Saw this interesting quote. Wonder if it applies to photography as well?

analoguey · Sep 5, 2015

"Study hard what interests you the most in the most undisciplined, irreverent and original manner possible." - Richard Feynman, Dead Link Removed

At least I have found that not looking at things as someone instructs you to look at, but instead what compels you to look at it or interests you, led me to understanding things better than the usual text book ways would have.

pdeeh · Sep 5, 2015

Ah analoguey, I look forward to the disputes between the Apollonians and the Dionysians that your post will prompt!

(and let's hope that Menippus wades in to disrupt matters too )

analoguey · Sep 5, 2015

At the risk of sounding ignorant, Not exactly sure what the appolonians or Dionysians refer to, pdeeh!

Bill Burk · Sep 5, 2015

I can't help thinking about how the first photography class might go...

Ed Gruberman shows up and says he wants to be on the walls of great museums now.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Z8VD4JXUozM

blansky · Sep 5, 2015

Most so called "quotes of famous people" fall into the "words to live by" variety.

Most of these people are quite old, have lived a full life, and are looking back, sometimes fondly on their success and other times bitter at their lack of success in some other areas.

So on this particular quotes from a very accomplished man, who is giving his advice on, basically, not following the rules or conventions, but instead going your own way.

Sounds brilliant.

The problem is, if he had done that early in his career, would he have actually been the success that he turned out to be.

In other words if he hadn't conformed at an early stage, would he have gotten to the point where he could tell you not to.

Which comes to the standard rule of "learn the rules, so you can break them".

And the paradox is, if you hadn't learned the rules, would you have gotten to a place where you knew WHEN to break them. Or HOW to break them.

Because just breaking rules off the get go, in most cases will get you nowhere.

analoguey · Sep 5, 2015

I remember Feynman from the article RD did on him on ' guesstimation' - and iirc, him calculating yield of atomic test by throwing up pieces of paper and measuring/checking how they fell to earth? (and apparently being not far off from the final yield calculations)

So I assume he was unconventional as per the quote I saw.

I think the irreverence referred to is possibly to the regimented ritualised thinking than to the subject itself? One can hardly be irreverent to what one is truly intrigued by/interested in?

/more interested in examples of whether it's worked in practice. [emoji56]

Bill Burk · Sep 5, 2015

blansky said:
Most so called "quotes of famous people" fall into the "words to live by" variety.

I know, everybody knows "words to live by." They never mean anything personal until, well... until they become personal.

They are meaningless until something comes along and gives you a "boot to the head."

My favorite example is "expose for the shadows, develop for the highlights" which I could quote from the time I picked up my first photography book. But it was just a trite saying until I ran my first Zone System tests (where I found my personal EI for TMY-2 was 64)... Then I realized what the saying meant all along.

And you know, though I since have adjusted and now I expose the film at 250 EI, two prints from those days where I was shooting it at 64 are on the wall in my hallway.

Where was I going with this thought? Oh, I wanted to bring up storytelling. That's something you do well blansky. And stories come close second to personal experience.

Les Olson · Sep 15, 2015

That Feynman-ish approach works for purely intellectual pursuits, but not for those where skill and judgement are involved, or where team-work is important. Having major surgery done by a surgeon who has studied in an undisciplined, irreverent and original manner is not a good idea, and photography seems to me less intellectual than practical (it is not Apollo vs Dionysos, but Aristotle instead of Plato).

The important part of Feynman's advice is the most often neglected: to study hard. A lot of folk take "undisciplined" study to mean "not much study at all", and that was not Feynman's approach.

baachitraka · Sep 15, 2015

Just study hard in what ever the way you want.

Roger Cole · Sep 15, 2015

Bill Burk said:
I know, everybody knows "words to live by." They never mean anything personal until, well... until they become personal.

They are meaningless until something comes along and gives you a "boot to the head."

My favorite example is "expose for the shadows, develop for the highlights" which I could quote from the time I picked up my first photography book. But it was just a trite saying until I ran my first Zone System tests (where I found my personal EI for TMY-2 was 64)... Then I realized what the saying meant all along.

And you know, though I since have adjusted and now I expose the film at 250 EI, two prints from those days where I was shooting it at 64 are on the wall in my hallway.

Where was I going with this thought? Oh, I wanted to bring up storytelling. That's something you do well blansky. And stories come close second to personal experience.

Ok, that has me curious about the tangent - how you got EI 64 from TMY-2 and what lead you to revise all the way to 250, a much more realistic number IME for TMY-2. I'd almost say the only way to get 64 out of TMY-2 would be a badly miscalibrated meter but somehow I doubt it. Anything from, say, 160, maybe 125, to 320 I could buy but 64? Should have run some tests on, say, Efke 25 in those days. You might have got a negative number!

Back to the discussion...

markbarendt · Sep 15, 2015

http://www.ted.com/talks/barry_schwartz_the_way_we_think_about_work_is_broken

Alan Klein · Sep 15, 2015

What they say about success, it's 10 percent inspiration and 90 percent perspiration.

DannL. · Sep 15, 2015

I find the quote very interesting. Perty much in line with how I tackle most everything. When studying a subject, be willing to take your studies well outside of the norm. You will be richer for it.

Case in point . . . You are studying rocks. You pass a rock in your daily adventures. Be willing to . . .

Pick the rock up to see how much it weighs.
Break the rock to see what's inside.
Look at the rock with a loupe or microscope to learn what's there.
Cut the rock to see how tough it is, and what it smells like.
Taste the rock . . . if your dare.
Skip the rock to see how well it skips on water.
Turn the rock over to see the world that lives underneath.

There's a thousand other things you can do with that rock, and each will reveal a new branch for study. Think outside of the box.

Bill Burk · Sep 15, 2015

Roger Cole said:
Ok, that has me curious about the tangent - how you got EI 64 from TMY-2

I was following Minor White's sheet exposure method where you push in the dark slide 3/8 inch between Zones and expose single sheets to a full series of Zones 0 (no exposure), Zone I then push down 3/8 inch, Zone II then push down 3/8 inch etc. until Zone XIII.

Knowing my shutter was badly inaccurate for the test, I used a 35mm camera as a Packard shutter... You can guess the rest... vignetting made my lower Zone exposures all lower than they should be. So the result was EI 64. I did the testing before an important trip, didn't have time to repeat the tests so I just took the numbers to the field and used it.

TMY-2 does very well rated at EI 64 and using Zone II shadow placement (per Minor White's booklet). I might have run into trouble if I'd used Zone III shadow placement as is common these days... or worse if I'd used Bruce Barnbaum's Zone IV shadow placement. This illustrates why it's best to take advice from one teacher... or at least study how different advice interrelates.

In effect, I can confirm Bruce Barnbaum's Zone IV shadow placement works very well.

Sirius Glass · Sep 15, 2015

Everyone has their own way of studying and learning. Use the one that works best for you.

Saw this interesting quote. Wonder if it applies to photography as well?

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