David Pratt posted:

The Tragedy of the Sunset Photo

Dren posted:

Bullshit linkbait is full of bullshit.

On a related note, better go take some sunset pictures before sensors get 5 more stops of dynamic range and everyone starts taking perfect sunset photos every time.

quote:

Romantic writers expressed a preference for sublimity over attractiveness in the late 18th and 19th centuries. Edmund Burke wrote, “For sublime objects are vast in their dimensions, beautiful ones comparatively small: beauty should be smooth and polished; the great, rugged and negligent … beauty should not be obscure; the great ought to be dark and gloomy: beauty should be light and delicate; the great ought to be solid, and even massive.” The experience of watching a sunset usually counts as sublime. The scene unfolds on a grand scale, loud with color and radiance; you get a shivery feeling of time passing as you sip your G&T; death draws just a bit nearer. Sunset pictures, though, reduce and tame that sublimity. Instead of your mortality rising to meet you, you see pretty colors, locked in a small and tidy moment. It’s as if putting sunsets on film magically relegates them to the same cloying aesthetic category as wildflowers and blonde children—other people’s.

voodoorootbeer posted:

Last weekend I stashed my Yashica-D in my son's diaper bag so that I didn't have to carry too much junk while we were at a wedding. This week we moved into a new house and I completely lost track of it; my wife believed that she had taken it out of the bag and I had no concept of where it could be. Today I woke up after sleeping off a midnight shift and got a call from her after they were done swimming at a friend's pool:

"We had kind of a poopy afternoon. Max pooped in his swim diaper. When I reached my hand down into the bottom of the diaper bag, I found more poop. I have no idea where it came from. I had to wash the bag and a bunch of stuff in it. Poop kind of got on your camera. You might want to take a toothbrush to it or something."

Sure enough there is poop on my camera. THERE IS POOP ON MY CAMERA.

xzzy posted:

That won't fix lens flares.

quote:

Anyone who writes about technology has suffered the ire of Apple, Microsoft and Amazon fans, all coming to the defense of their favorite technology companies. Sometimes, these readers can say some pretty mean things to writers and other people who comment on stories; all, strangely, in defense of a corporation.

But as I learned this week, compared to the photography community, technology fans seem tamer than a sloth.

In a Tool Kit article published on Thursday, I wrote about Leica’s digital cameras, where I noted that hard-core Leica owners “swear by its craftsmanship, lens quality and lack of bells and whistles.”

Within hours of the piece being published online, my in-box filled with vehement messages from all kinds of photographers and camera fans. They took to Twitter and Facebook, too.

The Canon faithful attacked me for not writing a similar profile on Canon cameras, which, they noted that in their opinion are the only camera worth buying. The Nikon owners denounced Leica, calling it a waste. There were even film-camera enthusiasts who came to the defense of film. But none of the comments were more vehement than those of the Leica owners.

Leica owners picked through every detail of the article, many sending long e-mails to complain that the experts I quoted in the article were not really “experts” at all, and that they, the people sending me e-mails and leaving comments, knew more about Leica cameras.

One polite reader, Jack B. Siegel, pointed me to a Leica forum where the article I wrote was on the equivalent of a digital dartboard. When I asked Mr. Siegel, an attorney and photographer, if this was normal, he said that camera owners can be ruthless, even more so than the techies.

“I am endlessly astonished about the rigid and hostile views and arguments over nothing,” he said to me in an e-mail about the photography forums he visits. Mr. Siegel, who is currently writing a book on photography law, noted that photo Web sites have to go to great lengths to stave off angry comments and have a positive discussion.

It turns out he’s right. Passions can rise so high on many of the serious camera Web sites that reviews even come with warnings and disclaimers to readers.

“Basically, I am not interested in comments from those who just want to comment for negativity,” wrote Steve Huff, a photographer and camera reviewer, before he began a lengthy and detailed review of a new Leica camera.

“If you start posting hateful comments that attack me or anyone else here you will be deleted, plain and simple,” Mr. Huff added. “I have a low tolerance for hate, bitterness, jealousy or idiotic comments from people who have no clue what the facts are.”

xzzy posted:

So a guy writes an article heaping praise on Leica cameras, and he still gets Leica owners bitching at him?

What the hell, humanity.

xzzy posted:

So a guy writes an article heaping praise on Leica cameras, and he still gets Leica owners bitching at him?

What the hell, humanity.

quote:

Leica owners picked through every detail of the article

quote:

I am as guilty of it as the next photographer. There's simply far too much attention paid to the technical quality of our images. Ultimately though, this isn't what's important. It's what the photographs are "of" and the vision behind them that makes them succeed or not.

Not a single one of the best photographs that I have ever published, exhibited, or sold stands on its technical merits. Yes, many of them have technical merit, but this isn't what makes them succeed. They would have been worthwhile (to the extent that they are) even if they had been taken with lesser equipment.

In the end you'll end up with some 56KB JPGs which open up to about 300k. That's about 4 X 5" at 72 PPI – what you see above. Now keep in mind that these 4X5" shots are at 72ppi. (I said that – right?). This means that at 240ppi they would print out at about 1.2" X 1.5", about the size of a postage stamp.

But, let's not let that deter us. You've heard of Bicubic Smoother? Well, go for it.



I've made 8X10" FunkyCam prints that actually look quite nice, in a funky kind of way. The above is one such example. I printed it that size on A3 matte paper, and placed it on my print viewing box. My wife, who rarely comments on my work unless asked (she was an Art History Major, and knows what's good for her), walked into my office, saw it, and exclaimed with no irony whatsoever in her voice– Wow, that's one of the best things you've done recently.

I explained that it had been made possible because I'd used a new camera. She rolled her eyes, and asked how much. I told her, and with a smile she replied that in that case she was off to buy a new pair of shoes. Go figure.

RangerScum posted:

If you have an art history major than your opinion on art is the correct one.

Wario In Real Life posted:

So the subject of cheap cameras and "it's not the quality of the camera that makes the photograph, it's your artistic vision!" came up in the gear thread and ugh this just makes me cringe...

MrBlandAverage posted:

Why? That's sort of an extreme counterexample, but why does a photo have to be technically perfect for it to be aesthetically pleasing? Is a photograph only good if the camera that took it cost more than $500?

Wario In Real Life posted:

What? Where did I say that?

There's certainly some happy medium between spending 30k on Leica gear for that perfect sharpness and using a 72dpi toy camera made of penny parts. My comments are directly in response to the big chunk of text that I quoted.

RangerScum posted:

If you have an art history major than your opinion on art is the correct one.

Wario In Real Life posted:

So the subject of cheap cameras and "it's not the quality of the camera that makes the photograph, it's your artistic vision!" came up in the gear thread and ugh this just makes me cringe...

Wario In Real Life posted:

There's certainly some happy medium between spending 30k on Leica gear for that perfect sharpness and using a 72dpi toy camera made of penny parts. My comments are directly in response to the big chunk of text that I quoted.

mr. mephistopheles posted:

I don't know, there's such a huge disconnect between what photographers and people interested in art think is a good photo and what people who instagram the poo poo out of everything think is a good photo that it's hard to really gauge

Pablo Bluth posted:

There's also often a massive disconnect between "people interested in art" and photographers. The Art School clique who'll hang a photo of an old shoe and write two hundred words on the photo's social commentary, but turn their noses up at something like world class sports photography.

Reichstag posted:

Reichstag posted:

atomicthumbs posted:

Why do you think you're correct and they're not?

Reichstag posted:

RangerScum posted:

*You're

SoundMonkey posted:

I was waiting to see who was going to be That Guy

Mr. Despair posted:

Mr. Despair posted:

Mr. Despair posted:

Mr. Despair posted:

SoundMonkey posted:

I was waiting to see who was going to be That Guy

mr. mephistopheles posted:

That Guy used the wrong form of 'then' like ten posts up too.

VomitOnLino posted:

Am I to late too hop on this train?
I blame time-zones.

Also appropriately, for the topic at hand I just finished laying out the sawing pattern for my wooden pinhole camera.