies this desire by buying an expensive camera and some lenses that cost him an arm and a leg, I have nothing against it. Really. If it works, if he feels better,fine. But it has nothing to do with photography.
As for "absolute sharpness" - I prefer "detail". Because absolute sharpness is a technical parameter that is often meaningless to me. Detail is about the content. And sharpness and detail do not always go hand in hand, as shown by later FUJI cameras.

 

[amolitor]

Technique has always been vanishing.

These days we have a certain attitude that if you don't understand the Holy Exposure Triangle, and perhaps how to use flash, or something of photoshop, or whatever, you're not serious. You're not connected to the work, you're just a dilettante. The technique that, somehow, informs the work and makes it better is lost on you.

150 years ago the same kinds of attitudes existed. They didn't care much about the exposure triangle, though. The techniques that connected you to the work, that made you not a dilettante, were things like the skill of flowing collodion across a glass plate. Exposure was, well, give it a minute or two, it'll be OK.

Computers followed much the same trend. If you didn't understand tubes and transistors, then you really wern't much of a computer person. How can you program the thing if you don't know how a half-adder works?! Later, you didn't really need to know about transistors, but f you didn't understand assembly language then you didn't understand how computers work. Then people stopped worrying so much about that, C programming was really the right level of abstraction to understand computers. These days it's about frameworks more than languages.

None of this means that people today are crappier than they were last year. Quite the contrary. Moving to higher levels of abstraction lets us focus on what's important. Certain minutiae may be an important part of how you and your friends relate to the work, but it's not how other people do. And that is OK. Not everyone has to use film to take a good picture, although for some people it is without question important.

I know a guy who didn't really find his voice until he started doing wet plate. The minutiae of that process are somehow important to how he makes a picture, even though, ultimately, the work is still about putting the camera in a good place, and pressing the shutter button at the right time.

This in no way precludes the possibility that another person cannot make superb work with a digital camera in Auto mode.

 

[sashbar]

Technique has always been vanishing.

These days we have a certain attitude that if you don't understand the Holy Exposure Triangle, and perhaps how to use flash, or something of photoshop, or whatever, you're not serious. You're not connected to the work, you're just a dilettante. The technique that, somehow, informs the work and makes it better is lost on you.

150 years ago the same kinds of attitudes existed. They didn't care much about the exposure triangle, though. The techniques that connected you to the work, that made you not a dilettante, were things like the skill of flowing collodion across a glass plate. Exposure was, well, give it a minute or two, it'll be OK.

Computers followed much the same trend. If you didn't understand tubes and transistors, then you really wern't much of a computer person. How can you program the thing if you don't know how a half-adder works?! Later, you didn't really need to know about transistors, but f you didn't understand assembly language then you didn't understand how computers work. Then people stopped worrying so much about that, C programming was really the right level of abstraction to understand computers. These days it's about frameworks more than languages.

None of this means that people today are crappier than they were last year. Quite the contrary. Moving to higher levels of abstraction lets us focus on what's important. Certain minutiae may be an important part of how you and your friends relate to the work, but it's not how other people do. And that is OK. Not everyone has to use film to take a good picture, although for some people it is without question important.

I know a guy who didn't really find his voice until he started doing wet plate. The minutiae of that process are somehow important to how he makes a picture, even though, ultimately, the work is still about putting the camera in a good place, and pressing the shutter button at the right time.

This in no way precludes the possibility that another person cannot make superb work with a digital camera in Auto mode.

You can look at it from a completely different perspective. We are loosing our battle for control with progress, and "How" is exactly what is at stake.

500 years ago people knew pretty well how things worked. You would not need to be a professional in the field to explain how a carrieage moves or how a sand watch shows time.
These days we understand increasingly less about things that surround us, and only professionals can explain coherently how a hadron collider, Tianhe -1A or even an iPhone work.
In the not so distant future new more clever machines will be engineered, construsted and built by lesser machines. And nobody, including the professionals in the filed will be able to explain how exactly these machines work because it will not be a human design. Probably the moment when humans will not be able to answer the "How?" question any more, will be a turning point for our civilization, and it all will go down the slope.
Probably that is why a kid wants to open a box to look what is inside and how it works. It is the basic survival instinct. :shock: