Mentioning Traditional Photography On The Web

Flotsam said:

I guess the fact that I actually am a boring, luddite elitist takes the sting out of that particular insult

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I guess the fact that I actually am a boring, modernist egalitarian means that I've been posting to the wrong forum all along.

"Plattenwürdigkeit"?

The one thing I didn’t see mentioned was this. Digital is devaluing images. Why? Well rather then art being produced where someone keeps it for years on end digital have made photographs nothing more than wall art.

Someone’s buy a print for $20 the artist feel they made a good profit because hey it only cost me $2 bucks to print it on the ink printer, and a few months later it goes in the trash and more wall art they buy to replace it cheaply. Photographs are now becoming nothing more than posters with no value and this is also going into the painting world with digital oil painting. Total crap.

WE are losing more than people not using film any more we are losing the arts, the tradition, etc… And this digital garbage won’t last. HD crash, gone, CD scratched, images gone, etc…

Ink? Ink is not stable it does not last and there test are a joke. Their tests are done in labs with method to try and simulate aging. BW has been around for years and those images are still here. Color on the other hand has faded, and they are trying to say ink will out last a silver print?

Ok yeah right. Not everyone is an idiot like consumer Joe. Sick that people no longer research anything and takes what the TV or ADS say as the Gospel. Sick.

Oh yeah if it is in the paper is has got to be turn. We don’t need to think for ourselves anymore.

Well it is just sad and it really pisses me off, but oh well this is a society of a bunch of dumb down people with no regards to anything as long as they can get it now. Quality? Forgot about it they don’t care. All they want is more more more and screw quality.

I got a call the other day to cover a Wedding, first thing I was asked after I explained what I do was, “Well how many pictures do I get and how many on the CD?” I replied, I guess you are into quantity and not quality, you called the wrong person good day.

It is almost to the point where it is not worth doing anymore as I will not try to compete with the guy down the street that will do volume wedding for $800-1000 a pop and give everything away. These idiots make the industry as well have no value as now anyone with a digi cam can shoot a wedding. Sure the Bride and Groom are pissed after the fact but hey, they got what they deserved. You get what you play for regardless of what the masses think.

I am sick of this mentality. Digital has done a number on just more than the arts.

Sucks!

Just my two cents.

It's easy to get down about it that's for sure. The biggest glimmer of hope that I've had in a long time was that photojournalist interview. He explained that since everyone was using the same digital cameras all the images looked identical. So he reverted back to a Graflex and film and now he's in serious demand. This says to me that the digital art bubble will eventually burst..

The online photographic community is a very depressing place at times for those who don't capture images in 0's and 1's. I however consider APUG and and film to be the Prozac of the modern photographic era and the enlarger is my shrink!

Sean I'm with you on that one. Also with my wedding work, I've totally restructured so I am in no way competing with digital wedding photographers. The get less images for more money, but hey, what they get is highly quality controlled and prints that a digital photographer can not reproduce. Sure I may have cut out most of the market but I'm very happy to work with a small number of clients that really appreciate my style of work, my finished images and hand-made one-off albums the run-of-the-mill can not provide.

Sean I'm always happy to spread the APUG word.
Well done on a great site: "The University of APUG" where on-campus life is thriving!

Nicole Boenig-McGrade said:

Sure I may have cut out most of the market but I'm very happy to work with a small number of clients that really appreciate my style of work, my finished images and hand-made one-off albums the run-of-the-mill can not provide.

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There are always those whose primary concern is quality; it is much more satisfying to work with these type of people in the long run.

Robert

Sean said:

I went hunting for it but can't get past the full page animated cellphone digicam ads. ouch, when did they start doing that?

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There was a recent thread discussing this on photo.net. In part of the thread, one poster made disparaging remarks about apug because the galleries are only for subscribers. Different people have different tastes.

Personally, I find the animated university of pheonix ads totally distracting, along with the nokia ads. Every time I see them, I think of when KEH showed up with a banner ad that was too yellow. Very different styles.

Just so that no one takes this wrong--photo.net is a damned good site. I have my reasons to prefer APUG, but I have no problem understanding why people prefer photo.net.

Matt

While we learn that the public really wants instant images rather than 'quality' and we possibly become discouraged, let us also remember that painters had similar laments when photography came into the public area. We are the technologists that painters resented as much as we might resent digital. The difference between digital and analog is not (at first) as profound as photography was to painting, but it will become profoundly different soon enough. More shocks are in store, and that is a GOOD thing because the greater the difference, the more liberated analog photography will become. Inherent limits are important. Love the limits because it leads to depths while the new technology spreads over the public like a microthin oil slick.

Painting is still alive and well! It has moved into heady areas that many photographers did not understand when photography became widely possible. Most photographers still do not understand painting. I am not suggesting that photography should be more painterly-like, but more analog photography-like!

Finally, just because a technology such as analog photography has been a professional endeavor for over a hundred years is no reason it should continue to thrive. Wedding and product photographers are early casualties. Persons on those areas might want to reconsider their aspirations and either specialize (as several here have already noted) or find a different line of work and make art, high-craft instead - or not.

Revel in analog's differences, not digital's likeness.

Pixelographers who are critical of analoge sites and photography usually are having a problem justifying the computer aided aspect of their medium. I have said before that I believe that a craft involves hands on making of the piece. Digital cameras, photoshop, and inkjet printers are a conveinent process but certainly not craft. If there was no analogue processes to compare their efforts to, they could lose the guilt they feel over using what is 90% a computer process.

As I have argued before (but am usually shouted down) we need to work to seperate digital from analogue in the minds of consumers of prints and galleries. First we need to stop using the term digital photography. Digital consists of the manipulation of pixels and data bits. Yes, light energizes the ccd chip into 1s and 0s but from that point on it is all computer driven.
The final product is a pixelgraph, produced from tansfering data bits to the printer.

So I encourage the use of the term pixelography or digtal pixelogphy when refering to digtial imaging processes.

Second we need to emphasize the difference in processes to consumers. One is a computer process and the other a hands on craft.

Third we need to counter every myth about analogue that appears in print or on the internet. The ones about dark smelly darkrooms, pollution from traditional, and the totally unproven (except by questionable acceleration tests) claims of longevity of inkjet prints.

Does this make me an elitist snob? I don't know. Others I am sure will let me know. But the more we can seperate pixelography from traditional the sooner analogue and alternative processes will be considered unique valuable and collectable art and craft.

I was banned from www.toxpose.com for raising the issue of digital images being mixed in with film images.
I dared to say seperate forums would be a better way to go because then those looking for information on digital techniques and those looking for traditional techniques would find things more easily. The forum began life as a Lomo forum, but the 'admins' and their little clique of buddies have all recently bought Nikon DSLRs and wanted to use those rather than their Lomo cameras ie. Holga, Lomo etc.
I was a member of that site for nearly 2 years and they banned me for objecting to digital overload on an ostensibly film site. I was called a luddite, an elitist, a stubborn old man... and those are just the things I care to repeat!


Needless to say it is now just another boring digital site with all the usual photoshopped rubbish.

Jim Chinn said:

Pixelographers who are critical of analoge sites and photography usually are having a problem justifying the computer aided aspect of their medium. I have said before that I believe that a craft involves hands on making of the piece. Digital cameras, photoshop, and inkjet printers are a conveinent process but certainly not craft. If there was no analogue processes to compare their efforts to, they could lose the guilt they feel over using what is 90% a computer process.

As I have argued before (but am usually shouted down) we need to work to seperate digital from analogue in the minds of consumers of prints and galleries. First we need to stop using the term digital photography. Digital consists of the manipulation of pixels and data bits. Yes, light energizes the ccd chip into 1s and 0s but from that point on it is all computer driven.
The final product is a pixelgraph, produced from tansfering data bits to the printer.

So I encourage the use of the term pixelography or digtal pixelogphy when refering to digtial imaging processes.

Second we need to emphasize the difference in processes to consumers. One is a computer process and the other a hands on craft.

Third we need to counter every myth about analogue that appears in print or on the internet. The ones about dark smelly darkrooms, pollution from traditional, and the totally unproven (except by questionable acceleration tests) claims of longevity of inkjet prints.

Does this make me an elitist snob? I don't know. Others I am sure will let me know. But the more we can seperate pixelography from traditional the sooner analogue and alternative processes will be considered unique valuable and collectable art and craft.

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Well Jim, be prepared to get into some flame wars. If you do, just remember to ask them if they are willing to send you and ink jet print so you can put it on a window where the sun hits it directly for 30 days right next to your silver print, that usually shuts them up.

OTOH, IMO it is a loosing battle. More and more people are converting to digital and nothing you can say will persuade them they have made the best desicion. We have had this kind of dicussions in the LF forum and in the end nothing ever changes and they continue to assert their prints will last for hundreds of years.

Since you mentioned painting...
Its so sad to see painters still using oils and brushes and canvases and two thousand year old techniques! Its horrible that people still draw with pencils and charcoal! How can it be possible than watercolors and eucaustics still exist! Its maddening that there are sculptors in 2005 that use such passe tools such as knives, chisels and their hands! Clay! Stone! How can someone get dirty and grow blisters from sculpting! I can't believe that musicians still use analog instruments! Why, pianos are still be played and guitars have strings! What happened to digital synthesizers? I thought they would replace every instrument...

What is really strange is that people comment and critise an artist's choice of materials and tools. Imagine talking with a painter and calling him names because you don't approve of his tools. It takes balls to do that and unless you got them don't.

I use whatever godamned tool I want to create my art and whatever process I desire, so if you don't like my work, that's fine. If you don't like my tools, then you better have some balls to say that in my face, otherwise go f**k yourself. I like my Hasselblad to eat film and that's it.

hortense said:

"Plattenwürdigkeit"?

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Plattenwürdigkeit = worthy of a photographic plate

What is really sad and confusing is that many years ago a company called Fractal Designs introduced their "Painter" software that allows people to mimick all sorts of paint media from oils to watercolors using their computer. And yet for some reason, there are still a bunch of stick-in-the-mud elitists that actually go out and buy paint and brushes and put sloppy, smelly paint on canvas by hand.
I think that I will go to a web site devoted to oil painting and demand that they stop using an out of date technology.

I find the digital camp usually argues that "the final image"; is all that matters. They say the process is only a means to an end. But in reality they are just as concerned with the proccess as we are (they just don't like to admit it).

I'm finding it increasingly hard to mention the word traditional photography on the net anymore. If you do, be prepared to get flamed..."

I think that happens whenever you mention a diametrically opposed point-of-view on a website dedicated to one type of photography (or philosophy). If you mention digital photography in a positive manner on this website you get flamed or told to leave the site as it's not a digitally oriented site - so, I see the SAME attitude from both types of sites.

Either way, it's unfortunate, because the real goal should be producing interesting images, not worship of equipment, technologies, or processes.

I was a bit disturbed this weekend when a long time friend called and said that Jobo Fototechnic is closing their U.S. analog equipment distribution. While I don't have a lot of Jobo equipment, the elimination of one more source for equipment potentially makes producing work in my darkroom even more challenging.

The flip side, for me, is the release of a new series of large format printers from Epson with a Dmax and color gamut that is larger than can be produced with color wet darkroom processes. I have a new option in producing work that I've had a difficult time doing to my satisfaction in a wet darkroom (large scale, color matched, multiple images on a single sheet).

I don't think any one method or processes is fundamentally better than another, there is only the correct one that fits the image and artist's intent - whether it's a silver, platinum, inkjet, or other type of print.

A good photograph will be just that regardless of the process. The process should be that one which is best for the image - and not an end goal itself.

As for longevity issues, etc., anyone who has those concerns should not work in color to begin with. The "best" color materials (whether you define it as dye transfer, Ilfochrome, etc.) have a long way to go to even approach black and white longevity.

However, I will make the observation, that pigment ink technologies have the potential to match ink printing of other printed color art such as lithographs, woodblocks, and monotypes for longevity and color fastness.

Why do we all (film and digital alike) care so much?? Why are we all so threatened either way? LF guys sometimes shake their heads at 35mm only users. D70 users laugh at people who get off on their digital phone images.

I think Coke drinkers are Luddites... Pepsi is clearly the better beverage.. But Rum and cokes taste better.. So I guess it is about the finished product. I've tried digital. My work looks rediculous. Click, click, go back, click, go back, try this, nope, don't like it, try this filter, nope, thats ugly and I end up with crap.... And I get agitated and anxious and I surf the web in between filters and clone stamping and I am easily distracted... So, I go back to the darkroom where I am comfortable and at ease, where I can make MY art. My images.. Where things make sense. Where my hands are never, ever quite dry. Where I have a wet spot in my pants from hangin a towel through my pocket. Luddite? I'm 30 years old and drive a Volkswagon and Burn hundreds and hundreds of DVD's every month. I play video games with my 8 year old and I can still beat him. I listen to Hip Hop, metal, techno and everything young and dumb and "hip" on my Ipod. I eat Tofu cocoa krispies all in the same meal. I cuss, drink, smoke, and engage in premarital sex as often as I can and I refuse to wear pleated pants. I am a LUDDITE? Okay..

I could be the only film guy left in the world and I would still be doing it because its the only way I can do it.

steve said:

The flip side, for me, is the release of a new series of large format printers from Epson with a Dmax and color gamut that is larger than can be produced with color wet darkroom processes.

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I wouldn't be too sure of this, the new Fuji Crystal Archive Type II is quite impressive. Epson has made similar claims before, and they haven't panned out. Don't get me wrong, I plan on getting a R2400 myself.

A good photograph will be just that regardless of the process.

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See, this is exactly where many of us disagree, a good photograph will be enhanced by the process used IMO. I choose my subjects to fit my process as well as my vision, my prints do not look the same on silver and I am sure would nto look the same on ink jet. The totality of the print should include the process, and not just say well what matters is only the end product.

Jorge said:

See, this is exactly where many of us disagree, a good photograph will be enhanced by the process used IMO. I choose my subjects to fit my process as well as my vision, my prints do not look the same on silver and I am sure would nto look the same on ink jet. The totality of the print should include the process, and not just say well what matters is only the end product.

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I find it interesting that you deliberately did not use the second half of the thought involved in order to make a point. Half a thought is just that and used only for your advantage. But let's continue anyway since you seem to totally misunderstand my point.

Perhaps if I explained it a bit further you would see we really mean the same thing. I am certainly not saying that you can transport images across print processess without careful consideration of changing the entire aesthetic of the image.

If you work in a certain print process, and choose your workflow - camera (digital or analog) film, developer, etc., etc., to match the image production method; then that is the "best way" to produce the image. The entire process has been used to enhance the final image.

This is no different than any other area of art. If I'm making a lithograph, I have a large range of materials to choose from. Stones, plates, crayons, pencils, solvent washes, water washes, inks, varnishes, papers, etc. A change of anyone of those can totally alter the final print. So you must match the production choices to the artistic intent.

Photography is exactly the same. There are hundreds of tools, techniques, and choices that must be made to present the image in the best way possible. The image is not the process it is a product of the processes.

In one sense, the viewer does "see the process" in that a successful image is the culmination of the workflow that created the image. What I reject is the idea that one type of workflow is somehow inherently superior to another just because of the methods involved - and by that stricture alone images produced by the self-defined "lesser" methods are, therefore, inferior images.

To me, if the final image is the best emodiment of the artist's intent, that is the correct method to use - without thought to analog or digital.

arigram said:

Since you mentioned painting...
Its so sad to see painters still using oils and brushes and canvases and two thousand year old techniques! Its horrible that people still draw with pencils and charcoal!

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It's even worse than that! Any painter today can get Prussian Blue! Why in my day, one had to apply to the Guild to get that color. If they didn't approve of your work, no blue!

...well, in a past life, maybe.

steve said:

I find it interesting that you deliberately did not use the second half of the thought involved in order to make a point. Half a thought is just that and used only for your advantage. But let's continue anyway since you seem to totally misunderstand my point.

Perhaps if I explained it a bit further you would see we really mean the same thing. I am certainly not saying that you can transport images across print processess without careful consideration of changing the entire aesthetic of the image.

If you work in a certain print process, and choose your workflow - camera (digital or analog) film, developer, etc., etc., to match the image production method; then that is the "best way" to produce the image. The entire process has been used to enhance the final image.

This is no different than any other area of art. If I'm making a lithograph, I have a large range of materials to choose from. Stones, plates, crayons, pencils, solvent washes, water washes, inks, varnishes, papers, etc. A change of anyone of those can totally alter the final print. So you must match the production choices to the artistic intent.

Photography is exactly the same. There are hundreds of tools, techniques, and choices that must be made to present the image in the best way possible. The image is not the process it is a product of the processes.

In one sense, the viewer does "see the process" in that a successful image is the culmination of the workflow that created the image. What I reject is the idea that one type of workflow is somehow inherently superior to another just because of the methods involved - and by that stricture alone images produced by the self-defined "lesser" methods are, therefore, inferior images.

To me, if the final image is the best emodiment of the artist's intent, that is the correct method to use - without thought to analog or digital.

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Well, I chose that sentence because it pretty much sums up your thinking. The rest was just fill in. I would buy your argument if those making ink jet prints would say "I think my prints look better on ink jet" and leave it at that, but usually when someone states this, it goes acompanied by the "they look better because I have more control." Meaning that is not the process that attracted them but the fact that they can correct their mistakes or use computer techniques they did not have the patience or skill to leanr and use in the darkroom. So far I have seen the change as a matter of convenience and not of admiration for the process.

So far I have yet to hear anybody see a silver print or a pt/pd print and say: "you know, this is a fine print, but it would look so much better as an ink jet!"
I am sure this will change as ink jets become the prevalent medium, but when compared side by side, I think even those who have never seen a traditional print will be able to tell the difference.

The image is not the process it is a product of the processes.

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I disagree, the photograph is the sum of the process and vision, this is something you and others doing ink jets always ignore or try to convince us it is not true, if it is not so, why are you arguing now?

As a member who seems to only participate in this forum to defend digital, I am not surprised you dont seem to think a process superior to another, those of us who are stubburnly doing this even on the face of dwindling supplies do it because we can see the difference, if I knew I could make a better ink jet print than I could a pt/pd print, I would be doing it already. In the end it seem that the "process" does not matter, yet, we see ink manufacturers come up with "selenium tone" inks, "digital platinum glicèe", funny, if the process does not matter, why try to emulate it?

If you are happy with your ink jet prints, by all means stick with them, I welcome people who want to do B&W ink jet, but I think you are going to have a hard time comming on this forum and trying to convince us the "process does not matter," if it didnt matter to us and we could not see the difference, then this would be DPUG.....

Jorge said:

Well, I chose that sentence because it pretty much sums up your thinking. The rest was just fill in. I would buy your argument if those making ink jet prints would say "I think my prints look better on ink jet" and leave it at that, but usually when someone states this, it goes acompanied by the "they look better because I have more control." Meaning that is not the process that attracted them but the fact that they can correct their mistakes or use computer techniques they did not have the patience or skill to leanr and use in the darkroom. So far I have seen the change as a matter of convenience and not of admiration for the process.

So far I have yet to hear anybody see a silver print or a pt/pd print and say: "you know, this is a fine print, but it would look so much better as an ink jet!"
I am sure this will change as ink jets become the prevalent medium, but when compared side by side, I think even those who have never seen a traditional print will be able to tell the difference.

I disagree, the photograph is the sum of the process and vision, this is something you and others doing ink jets always ignore or try to convince us it is not true, if it is not so, why are you arguing now?

As a member who seems to only participate in this forum to defend digital, I am not surprised you dont seem to think a process superior to another, those of us who are stubburnly doing this even on the face of dwindling supplies do it because we can see the difference, if I knew I could make a better ink jet print than I could a pt/pd print, I would be doing it already. In the end it seem that the "process" does not matter, yet, we see ink manufacturers come up with "selenium tone" inks, "digital platinum glicèe", funny, if the process does not matter, why try to emulate it?

If you are happy with your ink jet prints, by all means stick with them, I welcome people who want to do B&W ink jet, but I think you are going to have a hard time comming on this forum and trying to convince us the "process does not matter," if it didnt matter to us and we could not see the difference, then this would be DPUG.....

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Well, once again, you read your intentions and prejudices into whatever I write.

I don't make black and white prints anymore. I did that for years, and have no interest in B&W images. I find color far more challenging.

But, I'll put my darkroom skills in either color or black and white up against anyone. I learned darkroom processes from the best in the business who would not accept less than perfect for either a negative, transparency, or print. So, please don't insult me with your "lesser skill" attitude.

Let me make this perfectly clear. I like my color inkjet prints much better than color wet darkroom prints because the process is more akin to fine art INK printing (which I've studied for years) and less like a color photographic print.

Not better, not worse - but what I like for my images. I like fine art ink prints. Monoprints, woodcuts, lithographs, etchings, serigraphs, etc. I like the way ink looks on paper better than either chromogenic or dye destruction prints of the same images - is that clear enough for you?

The control available has nothing to do with correcting mistakes made in process - it's the additional compositional abilities to put images together onto a single sheet that interest me. I like the look of ink on paper. I've printed fine art lithographs professionally and have always wanted a way to transition a photographic image into an ink-based image.

I use fairly high-end equipment to get what I want. My scanner and printer are equipment commonly found in service bureaus and professional print houses. So, I again, can't relate to your comments that are based on hearsay or your experience with amateur equipment.

I'm not defending digital, I just don't accept the mantra that the world only works one way to get an interesting, quality photographic image.

As for convenience - please - again don't insult me. The amount of time I spend to get the final image(s) into a form that meets my intentions is every bit the equal of the amount of time I spend in a darkroom to get images. The ONLY convenience is once the final image meets my intent I can be assured that subsequent images will match.

"I disagree, the photograph is the sum of the process and vision, this is something you and others doing ink jets always ignore or try to convince us it is not true, if it is not so, why are you arguing now?"

I see you don't read very carefully, as you're obviously looking to be contentious beyond discussing photography. So, why don't you tell me the real difference between what you've written above and what I've already written in the previous post when I said:

"In one sense, the viewer does "see the process" in that a successful image is the culmination of the workflow that created the image."

Gosh, sounds pretty close to the same thing to me. That includes everything from the photographer's personal aesthetic (vision - whatever you want to call it), to the entire workflow of equipment, and all of the choices made to get to the final image.

If you're happy in making silver prints, or the thrill of a pyro negative on Azo - I think that's wonderful for you. It's just something I've already done and it doesn't fit my current imaging interests. I may go back to doing things like that in the future IF I have an interest and images that need that type of treatment.

But, right now, it's not the "best" for my images.

But, don't try and play some quality game with me. It won't work, you have no idea what I do, how I do it or why. Don't read your cheap shot digital hypothesis into what I do - I make fine art prints in every sense.

Wow, such righteous indignation! I suppose you dont read your intentions and prejudices into everything I write uh?

I am not "trying" and play the quality game, I am sure of it. If you suffer from wishful thinking, it is not my problem. As I said, I welcome ink jet posters, they make my stuff look much better...

You know, you would do better if you go back to your digital forum and ink jet printing. If you want to do ink porcesses then do them, if you do ink jet posters because they are done with ink, well then dont call it photography. Funny, you guys always want to have your cake and eat it too....I am done with this, like I said, you are going to find it a hard sell to try and tell us the process does not matter.

You all are missing one very important point.

When photography came about and it was a threat to paint per say you, but you could still get the material or make it and even today you can get it quite easily, as well as canvas, brushes, etc... So I am sick of hearing well painters felt the same way or well digital is a new way. BS.

Digital is being forced down our throats and we have no choice. They are taking away our media forcing us to use this digital crap or not shoot at all. How is that fair?

Jobo is closing up their US operations, Kodak is no longer making papers, films are being discontinued, etc... We will have no media left to produce or master our craft with. I don’t not know how to make film with the consistent results that I can get from them today. What next glass plates? Where do we get them? Good luck hiking 20 miles and taking pictures unless you get that new digicam with 10 MP.

So stop feeding the BS and believing it. Digital is destroying the world of photographic art. Soon we will have nothing left to make images with. Sure we can coat papers but once film is gone it is gone.

Total shit.

If anyone is the egoist elitists it is the digital camp, we are not forcing our media down their throats but they are forcing it down ours and making it to where we have no choice.

And yes there is a difference between a fine hand crafted print than a piece of crap ink print that took a few mouse clicks to produce. It is lazy and annoying.

And by the way I also use digital and I am not proud of it. Furthermore, I do not consider an ink print art, wall art maybe, fine art definitely not.


Major difference.