I miss the omission of the ?????

[Phil V]

In all seriousness though... what would constitute awesome wedding photography? It almost certainly isn't technical in nature, that much I can be certain of... so yes, as you say, the medium you shoot on is irrelevant in this regard.

All I'm saying is that digital is easy... and hence boring as a process. I reckon that's why so many people are enamoured, and utterly reliant on processing. The actual photography is as dull as dish water. Take processing away and I reckon most amateurs would just chuck the towel in.

I was about to say that no awesome photography was technical in nature, but I think some digital / photoshop compositing is awesome and that really is a technical pursuit (based on artistic vision though).

I'm happy that modern cameras have made photography easier, because it has actually improved the quality of social photography, no longer is the lack of technical ability a barrier, so now more creative people get to have a play. Just being able to focus and expose used to be enough to get regular bookings, and now that's not the case.

 

[Terrywoodenpic]

Ii 7

Grammar police alert...

Is it too late to point out the thread title is a borderline double negative (ambiguous)...
I regret the omission of...
I miss the addition of...

And that the elipse is more suitable than multiple question marks.

Back on topic.

We all know that Digital FF is better quality than 35mm, but obviously bigger film is better, however if anyone wants to think that 35mm film is quirky to use, don't even think about getting decent scans of 120 film or larger. Or even picking up your own enlarger that size.

I'm with Dave on this (almost), yes it was magical watching a print materialise, but what a load of hassle to get there. sitting in a comfy chair looking at a computer screen listening to good music and drinking coffee is my idea of photo processing.

I tend to use the ellipsis rather too much... but it does not indicate a question...
multiple question marks are perhaps unnecessary??? ugly but harmless.

 

[Terrywoodenpic]

I've only recently started developing film, but I prefer the smell of fresh ground coffee...

Besides, I don't think Col Kilgore would have said 'fixer'

Better to drink as well

 

[Phil V]

Ii 7



I tend to use the ellipsis rather too much... but it does not indicate a question...
multiple question marks are perhaps unnecessary, ugly but harmless.

I'm not sure the title is a question as such,

I too might be accused of the overuse of an ellipsis

 

[Terrywoodenpic]

In all seriousness though... what would constitute awesome wedding photography? It almost certaphotography t technical in nature, that much I can be certain of... so yes, as you say, the medium you shoot on is irrelevant in this regard.

All I'm saying is that digital is easy... and hence boring as a process. I reckon that's why so many people are enamoured, and utterly reliant on processing. The actual photography is as dull as dish water. Take processing away and I reckon most amateurs would just chuck the towel in.

I have never experienced photography that did not involve any post capture work of some kind to complete it. Just as I have never been involved in phototgraphy that did not involve preplanning and at least a reasonable amount of thought.
Photographic techiniques have never been difficult, but they have always required skills, practice and understanding.

 

[Pookeyhead]

I have never experienced photography that did not involve any post capture work of some kind to complete it.

As usual, people are choosing to misinterpret what I say. I'm not suggesting "processing" is unnecessary, nor am I suggesting there was a golden age where nothing in the darkroom influenced the final outcome. I'm suggesting it has now become the most important part... the part where the image is MADE for most amateurs. Amateurs now, would no more show their raw files than they would show their genitals. However, back in the film days, many a fantastic image was a straight print with nothing done to it... unless you class choosing a grade of paper as having something done to it. Of course, just as many were masterfully printed to enhance the image even further. Nowadays.... it's just moving sliders around mostly, which gives a generic, cookie cutter look to the vast majority of imagery you see in the public domain.

 

[Ed Sutton]

I'm suggesting it has now become the most important part... the part where the image is MADE for most amateurs.

I'm not so sure it's a digital phenomenon. I seem to remember the photo mags back in my early days (late 1970s/early '80s) containing plenty of composite photos and other kinds of technically manipulated crap. It might not have been done in the darkroom, Cokin was to blame for a lot of it. Starburst filter or tobacco grad anyone?

 

[Blank_Canvas]

As usual, people are choosing to misinterpret what I say. I'm not suggesting "processing" is unnecessary, nor am I suggesting there was a golden age where nothing in the darkroom influenced the final outcome. I'm suggesting it has now become the most important part... the part where the image is MADE for most amateurs. Amateurs now, would no more show their raw files than they would show their genitals. However, back in the film days, many a fantastic image was a straight print with nothing done to it... unless you class choosing a grade of paper as having something done to it. Of course, just as many were masterfully printed to enhance the image even further. Nowadays.... it's just moving sliders around mostly, which gives a generic, cookie cutter look to the vast majority of imagery you see in the public domain.

Just to add a bit of balance, there were also a great number of over or underexposed photographs taken, and also bit of heavy handed dodging and burning going on ! It wasn't all brilliant back then and it's important not to forget that. So in some respects perhaps nothing has changed? However, I do agree with you there was a good deal of great photographs about with very little required to be done in the printing stage.

 

[Blank_Canvas]

I'm not so sure it's a digital phenomenon. I seem to remember the photo mags back in my early days (late 1970s/early '80s) containing plenty of composite photos and other kinds of technically manipulated crap. It might not have been done in the darkroom, Cokin was to blame for a lot of it. Starburst filter or tobacco grad anyone?

You'll remember the heart shaped masks and couples superimposed on a wine glass then !

 

[Ed Sutton]

You'll remember the heart shaped masks and couples superimposed on a wine glass then !

Thanks a lot.... I'd forgotten them!

 

[Pookeyhead]

Just to add a bit of balance, there were also a great number of over or underexposed photographs taken, and also bit of heavy handed dodging and burning going on ! It wasn't all brilliant back then and it's important not to forget that.

Yep.. there were crap photographers back then too. Nowadays though, we have to the shadow recovery and exposure slider, and to hell with the noise Part of the problem is that you had to print your underexposed negs, and that taught you a lesson. Printing a horribly thin neg was awful... it taught you a lesson... as did trying to print a dense one.

 

[Ed Sutton]

I'm happy that modern cameras have made photography easier, because it has actually improved the quality of social photography, no longer is the lack of technical ability a barrier, so now more creative people get to have a play.

I think that applies across the board. I'm sure many visually aware and creative people flinch from technical procedures. Liberated from having to think about the technicalities they can get on with the important task of making pictures.

Nowadays though, we have to the shadow recovery and exposure slider, and to hell with the noise

But if the intended display medium is a (usually small) screen, and the noise isn't worrisome on that screen, there's no problem. The same applies to massive crops. The print as final output for photographs is not the current display form for most people, and the large print never has been. Not even for 'serious photographers'. The large print (A2 or larger) seems to be a modern trend possibly encouraged by advances in printing technology - such as inkjets and pigment inks!

 

[Pookeyhead]

But if the intended display medium is a (usually small) screen, and the noise isn't worrisome on that screen, there's no problem.

Until their 800 pixel JPEG wins them a competition, and they have to supply a 50MB TIFF.

 

[ianp5a]

Actually, there is no omission of anything, as 'most' of it is still all available. It's just that people choose the new, modern options. And it's these that omit some of the old benefits. People largely choose convenience, speed and ease of use.

If you make something easier to do, there will always be some that overdo it. But that does not mean that the ease of use is itself bad. And if it's someone's hobby, if it makes them happy, let them do what they choose.

 

[StephenM]

The print as final output for photographs is not the current display form for most people, and the large print never has been. Not even for 'serious photographers'. The large print (A2 or larger) seems to be a modern trend possibly encouraged by advances in printing technology - such as inkjets and pigment inks!

Is this the case? A2 is about 20"x16" and I recall a lot being written about prints of that size in the 1960s. I even recall quite a few articles on how to make large prints (which in context meant prints using the 3' wide rolls of paper, processed by the see saw method in home made troughs (or drain pipes!).

My print size has always been effectively as large as possible while retaining quality, which limited me to 10x8 when using 35mm film (12x16 prints were poor by comparison) and it was only when I moved the medium and large format that I was able to go larger. For me, this was a "modern trend" but it was more to do with the capabilities of the camera than any advances in printing technology. I'd have gone larger sooner if I'd used older equipment in fact.

 

[Ed Sutton]

5ft by 4ft prints seem to be the norm in the exhibitions of contemporary photography I go to look at. Yet 'vintage' prints by photographers from the sixties to eighties are often no more than 10 x 8 inches, 20x16 max - which seems 'small' these days.

 

[Terrywoodenpic]

5ft by 4ft prints seem to be the norm in the exhibitions of contemporary photography I go to look at. Yet 'vintage' prints by photographers from the sixties to eighties are often no more than 10 x 8 inches, 20x16 max - which seems 'small' these days.

As a working photographer from the late 50's and 60's It was my custom to make index prints 6 1/2 x 8 1/2 of everything. Clients saw nothing smaller than 10 x8. It was normal for me to print and process every thing myself in studio. Normal sizes included 12x10, 15x12, and 20x16. Display prints were more likely to be 20 x30. Sizes over that required oversize every thing, that few professional darkrooms could manage.
but were far from difficult to achieve. Even a 20x30 is not much of an enlargemen from 5x4. And still less from a 10 x8 negative. Quality issues of over enlargement did not arise. I never used 35mm as a professional format.
A majority of prints used on trade stands and the like, of what ever size, needed to have a union stamp before they could be exhibited. Many photographers, used union processing houses to produce them. Others like my self, joined associations like the master photographers association, which had registered itself as a trade union.
People today have little idea how restricting the union closed shop could be. The likes of modern freelances were frozen out almost completely. Because if you took shots for a buiseness they could never use them, with out that precious stamp.
Neither process houses, nor printers nor exhibition staff would touch them.
very many extremely large prints were made for exhibitions, but very few had a life beyond that exhibition, virtually none belonged to a photographer, they were ephemeral. ..

 

[Terrywoodenpic]

ìi

Yep.. there were crap photographers back then too. Nowadays though, we have to the shadow recovery and exposure slider, and to hell with the noise Part of the problem is that you had to print your underexposed negs, and that taught you a lesson. Prinremarkably horribly thin neg was awful... it taught you a lesson... as did trying to print a dense one.

Today even more than in the past, photographers have little idea how to define a correct exposure.
In the digital age it seems to have come to mean, to set an exposure that captures all possible tones, whether they are relavent to the final image or not. The actual exposure, tonal range, gamma, white and black points, are then deferred to the raw processing stage.
This is of course entirely practical in a remarkably large number of circumstances, but is unlikely to ever achieve the best quality image, especially in relation to noise and tonal values. Which are better considered and placed at the taking stage.

 

[Terrywoodenpic]

Seems to be some sort of split duplicate post.
i have deleted what i can.

 

[Blank_Canvas]

I used to love working with film but I was in my element in the darkroom. I don't have a darkroom these days and that's why I touch film anymore. I just can't can't see the point in developing films and then scanning negatives and processing them in Photoshop (may as well go 100% digital). That's just a bastardised process. I'm not knocking people who do. It's just that for me it's all or nothing.

 

[Ed Sutton]

...very many extremely large prints were made for exhibitions, but very few had a life beyond that exhibition, virtually none belonged to a photographer, they were ephemeral. ..

I wonder if we're talking about different kinds of photography and exhibition?

 

[Terrywoodenpic]

I wonder if we're talking about different kinds of photography and exhibition?

You made no distinction...
However few if any amateurs ever made prints larger than 20x16 in those days. Nor was it widely stocked.
competitions and exhibitions laid down the required parameters.
A packet of 10 sheets of 20x16 probably exceeded many amateurs budgets for the month.
Professionals like myself were under no such restiction and our purchases were free of purchase tax.

 

[Ed Sutton]

You made no distinction...

I didn't think there was one needed making.

But that's one of the problems with photography - it can be put to different purposes, and thought of differently, by different people.