Pictures OF cameras looked down upon

[removed account4]

"Your initial inference was that people who didn't appreciate images of cameras were photo snobs. I don't see how you arrived at that position."

Simple: it is an attitude found in the photography forums I frequent, including this one. "Are you a real photographer, or just a camera collector/fondler?" is often implied or sometimes outright asked. My point, which you seem to be arguing against, is that one can be both, that one does not detract from the other, and that collecting is nothing to be ashamed of.

frank

is it possible to be a camera fondler but of (formerly) unloved cameras ?
most of the camera fondlers ( your words notmine ) fondle expensive beautiful cameras
that are often either shelf queens or not used much ... and it is it possible to be a camera fondler
without actually fondling the camera, and with cameras that are well, junk ?
i ask because i have a bunch of old cameras that i love, some i bought, some i found, some were given to me
but most of a story that goes wtih them that i try to keep alive by using them and keeping the juju going, some oare in terrible condition.
not sure if that is fondling or just using, and to be honest, i don't get the whole "real photographer" schtick
if you take pictures with any sort of camera, or enjoy doing it once in a while or even 2x a year or 6 years or
you consider yourself an enjoyer of cameras you are a photographer. too many people look down their noses
for using cameras that aren't up to someone else's standards. its too bad, cause it is often times the people using low fidelity ( LOMO &C )
cameras that are spending all the $$ on film keeping photography alive for the people who do it less often ( and equallly as serious ).

 

[Sirius Glass]

Great. I'm somewhat relieved that I still make sense!

You still have many years to go before you are old enough to be called a ...

 

[frank]

I hope so, Sirius!

John, of course you can prefer any camera you like. Just as every bride is beautiful to at least one person.
Like beauty, it is in the eye of the beholder and completely subjective. Whatever floats your boat is okay.

I try to be as non-judgemental as possible.

 

[blockend]

At the age of us geezers (speaking for myself) I'm quite aware that adding or subtracting equipment doesn't affect the quality of what I produce (unless I perhaps go to 8x10).

I don't believe the quality of your photograph and the size of your negative are related. Which is very different from saying big negatives can't make good photos.

Let's be clear, APUG is primarily a gear forum. Therefore praising, fondling, ogling pictures of cameras is in line with its remit. This section is called "Ethics and Philosophy", and is the only part that is not concerned mainly with equipment and materials. As such it is reasonable to discuss personal viewpoints on the medium as a whole. My view is people who don't get off on pictures of cameras are not photography snobs, as has been suggested, but have different concerns.

Here's an example. Forty years ago when I set out with my first camera, Zenits and Prakticas were looked down upon. This was because they were the cheapest SLR cameras available. Plenty of people were told their cameras were "bad" and quickly traded "up" to different brands. Four decades on some of the most interesting, historically important pictures were taken on those cheap cameras. I assume this was because their users weren't interested in photography per se, but in what they saw through their viewfinders. That serious photographers told them their camera didn't cut the mustard was neither here nor there to them, they were too busy taking photos of interesting things to care.

For people interested in making pictures gear can be a distraction, not least because the industry is predicated on the idea your current camera isn't as good as your next one, and the weight of advertising plays upon those securities - a look at old magazines will show there's nothing new there. I never owned a Zenit or a Praktica but I had a Chinon, which was only a notch up on the Jones scale, and the images taken on that camera have no less quality than those on the fine cameras I subsequently acquired. That fact will be illuminating to some people and irrelevant to others. There is nothing morally wrong with acquiring and displaying old cameras, but I don't accept people who aren't interested in them are snobs.

 

[frank]

The difference here is that we are not being brainwashed by marketing/advertising and buying the newest cameras because they are better than our old ones. In many cases we are buying older cameras that we couldn't afford when they were new, but can now for various reasons.

I'll concede that there are cases where the casual weekend hobby photographer with a great job offering discretionary income (say dentistry) will buy tons of uber expensive gear and output crappy images, compared to someone passionate and dedicated to photography enough to make it his life's work but earns very little (due to the typical life as an artist) so can only buy inexpensive gear, but because of his passion and dedication, outputs amazing images. But it's not all like that.

 

[blockend]

I'll concede that there are cases where the casual weekend hobby photographer with a great job offering discretionary income (say dentistry) will buy tons of uber expensive gear and output crappy images, compared to someone passionate and dedicated to photography enough to make it his life's work but earns very little (due to the typical life as an artist) so can only buy inexpensive gear, but because of his passion and dedication, outputs amazing images. But it's not all like that.

I don't see any correlation between the price of someone's film gear and their results. In 35mm, a £100-200 outlay on equipment is indistinguishable from a £5000 budget in image terms. Photography is a very democratic medium, a kid with a point and shoot can knock spots off someone with limitless funds to dedicate to the medium. It doesn't require unusual self sacrifice, just commitment, passion and an eye.

 

[frank]

I don't see any correlation between the price of someone's film gear and their results. In 35mm, a £100-200 outlay on equipment is indistinguishable from a £5000 budget in image terms. Photography is a very democratic medium, a kid with a point and shoot can knock spots off someone with limitless funds to dedicate to the medium. It doesn't require unusual self sacrifice, just commitment, passion and an eye.

I don't disagree, in fact my post indicates this. (dentist with expensive gear outputting crappy images.)

 

[Sirius Glass]

The difference here is that we are not being brainwashed by marketing/advertising and buying the newest cameras because they are better than our old ones. In many cases we are buying older cameras that we couldn't afford when they were new, but can now for various reasons.

I am happy that I have the cameras that I could only dream about when I was young.

Am I taking better photographs with that equipment?

• My experience and technical knowledge has greatly improved so the photographs are much better.
• I shot slides for years so that I learned to compose and get it right before I took the picture on less expensive equipment.
• Now that I have the equipment and could set up a darkroom, I have learned a lot about the art of printing and improved beyond just cropping before taking the photograph.
• I learned from mistakes and by experimenting on the less expensive cameras. [Example: for the same size subject on the film when the subject is close to the camera switching focal length lenses will not change the depth of field. I learned that on a Minolta SRT-101. Later at Kodak I studied optics and my boss helped me with the mathematics to do the proof that the focal length drops out of the depth of field equations]. Now I am learning through studying optics, and the technical part of photography why those learned things are the way they are.
• With the more advanced, better equipment I can now do photographs and use use techniques that were not possible on the less able equipment: extreme wide angle [SWC, WideLux], extreme telephoto, increasing development for higher contrast, color developing and printing, large format movements, taking old barrel lenses and using them with a focal plane shutter on 4"x5" film ...
• A new world has been opened in the darkroom beyond developing black & white film and printing it as a teenager.
• There were limits on some things that I could do on the less expensive equipment that are do not exist on the more expensive equipment.

So yes my photographs are better with the better equipment, however the difference is not from the equipment alone. It is also from experience, education, and observation as well as added capabilities.

 

[frank]

Nothing wrong with that Michael, IMO. Just try to make them the best pictures you can.

 

[Sean Mac]

I really like seeing all the different cameras owned by APUG posters.

In Brendan Behans immortal words "#### the begrudgers!"

Only own 4 myself but number 5 seems highly likely...

 

[Theo Sulphate]

I am an artist who uses cameras, film and alt processes to make art. My tools are important -- as important as any other part of the artistic process. It is as simple (or complex) as that.

Looking at your 8x10 camera, which appears somewhat portable, I've half convinced myself that's one feasible way for me to go with large format - no enlargement, just a crisp detailed contact print. That would certainly eliminate the middleman.

 

[blansky]

Photography is like most tool/device based endeavors, there is the tool/mechanical fetishes and the print/results fetishes.

And sometimes both at the same time.

It's like golfers, skiers, tennis players who have all the right equipment and play like shit and the guys with the crappy stuff that can beat them.

We used to call Hasselblads the finest portrait photographers camera but we also called it the doctor cam, because the pros loved and respected it and the doctors fetishised it and showed it off.

Different people have different goals and agendas.