Are Camera Enthusiast Overly Worried About Equipment Over Content?

Ansel Adams was a reknowned 'gear-head' obsessed with the minutiae of technical detail.

It's entirely possible to be technically obsessed and a great photographer.
 
I'm perfectly happy with my current kit, but as soon as my small brain decides I need a 50D or similar, I can guarantee I will spend every waking hour working out how to come up with the funds. I'm not just like this with cameras though - I got it into my head about 12 months ago I wanted a HD telly to complement my Xbox, and spent 3 months working out how to generate funds, before selling several things (including my soul) to get it! :D

In terms of pictures, I see so many 'wow factor' pictures on here produced with inferior equipment to my own to know that it's definitely the person who's behind the lens who's the most important factor, not the kit they're using. I only wish I could produce similar results myself! :(
 
I always like to own and operate the best equipment I can afford (not just photographic kit), and I am also interested (but not particularly good) in the technical aspects of both taking the photo and post-processing.

However, IMHO, it is the "picture" that counts at the end of the day. Its always nice to be told how good you are by someone else (especially someone whose work you admire), but if you like what you have taken, then that's the important thing.

As an example, when I went recently to the hospital where my youngest daughter had just given birth to my grandson, I didn't even consider apertures, f stops, exposure etc. I just stuck the camera in auto and took lots of pictures. They may not be brilliant to everyone else but to me and my family they are priceless (and unrepeatable).

On the technical side of course, having a camera that allowed me to do that was a plus!

Another plus side of all those folk who are obsessed with having all the newest, expensive kit is that to get it they often sell off the "out of date" stuff they only bought relatively recently - and that's how I and lot of others can afford to get our kit!!
 
It is much easier to be able to equip oneself with top-line equipment than it is to develop photographic talent.

ANYONE with sufficient finances can, if desired, equip him/herself with the best available equipment.

Far fewer photographers can attain the skill required to get the utmost from that equipment.

However, whilst it is a truism that a person with top-notch talent and lower grade equipment will usually be able to attain better imagery than a person with no talent and the best equipment. I will certainly agree with that.

BUT....

It is equally true that when talent is equal, the photographer with top-notch equipment will usually attain the better imagery.
 
If it's any consolation, this "tools vs. craft" debate seems to be a major topic in the Internet forums of many other hobbies.

Prior to my (recent) interest in photography, I was a keen bass player and used to spend thousdands of pounds on equipment, hundreds of hours practising and tens of hours (or was it the other way around ;)) on Internet forums for musicians. Every thread about equipment, of any great length, was sure to contain a comment along the lines of:

"Jaco Pastorious (arguabley the finest electric bass player ever to record) only needed 4 strings and a beat-up old Fender Jazz (guitar equivalent of a Canon 450D :D) to produce his "sound"; what makes you think that you need a $5,000, handmade, 7-string bass to progress any further!?

That "attitude" got to be pretty damned tedious, after a few reads :nono:.

So, no, I don't think that photographers are (any) more concerned about "Equipment over Content" (than any other group of hobbyists). Besides, it's a lot cheaper to talk about new equipment, than it is to just go and buy it all and hope that it's what you're expecting :|!

Ultimatley, there are sections on this forum for discussing both Equipment and Technique/Content - so what's the problem :thinking:!?
 
I'm a wee bit of a kit junkie myself but for me it really is about the image. Some of my best shots were taken from the hip with my Fuji F420.

There's an interesting article in the December 08 issue of Professional Photographer entitled "Play Time", about photographers making money from shots taken with "toy" cameras such as the Diana F+ and Holga. The Holga they used even had a glass lens!
 
Guys, this is a fantastic thread. Very interesting reading so far.

I am glad most of you consider that the result is more important than the equipment it was taken with.

We are bombarded by thousands of images a day and it is more and more difficult for a photographer to make a meaningful image that sticks in the mind.

When I think of the images that stick with me over time they are not often technically perfect or composed according to the traditional school but they have impact and just grab you with two hands and force you to look.

The images that immediately come to mind are those taken by Paolo Pellegrin, Thomas Dworzak and Jim Goldberg (the image he took of his father as he died is totally haunting).

Pellegrin in particular has a really chaotice way of taking photoraphs, slow shutter speeds, grainy film and both he and subjects on the move at the same time. To a gear head these images would cause them to choke on their CMOS sensors but for impact they can't be beat. Check out his image of the rebel facing the camera and brandishing a machete. A compositional and technical mess but wow, what a flaming picture!

I'm all about the image and care very little about the equipment unless it serves a purpose. Having said all that, you have to know your onions and I think, there is a bit of the gear head in all of us.

I will leave the obsessive tech geeks to lust after the bleeding edge, after all, their expenditure helps the technology that serves us well to filter down to lower end kit.
 
i have to say the reason i bought the equiptment i bought was because i need it. I was going to my local football team with a 40D and a 100-400 and it was not good enough when it started getting dark, so i bought a 1D mkIII with outstanding noise capability and a 120-300mm f/2.8 for the low light. I would not have been able to take the shots i want without the equiptment.

On the other hand if i was taking pics of a landscape i wouldnt need to buy massivly expensive equiptment because to me a landscape is a landscape and my 40D and kit lens would have doen the job.
 
Oakey22 said:
i have to say the reason i bought the equiptment i bought was because i need it. I was going to my local football team with a 40D and a 100-400 and it was not good enough when it started getting dark, so i bought a 1D mkIII with outstanding noise capability and a 120-300mm f/2.8 for the low light. I would not have been able to take the shots i want without the equiptment..
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Exactly.. people keep saying you can take a good pic with any camera... Love to see them at a non league ground on a winters night... they wouldnt get any picture.. but with a 1dmkIII or the nikon d3 (is it d3?) top end equipment there publishable quality :)
 
Both are inter connected. As a perfectionist we look for what will give us the result we strive for. Ansel Adams could not have achieved his results with a 35mm camera whilst Salgado and the other photojournalists would have been lost without theirs.

Both used the best Bodies and Lenses possible. They just purchased with a purpose, rather than acquire for the sake of it.

Adams in particular was insistant on top quality shutters and optics.
 
Jonathan_Taylor said:
Surely if a photograph has the ability to infuse an emotional response from the viewer, even if it is a negative one, its worth far out weights the merits of any post production used or the equipment it was taken with?

But maybe you feel the two have equal merit?

Or maybe even the technical excellence of the image is where the resonance of the image gets its strength from for you?
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As you start as a photographer it is easy to believe in the magic bullet, in so far as 'If I had x lens I could take so much better photographs' and with the information now so readily accessible it is easier to sit around and read pages and pages of information about x lens than it is to actually get out and about and make photographs and develop your eye. 20 Years ago, you would have gone to camera club and read reviews in magazine instead lol. People don't understand that having the same lens and camera will not get you the same shot as the one you are trying to imitate. I think this realisation comes quite late on with a lot of people. So yes, I think a lot of enthusiast do get hung up with 'Function over Form'

I also think that the kind of peer review you get on forums does tend to be biased towards the 'nice shot but could be sharper' and 'nice shot but if you had a better lens you would get nicer out of focus areas' etc. It's not very often you see comments about the composition beyond the rule of thirds and lead in lines and this only serves to reinforce the idea that the camera truly matters. Obviously there are photos you wouldn't get with a Polaroid that you can get with a D3 but you wouldnt try and do plumbing with a wood saw!


Impact, emotion and viewer involvement is very genre specific. E.G. In motorsport. There, the technical element is much more important than a genre where the subject is the entire photograph and technical element is secondary, such as reportage and war photography. Nobody cares if the photographer is using a D3 or a Holga, what matters is capturing the emotional impact of the scene or having the balls to stick your head above the trench and get the shot.

There are always going to be people to whom photography is more about conspicous consumption than it is about art, but it's the same with so many things. How many owners of BMW M3's actually have them because they like to take them to track days and truly appreciate the abilities of the car and how many have them because it looks good on the driveway?
 
Gandhi..............I love you!

That's about as well constructed answer as it is possible to give. Thank you :)
 
Gandhi said:
As you start as a photographer it is easy to believe in the magic bullet, in so far as 'If I had x lens I could take so much better photographs' and with the information now so readily accessible it is easier to sit around and read pages and pages of information about x lens than it is to actually get out and about and make photographs and develop your eye. 20 Years ago, you would have gone to camera club and read reviews in magazine instead lol. People don't understand that having the same lens and camera will not get you the same shot as the one you are trying to imitate. I think this realisation comes quite late on with a lot of people. So yes, I think a lot of enthusiast do get hung up with 'Function over Form'

I also think that the kind of peer review you get on forums does tend to be biased towards the 'nice shot but could be sharper' and 'nice shot but if you had a better lens you would get nicer out of focus areas' etc. It's not very often you see comments about the composition beyond the rule of thirds and lead in lines and this only serves to reinforce the idea that the camera truly matters. Obviously there are photos you wouldn't get with a Polaroid that you can get with a D3 but you wouldnt try and do plumbing with a wood saw!


Impact, emotion and viewer involvement is very genre specific. E.G. In motorsport. There, the technical element is much more important than a genre where the subject is the entire photograph and technical element is secondary, such as reportage and war photography. Nobody cares if the photographer is using a D3 or a Holga, what matters is capturing the emotional impact of the scene or having the balls to stick your head above the trench and get the shot.

There are always going to be people to whom photography is more about conspicous consumption than it is about art, but it's the same with so many things. How many owners of BMW M3's actually have them because they like to take them to track days and truly appreciate the abilities of the car and how many have them because it looks good on the driveway?
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:clap::clap::clap:

Chris :)
 
I agree in the most part with Gandhi however most of the war/magnum photographers I'm aware of used Leica by choice, and most photojournalists today Full Frame 1ds or D3. So whilst it may matter not to the viewer what was used it sure seems to matter to the photographer what he/she used.

I would not pop my head out of the trench to capture a photograph if all I had to rely on was a Holga. Would you????
 
Stevedeer - I loved those wedding shots and I bet the Bride & Groom did too - a case of forget about the gear and just go for it. 'Pictures' that told the whole story.
 
I have pictures taken on a crappy camera phone that I treasure more than any other shots I have taken, the subject of said photos makes them perfect, not the quality.
 
WTD95_small.jpg
 
Sticks head above parapet...

But, I upgraded my camera/lenses because my older stuff didn't do what I wanted it to. My 40D is so much better for sport, my 100-400 is much, much better than my cheapest 75-300 ever was and focusses much quicker. It's also a lot sharper than my old lens when picking a point on manual focus.

Plus having better kit means I can push myself more.

Photoshop etc. Well even the older film photographers used darkeroom techniques to improve their photo's. A little lightening/darkening in places around the images, cropping etc.

So yes - the photo is important, but sometimes it just needs a push to turn a good photo into a great one.
 
Photography is an art-----The images that are produced are called pictures.A child fooling around with paints produces splashes of colour and indistinct images----it might not be very good but it is still art.Our greatest photographers are artists with their cameras and produce stunning images that can and do affect us on so many different levels.They tend to use the best equipment possible because in the main it helps them achieve a particular feel or look.
I could use their equipment and studio etc and would still churn out the dross I affectionately call "My work."On the other hand if a great photographer were to pick up my equipment I have no doubt that they would produce some stunning images.
I am proud to have produced a few really decent pics (Well I like them)--but my good pics are the exception not the norm.Great photographers have an eye and a feel that enables them to consistently turn out high quality interesting images.The equipment might be good and much work done in post but its that ability to see and frame that initial shot that is so special.
I dont think too many people would pay money and queue to see an exhibition of razor sharp,perfectly exposed boring pictures.On the other hand if a Karsch exhibition came to town----???
Pete.
 
It took me a long while to switch to Digital from film. For the reason that I always felt a DSLR wasn't able to produce what I was seeing through the lens as well as slide/film. Whilst this is no longer the case there are still times when my camera doesn't produce what I see. HDR & PP help get me close to it and for this reason I now accept these processes as part of my photography.

I have deliberately restricted my equipment to a body and lens that will allow me to pursue my photography as a much loved hobby (although due to recently losing my job as a victim of the credit cunch this is now my only option). This limit of equipment means I have the challenge of getting into the camera what I am seeing by getting more confident and aware of its limitations and abilities. It means I have to come up with solutions of how to achieve my photo challenges with limited resources.

Ultimately, what makes photography such a wonderful hobby for me is this constant challenge and looking around me at all the wonderful images I get to see each day. Whilst my photo's are for my pleasure it makes it so much better when out of the blue someone else take the time and effort to show some appreciation of your efforts even though they may be on the other side of the globe and totally unknown to you Link to a recent Example on flickr for me. This is my icing on the cake ......

I therefore disagree that extra equipment is needed to make a better photo if that is the case you don't know your equipment well enough and whilst photography is a hobby and not a profession you are recording a memory for yourself .... possibly? Whilst I would like additional lenses/equip for specialist ideas I have, these will wait untill I have exhausted all the possible solutions to getting these shots with the equipment I have at hand.

If you have equipment sat on a shelf or lost in a cupboard then this surely proves it wasn't needed .... dig it out as a challenge to yourself and go out and use it ..... rather than buying a new bit of kit. You know you deserve it.:thumbs:
 
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