Idiots!!!

Stephen Frizza · Mar 21, 2010

Something that is a pet hate of mine is when digital photographers try to make their images replicate traditional techniques and fail, over the years ive seen stupid things like "digital cyanotype"....errr no thats a blue inkjet!
I see minilab prints with full bleed from colour images but the bleed is always pure black and always identical frame to frame...its a shitty template Ive seen shop windows with pictures showing film rebate which makes no sense for the format that has been shot. and this morning on the news there was a segment about Hollywood and the image that came across the screen was a film strip with colour images but the digital retoucher had TMY rebate.... I feel like screaming when i see it. People should do some homework before trying to replicate traditional photographic looks. Its as bad as watching a movie set in the 1700's and seeing an extra in it wearing sun glasses or a wrist watch.Who else here gets frustrated by these things? whats the worst you have seen? and did u say or do anything about it? I see the handy work of these idiots every day.

nickandre · Mar 21, 2010

I once saw a slide film simulation where the frame number replaced the sprocket hole...

lxdude · Mar 21, 2010

Something I've seen on newsmagazine shows here in the US like Dateline NBC. When they want to portray something as having happened in the past using "re-enactment", or older actual videotape of something, they like to overlay it to make it look like scratchy, spotty, really dirty, film camera footage. That drives me nuts. It just accentuates the "infotainment" aspect and degrades any sense of serious journalism. One guy on Dateline, Keith Morrison, uses tone of voice to imply who the dishonest/guilty/lying/etc. party is. Very scummy.

When my television died last year I didn't replace it. I'm better off without the dreck and drivel on TV these days. If there's something truly newsworthy, I can watch it online, anyway.

David Grenet · Mar 21, 2010

I'm with you there - my favorite is when they photoshop in a rebate and leave the EXIF data showing it was shot with a dslr. Or that time an oversaturated colour image had an ACROS rebate...

SchwinnParamount · Mar 21, 2010

I used to be disgusted but now I'm just amused. I'm not laughing with the idiots, I'm laughing at them. Life is too short to waste anxiety over idiocy.

photomem · Mar 21, 2010

The other day a "professional master photographer" handed me his business card. It had a film strip of color images across the background, complete with a Tri-X film strip rebate. I couldn't help it, I looked at him then started laughing. I wish I wouldn't have given him the card back.. so I could scan it and post it here.

markbarendt · Mar 21, 2010

I gotta giggle when somebody uses an HP5 35mm template for color shots.

lns · Mar 21, 2010

It doesn't bother me at all. I consider it a tribute to the medium of film. It must seem to these folks that it makes their work seem more classically photographic, or maybe just more serious. Anyway, film photographers for years have used darkroom techniques and manipulations to present their work in a certain way. So I'm kind of live and let live about it. I can't go around telling artists how they should make art.

Anyway, it's better than HDR color work, which hurts my eyes and I'm sure damages my brain.

-Laura

ChrisC · Mar 21, 2010

It doesn't bother me any more than giving me a slight chuckle, but the one thing that comes to mind was flicking through a men's fashion magazine a few months back. There was a series of about 8 images that still had all their 120 edge markings left around them, only they were all the same frame number. Either the photographer had incredible luck with frame number 7, or he/the editor is just really lazy.

For me it's just like spotting spelling mistakes in a publication. It's nothing more than amusing.

L Gebhardt · Mar 21, 2010

I agree, especially when it's for a news story. I feel if they doctor the images up with fake rebates, what else have they changed or distorted in the images. If I find lots of spelling or grammar errors I can't help but wonder how many factual errors also slipped by.

Drifter · Mar 22, 2010

The stupidest (or perhaps funniest) I've seen are the fake Polaroids - fake Type 55's and the dreaded Polardroid.

Steve Roberts · Mar 22, 2010

It seems to me that this "make it like film" nonsense very often starts at the point when the photograph is taken and an electronic noise attempts to replicate the noise made by the focal plane shutter and mirror clatter of a good old fashioned analogue SLR.

railwayman3 · Mar 22, 2010

lxdude said:
Something I've seen on newsmagazine shows here in the US like Dateline NBC. When they want to portray something as having happened in the past using "re-enactment", or older actual videotape of something, they like to overlay it to make it look like scratchy, spotty, really dirty, film camera footage. That drives me nuts. It just accentuates the "infotainment" aspect and degrades any sense of serious journalism. One guy on Dateline, Keith Morrison, uses tone of voice to imply who the dishonest/guilty/lying/etc. party is. Very scummy.

When my television died last year I didn't replace it. I'm better off without the dreck and drivel on TV these days. If there's something truly newsworthy, I can watch it online, anyway.

The artificial "scratchiness" on old or simulated old film is one of my annoyances too......real scratchiness or damage to old film or photos is a FAULT of later handling, when you see a properly restored old film or photo it's amazing how good the oldtime photographers and film-makers were.

(I agree on your TV comment as well, my set is 18 years old and watched less than an hour in a typical week....too many other interests and hobbies...)

Ken N · Mar 22, 2010

Oh, I thought you were going to talk about digital B&W prints. The surface gloss differential is enough to drive me batty.

Videbaek · Mar 23, 2010

I'm with those who are mildly amused when seeing lazy digital simulation work -- whether of film negative edges or Poladroids or ersatz vintage-1890 photos or whatever. There's always been plenty of lazy, bad work, professional or otherwise, done with analogue photography going right back to the beginning. I guess, overall, I'm just very disappointed with how computers are used to produce imagery, photographic or otherwise. How many times have I read "Absolutely ANYTHING can be done now by bringing together computers and photography". Surely this is true, but mostly one sees clunky photo collage. Two areas of "digital art" that are growing all the time, which I loathe above all: "surrealist" photo collage and trying to make a photo look like a painting. Occasionally done with some skill but morphing a nude female figure into a teapot with a Mondrian bowler hat hovering overhead makes mockery of the whole thing (it's usually something like that), and Photoshop layering of luminosity curves and saturation curves and adding a craquelure layer does not make a photo look anything like a painting, at least not to those who have seen some real paintings and admire good painting. The only really skilled digital photo collage and post-processing work I've seen has been in high-end global advertising. Some of the top global ad agencies have people with both the skills and the eye to bring it off. The best digital photo collage I've seen was a print ad campaign for DIESEL. The thing is that the basic talents and skills -- drawing, painting, composition and design, colour understanding, and just plain getting good visual ideas -- are just as important as they've always been. The computer can be a great tool in the creative process but can't substitute for the basic skills.

Loris Medici · Mar 23, 2010

Videbaek said:
...
morphing a nude female figure into a teapot with a Mondrian bowler hat hovering overhead
...

Magritte?

Ross Chambers · Mar 23, 2010

railwayman3 said:
The artificial "scratchiness" on old or simulated old film is one of my annoyances too......real scratchiness or damage to old film or photos is a FAULT of later handling, when you see a properly restored old film or photo it's amazing how good the oldtime photographers and film-makers were.

I've had experience with two motion picture labs undertaking the "aging" of film. One, in Australia, just tossed it on the floor and then ran it past a scratching device.

The other, in New Zealand, contrived to shrink the emulsion chemically, damaged sprocket holes so that the image jumped about in the frame, made visibly bad in frame splices, and a few other tricks as well.

Guess who works for Weta, Wingnut and Peter Jackson? And knows his medium and craft? And has shot wet collodion? And is a Kiwi?

Regards - Ross

darkosaric · Mar 23, 2010

Once I have shown beautiful Lith print on Foma MG paper to colleague at work - and he told me "I can do this in PS, even better". I replied: make a print and bring it ... still waiting for print

Black Dog · Mar 23, 2010

Clunk click....every trip!

Steve Roberts said:
It seems to me that this "make it like film" nonsense very often starts at the point when the photograph is taken and an electronic noise attempts to replicate the noise made by the focal plane shutter and mirror clatter of a good old fashioned analogue SLR.

That one cracks me up too hehehehe:munch:

Shawn Dougherty · Mar 23, 2010

darkosaric said:
I replied: make a print and bring it ... still waiting for print

That seems to be the norm with photography. Someone claims "I can do this that and the other"... but when you ask to see prints somehow they never have any...

lxdude · Mar 23, 2010

I have a shot from 1975 which shows a black cat lying on its side side on a red shag rug looking at the camera. The red bedspread on the bed it was lying next to is reflected in one eye, making that eye appear red. People used to say it was a cool shot, and ask how I got it, to which I would reply, "Anticipate it and watch for it to happen". Now, all I get is how easy it is to do that in post processing. All I can say in response is that they just don't get it.
The biggest problem I have with the ease of manipulation these days is how it's assumed that's how something's done, and people miss out on the realization that what they're looking at really happened.

vanourek · Mar 23, 2010

Awww ... shit ...

vanourek · Mar 23, 2010

And this ...

lxdude · Mar 23, 2010

[[[shudder]]]

Mainecoonmaniac · Mar 23, 2010

Don't be so harsh. Imitation is the sincerest for of flattery. Obviously digital processes leave people cold and folks are trying to mimic an analog look. They're looking for more of an organic look would be my guess. They're looking for the perfect flaw. It's the difference the two process is like tasting saccharin while sugar is better.

Idiots!!!

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