Ken Rockwell and the popularity of film photography

Bill Burk · Aug 27, 2013

Ken Nadvornick said:
Just remember to leave off that final 's'. They already are plural...

Ken

That would work as well.

The paper, by the way, exaggerated the age of the show. It's only in its 5th year.

On another forum, I'm participating in a thread where the debate centers on the effectiveness of Selenium toning... Now the outcome of that thread will probably have lasting impact.

omaha · Aug 27, 2013

"oil vs watercolor"

Sifting through all this, that observation is the lasting impact of this thread for me.

blansky · Aug 27, 2013

Of course missing from this obsession is the real purpose of photography.

The actual subject.

So while all this emotion is spent on semantics, process, naming and outrage, if the subject sucks then who really cares.

It's like arguing and obsessing over what kind of sandals Jesus wore.

cliveh · Aug 27, 2013

blansky said:
Of course missing from this obsession is the real purpose of photography.

The actual subject.

So while all this emotion is spent on semantics, process, naming and outrage, if the subject sucks then who really cares.

It's like arguing and obsessing over what kind of sandals Jesus wore.

I think he probably wore the open toe variety.

ntenny · Aug 27, 2013

blansky said:
Of course missing from this obsession is the real purpose of photography.

The actual subject.

I feel quibbly this morning and Ken's already had his turn in the barrel so I'm gonna pick on you. What you say here is not at all universal, and my great-grandfather, who was basically a landscape pictorialist, more or less took my father out behind the barn when the latter had the nerve to suggest it. (He was a big advocate of the "it's about light" party line; personally I'd include line and composition as well.)

Or, to put it another way, ceci n'est pas une pipe. That's a painting, of course, but I think it says just about everything that can be said about the "purpose" of representational imagemaking in any medium.

It's like arguing and obsessing over what kind of sandals Jesus wore.

You just *know* somewhere there's a forum dedicated to exactly that. It's a kind of work-safe Rule 34...

-NT

Ken Nadvornick · Aug 27, 2013

blansky said:
Of course missing from this obsession is the real purpose of photography.

The actual subject.

So while all this emotion is spent on semantics, process, naming and outrage, if the subject sucks then who really cares.

From (there was a url link here which no longer exists)...

"It seems to me that most of the contributors here want to define it simply by how they use it."

"Because this is what I do with it, this is what it is. And the corollary, How could it possibly be anything else? Which inevitably leads to, Those guys don't know what they are talking about!"

What a thing is used for in no way definitively speaks to what it really is. Or how two things may differ. Lots of people successfully pound nails with the handle side of screwdrivers. That doesn't make a screwdriver a hammer.

Ken

markbarendt · Aug 27, 2013

Ken Nadvornick said:
What a thing is used for in no way definitively speaks to what it really is. Or how two things may differ. Lots of people successfully pound nails with the handle side of screwdrivers. That doesn't make a screwdriver a hammer.

Ken

So if I take a picture with a camera, put on a piece of paper, mount it in a frame, and put it on the wall; what should I call it.

Ken Nadvornick · Aug 27, 2013

markbarendt said:
So if I take a picture with a camera, put on a piece of paper, mount it in a frame, and put it on the wall; what should I call it.

A photograph?

Ken

blansky · Aug 27, 2013

If photography is not about the subject then why don't blind people make more photographs for other blind people?

markbarendt · Aug 27, 2013

Ken Nadvornick said:
A photograph?

Ken

Does it matter what tools get it from scene to wall?

MatthewDunn · Aug 27, 2013

blansky said:
If photography is not about the subject then why don't blind people make more photographs for other blind people?

I was just thinking that this thread didn't have enough petty bickering as it is and that we needed to start throwing innocent people under the bus to make our point...

Roger Cole · Aug 27, 2013

markbarendt said:
So if I take a picture with a camera, put on a piece of paper, mount it in a frame, and put it on the wall; what should I call it.

Ken Nadvornick said:
A photograph?

Ken

Well you could certainly call it an "image" or a "print." From there it diverges a bit. I suppose given currently accepted usage you could certainly call it a "photograph" just as either an oil or water color is a painting, to use my analogy above.

markbarendt said:
Does it matter what tools get it from scene to wall?

It does to some of us, doesn't to others.

Chris Lange · Aug 27, 2013

At what point does the validity argument end? This discussion is more pedantic than a sophomore art-history course on contemporary art.

"But what is art?"

"Is the chair art?"

"Well it could be art to someone..."

"If it's a handmade chair...but not from a factory."

"But by that logic then Andy Warhol..."

We put pictures on paper. That's about it.

The argument isn't what car you took, or how many gears it has, or even if it has a funny procedure necessary to switch between them... but if the destination was worth the drive.

Chris Lange · Aug 27, 2013

N.B.

The whole mystique of FILM IS ART is bullshit, and an argument that would have been universally swatted down in a moments notice 15 years ago. One must remind oneself from time to time that our exclusive little club used to have everyone and their mother as members.

Roger Cole · Aug 27, 2013

I don't read anyone saying that film is (necessarily) art or that digital (necessarily) isn't - that's a huge straw man. Either can be, either might not be. My position is simply that they are different arts, albeit that can also be merged in mixed media relatively easily.

And for some of us driving is the point, not the destination. Not so much here in the suburbs of metro Atlanta but when I lived in Tennessee, and still when I go back to visit, I'd often enough just go driving in the mountains with no destination in mind, wind through some curves, feel the air through the sunroof and windows, run through the gears and end up exactly where I left never having stopped along my big loop. I'm far from alone in doing that sometimes.

Chris Lange · Aug 27, 2013

Roger, I totally agree...I think the same logic applies to going for a nice walk in the early evening...

But I don't think that sort of logic applies at all when discussing the "real" (haha) Fine Art (capital F and capital A) world.

Ken Nadvornick · Aug 27, 2013

markbarendt said:
Does it matter what tools get it from scene to wall?

That depends on each individual, and whether any of the obvious differences between the two tool sets matter to them.

For example...

If 'blansky' manages to tame the newborn and creates a stunningly insightful portrait, Mom isn't going care how that scene made it to her wall. As far as she's concerned, she's thrilled and 'blansky' is a freakin' genius.

However, if Ken has finally decided to spend $10,000* to buy that vintage Ansel Adams Clearing Winter Storm that he always wanted, it's probably going to make a BIG difference to him how that scene made it to his wall. The process differences between the hand-made-by-Ansel-in-1980 version and a negative-scan-and-inkjet-in-2013 version could not be more meaningful.

In the first example, process could not be more irrelevant. In the second example, process could not be more critical. But in both examples, the core differences between the two photographic processes do still exist. That's a fact that is not open to interpretation.

As noted earlier, one does not dunk CCDs into D-76 in order to extract images...

Ken

* or whatever, I didn't actually Google it...

Klainmeister · Aug 27, 2013

Now Ken, what if Ansel had been alive and scanned in the neg, did the print, signed the back. Would it then still matter as much?

cliveh · Aug 27, 2013

Meanwhile, poor old ken Rockwell doesn't know what he started.

Ken Nadvornick · Aug 27, 2013

Klainmeister said:
Now Ken, what if Ansel had been alive and scanned in the neg, did the print, signed the back. Would it then still matter as much?

I dunno'. That never happened. Maybe it would have, or maybe not.

If pigs had wings, would the phrase "rolling around in the mud" with them have any meaning?

Ken

Ken Nadvornick · Aug 27, 2013

My $10,000 wants the original AA version, because the differences in the two processes matter to me. What matters to you... is up to you.

Of course, YMMV...

And my original issue wasn't tactility. It was provenance, in the sense of direct linkage between the subject and the medium used to record it. This provenance is asserted by the fact that the process underlying it when using film is real-world, not abstract.

Ken

MatthewDunn · Aug 27, 2013

It seems like a lot of people are twisting Ken's argument into what they want it to be and then proceeding to knock down their own modified version.

Personally, I think both analog and digital are "photography", they both can be "art", and they are equally capable of creating compelling, emotional images. I truly believe that. Having said that, the processes of getting there are not the same. They may feel similar and they may be trying to accomplish the same thing for the same purpose, but at a step-by-step process level, I think the considerations that go into the image-making are just different.

That may be a distinction without a difference to some and if all you care about is the end-product and whether it is compelling, emotional, honest, etc., than that is fine - a completely valid perspective. But I think it's hard to make an argument that the processes are not, if nothing more than at a physical, "what you actually do" level (i.e. stand in a darkroom vs. sit at a computer), different.

Ken Nadvornick · Aug 27, 2013

MatthewDunn said:
It seems like a lot of people are twisting Ken's argument into what they want it to be and then proceeding to knock down their own modified version.

Could not agree more with you (and Loretta...).

I sit here in stunned astonishment at my inability to get across the exasperatingly simple concept* that the two processes are not the same. This is the most fascinating display of human nature I may have ever seen.

And almost as astonishing to me is the fact that this conversation is taking place on one of the world's preeminent analog film discussion forums. And probably THE preeminent darkroom forum on the planet.

If EVER one would have thought the concept of different (not better, not worse, just different) would have resonated, one would have expected it to resonate here.

But I guess not...

Ken

* CCDs versus D-76, for gawd's sake. Think really, really hard about that for just a moment...

Roger Cole · Aug 27, 2013

I think it mostly does resonate here Ken. But most of us just nod silently. The ones who don't agree are more apt to speak up. That seems true in most things.

MatthewDunn · Aug 27, 2013

Ken Nadvornick said:
Could not agree more with you (and Loretta...).I sit here in stunned astonishment at my inability to get across the exasperatingly simple concept* that the two processes are not the same.

Fortunately, I don't think it has anything to do with that. I think this thread has become an outlet for a harmless argument that won't go quietly into the good night because it is the very process of arguing (as opposed to the actual intellectual point of the argument) that has become fulfilling. Does anyone in this thread *honestly* care whether someone on the internet whose name you do not know and whom you will never meet in real life think that what you do is or is not photography? If so, I might suggest you have more significant problems that you need to attend to.

This is about getting frustration and anxiety out in an anonymous way and without consequence. You can't (or at least shouldn't) kick the dog or beat your kids or your wife, but hey, yelling on the internet...sure. Oh, and could I get a side of "faux righteous indignation" every time someone doesn't agree with me?

Ken Rockwell and the popularity of film photography

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