The comeback?

[Berkeley Mike]

We have no idea how large this PR effort is. Judging by the talent and locations they used....not much. I'm betting the "talent" got swag and they shot in a parking lot.

 

[alentine]

it's time to forget about it and get onto the digital train before it leaves the station.

LOL
That train is not moving for the past 3 years. Numbers do not lie.
It's a seductive illusory Train, full of Colours with remote control for "UnDo/ReDo" things, Move, Remove, Add, Erase, Sharpen, Blur, lots of Scales to try along your IMAGINARY journey!
Most of that Train passengers have been treated from colour diarrhea, used anti USM/Blur tablets and started their photographic journey from the start in another ACTUAL and REAL Train

 

[removed account4]

LOL
That train is not moving for the past 3 years. Numbers do not lie.
It's a seductive illusory Train, full of Colours with remote control for "UnDo/ReDo" things, Move, Remove, Add, Erase, Sharpen, Blur, lots of Scales to try along your IMAGINARY journey!
Most of that Train passengers have been treated from colour diarrhea, used anti USM/Blur tablets and started their photographic journey from the start in another ACTUAL and REAL Train

its sad that these threads become some sort of weird soapbox for digital vs analog debates

does it really matter which one is actual/real or not. since photography began in the 1830s people have manipulated it to create
their own realities, black and white photography is an abstraction unless your cones don't work, and there are plenty of people
using digital whatever to produce things that are not much different than traditional black and white or color imagery. its too bad
people who go on about unrealness of digital have a narrow view of what film has always been able to do, and how emulsions
from autochrome to velvia to tech pan ( exposed at 200 and processed in print developer as kodak recommended ) to tmx and
darkroom gods like ulesmann and countless others create images as unreal as anything made with modern gear can rival ( yes i know ulesmann uses digital now )

the tent is big its too bad people have to keep people out instead of letting people in ...

sure, there's a comeback if you say there is, it really doesn't matter much to me one way or another
cause stats and numbers and facts can be manipulated to say whatever people want them to
and if it is in deep decline i dont' really care either cause i have no problem making my own materials...

 

[moose10101]

LOL
That train is not moving for the past 3 years. Numbers do not lie.
It's a seductive illusory Train, full of Colours with remote control for "UnDo/ReDo" things, Move, Remove, Add, Erase, Sharpen, Blur, lots of Scales to try along your IMAGINARY journey!
Most of that Train passengers have been treated from colour diarrhea, used anti USM/Blur tablets and started their photographic journey from the start in another ACTUAL and REAL Train

Feel better now?

 

[RPC]

does it really matter which one is actual/real or not. since photography began in the 1830s people have manipulated it to create
their own realities, black and white photography is an abstraction unless your cones don't work, and there are plenty of people
using digital whatever to produce things that are not much different than traditional black and white or color imagery. its too bad
people who go on about unrealness of digital have a narrow view of what film has always been able to do, and how emulsions
from autochrome to velvia to tech pan ( exposed at 200 and processed in print developer as kodak recommended ) to tmx and
darkroom gods like ulesmann and countless others create images as unreal as anything made with modern gear can rival ( yes i know ulesmann uses digital now )

It can all be manipulated to any degree desired, but the issue of which IS the closest to reality as possible if you DO WANT IT is very important to some.

 

[alentine]

Feel better now?

Not, actually.

 

[alentine]

Hay jnanian,
Just joking, I did not even mention "digital" !
Something maybe like crabgrass !

kind of like crabgrass ...

I like digital, but I do not use it in my photography.
I do not care even if that big tent may include 3D printers and iPad painters inside, or not.

it's time to forget about it and get onto the digital train before it leaves the station.

The metaphor started by Ralph, I just continued that metaphor

 

[Berkeley Mike]

It can all be manipulated to any degree desired, but the issue of which IS the closest to reality as possible if you DO WANT IT is very important to some.

This gets into "what is photography." What we do with this discipline is capture light and recreate a vision. I'm not sure what reality, external to our brains, has to do with a reality between our ears.

Our photo reality has been defined by film for a 190 years and that has defined a rendering style based upon chemical limitations. Some feel that this is an absolute rendering of reality. If it is all one has seen and how one has learned the craft then allowing another medium can be difficult.

 

[RPC]

If it is all one has seen and how one has learned the craft then allowing another medium can be difficult.

With some, it is the seeing and learning about another medium that makes wanting to use it difficult.

 

[Berkeley Mike]

With some, it is the seeing and learning about another medium that makes wanting to use it difficult.

And therein lies the conundrum; freeing ourselves of some absolute definition mired in an arbitrary set of chemical restrictions that has been habituated to a norm past which many cannot see.

 

[removed account4]

It can all be manipulated to any degree desired, but the issue of which IS the closest to reality as possible if you DO WANT IT is very important to some.

its 6/ 1/2 dozen ..

Just joking, I did not even mention "digital" !

LOL
have a nice nite !

 

[Nodda Duma]

These pretzels are making me thirsty!

 

[jtk]

This gets into "what is photography." What we do with this discipline is capture light and recreate a vision. I'm not sure what reality, external to our brains, has to do with a reality between our ears.

Our photo reality has been defined by film for a 190 years and that has defined a rendering style based upon chemical limitations. Some feel that this is an absolute rendering of reality. If it is all one has seen and how one has learned the craft then allowing another medium can be difficult.

I don't think photography has ever been "based on chemical limitations." Maybe I don't understand that formulation.

I think photography has always been "based on" techniques that graphically depict something we see. It surely includes depiction of periods of time, from instants (click!) to hours (film & video). It might even involve 3D printing.

 

[Arklatexian]

In grade school we were taught to use pen and ink. Early ball points were forbidden because they were messy. Basically lazy, I stayed with pen and ink because works flow onto paper without need to press, pen is just faster and easier. As for computer vs typewriter, I wright in longhand but no longer need typist since I can dictate using Dragon.
As for photography, an old friend working at B&H tells me there is a growing demand for cameras.
As for professionals dumping equipment, I bought a whole collection of Schneider lenses for my Arri for a song.
Digital has its place, but it’s ephemeral, negatives and film are almost forever.

I was taught in grade school to use pen and ink by right-handed teachers so my writing hand (left) was always in wet ink and the results were messy. One company, Esterbrook made a fountain pen for left-handers. The tip was ground differently than for right hand. I don't know if they are still in business. When I started printing everything, life got better, even with ballpoint.......Regards!

 

[Alan Edward Klein]

I was taught in grade school to use pen and ink by right-handed teachers so my writing hand (left) was always in wet ink and the results were messy. One company, Esterbrook made a fountain pen for left-handers. The tip was ground differently than for right hand. I don't know if they are still in business. When I started printing everything, life got better, even with ballpoint.......Regards!

I'm a righty and I couldn't write with a fountain pen either. My report cards always came back with the comment regarding Penmanship: "Needs Improvement".

 

[Berkeley Mike]

I don't think photography has ever been "based on chemical limitations." Maybe I don't understand that formulation.

I think photography has always been "based on" techniques that graphically depict something we see. It surely includes depiction of periods of time, from instants (click!) to hours (film & video). It might even involve 3D printing.

Humans have had the technology and insight into the "photo" part since at least since the 11th century from Alhazen, a Persian polymath (optics, math, philosophy, astronomy.) What we didn't have was the "graphy" part; the actual recording of the image. In around 1826 or 1827, Joseph Niépce captured light in a camera obscura on Bitumen of Judea (an asphalt material) on platinum in a 1-2 day exposure . The result was rinsed in Oil of Lavender leaving a relief. From there it was more chemicals and emulsions and substrates of chemical capacities. Kodak produced plastic-based B&W films in 1888 and made a cajillion bucks in silver halide processes.

The consequent image, the vision-product, was defined by the chemistry. This limited set of chemical monochrome artifacts, with a nod from centuries painting, were the springboard to a qualified aesthetic. These artifacts, the reference points for a new style of vision, were rehearsed over many years and now presume some absolute sense of photography.

History tells us that Photography is not static. New media create new possibilities outside previous limitations. This was far more prevalent in the middle and late 19th century as photo was evolving through myriad processes during the Industrial Revolution. The hue & cry from the previous technology at the new technology has contemporary equivalents, just as painters decried our craft at its birth: resins, pigments, and minerals hardly welcomed us.

 

[RPC]

Traditional photography may be based on chemical limitations, but I don't see a medium based on the limitations of sensors, algorithms and compression as being qualitatively any better.

 

[alentine]

Digital market is sustaining some serious slowness for the past few years.
If that lag continued, it will make the whole digital SLR age, equivalent to the age of Leica M6 camera.
Camera manufacturers meant to introduce digital SLRs on the same previously used, film cameras chassis. Still making digital SLRs on the same chassis of photography cameras made since 90's.
The technology was started maybe on the 60's by sony and kodak, it was quite harmful to the industry if introduced on 2000(to the public) as a new and different technology, on the appropriately compatible digital chassis.
Manufacturers do not care about photography in its Art form, they are concerned only with the Industry and Business.
It's extremely unfortunate to let them dictate our choices, choose our vocabularies or making our dictionary.
But hopefully, it looks that the sunset of that era has been already started.
With the emergence of Mirrorless Digital Cameras, digital SLRs will start to vanish. I think, will take sometime, but not longer.
When the predominance of digital features becomes the lowest norm, specially wireless, touchscreen, voice commands, cellphone/TV/home/business entertainment integration, wireless printing, slim flexible recycled inexpensive output LCDs and much smaller cameras with more sensitive and highly efficient silicon wafer sensors, the ability of discrimination will be better for the remaining part of photographers.

 

[Helinophoto]

Traditional photography may be based on chemical limitations, but I don't see a medium based on the limitations of sensors, algorithms and compression as being qualitatively any better.

Oh, I don't know about that.
It all depends on what "better" is and how we define that.

One can record a crappy photo with 1 terrapixels of data, or on film, and it would still be crap, so in that respect, the technical recording is irrelevant.

However, there are already some things that can be done with digital that cannot be done in analog.

What briefly comes to mind, are things like focus-stacking and after-the-fact focus shift, ISO 120 000 ++ .
Then there is the amount of information in for example shadow-areas, which can be lifted to insane levels after the shot has taken place.
Algorithms in post, also makes it possible to re-create a blown red channel from the green and blue one if you have overexposed the photo, so you can save blown highlights for example.

Technical qualities regarding the recording itself, is on-par with medium format for most high-pixel count DSLR's these days, there is no way around that.

But shooting film still has other qualities that makes it a unique way of capturing a scene. (how the film react, process and so on and not to mention the joy of using the amazing analog cameras).
Also, using one's nugget, rather than letting the camera decide and present the resulting photo, is much more satisfying. People stare more at the screen than the subject when shooting digital...which is kinda sad.

Everything has limitations, even film and paper.

Thing is, the limitations of digital are still being pushed, the ISO-limits are now at such a level that you can actually capture a (running) cat in a coalmine. The computers inside the cameras does an amazing job in autofocus-speed, or assisting with manual focus with functionality like focus-peaking. The dynamic range is ever increasing, last time I checked, I think someone mentioned 14 stops latitude on some Sony.

What it comes down to though, is the resulting photo, the idea and creation and in that regard, the recording-medium will not help anyone create a great photo, I've seen plenty of shots done with $4000 Sonys and $9000 Leicas that are basically sh*t. (and the same can be observed for analog on IE lomography.com).

 

[guangong]

I was taught in grade school to use pen and ink by right-handed teachers so my writing hand (left) was always in wet ink and the results were messy. One company, Esterbrook made a fountain pen for left-handers. The tip was ground differently than for right hand. I don't know if they are still in business. When I started printing everything, life got better, even with ballpoint.......Regards!

Not until 6th grade did we use fountain pens. Until then, we used pen holders and nibs. Teacher fill inkwells every morning. Pupil would fill other well with water.
About 15 yrs ago an aunt told my that I was originally left handed but apparently switched in first grade. Now enjoy being ambidextrous. More stubborn classmates stayed with left hand.
Composition always done after recess. Result...ink would defuse all over wherever sweaty oily arm rested. Or point would catch on paper thread and spring a stream of ink blotches across paper. Of course we were graded for neatness, which meant starting all over.

 

[Nodda Duma]

Traditional photography may be based on chemical limitations, but I don't see a medium based on the limitations of sensors, algorithms and compression as being qualitatively any better.

The only actual limitation is your brain's inherent image processing and emotional response. Everything else, including the imaging technology, is some combination of artistic choice, the original scene, and your Mk I eyeball(s).

The imaging medium is the choice of the artist. You guys are arguing over an artist's choice! Tell Van Gogh he should have used watercolor!

 

[RPC]

The comment was made earlier that photography has been limited by chemical limitations. I am simply trying to point out that if you are going to say that, then it should have been pointed out that today's medium has limitations as well, significant enough that they affect the decision of many to use it or not use it.

 

[Luckless]

The comment was made earlier that photography has been limited by chemical limitations. I am simply trying to point out that if you are going to say that, then it should have been pointed out that today's medium has limitations as well, significant enough that they affect the decision of many to use it or not use it.

And if someone doesn't believe that there are a range of limitations with both film and digital, then they should be challenged to produce a digital photo with an ultra large format capture area for one photo assignment, and then for their next assignment to have the images available for worldwide viewing in less than 60 seconds...

Different tools to achieve different results, and often suited to different tasks. Sure there is a large overlap in the middle between what either can do, but it is at the extremes where the usage of one or the other tends to really excel.

 

[Berkeley Mike]

Traditional photography may be based on chemical limitations, but I don't see a medium based on the limitations of sensors, algorithms and compression as being qualitatively any better.

I agree. My point is, though, that the artifacts and limitations of gelatin and silver, functionally a primitive monochrome light capture of 19th-century chemical technology, were embraced over time and an aesthetic was formed. The criticism of digital capture and development now is largely one of the consequent artifacts of its technology from a perspective of the one photographic medium that has been sustained for nearly 170 years.

Yet, the potentials, given that the digital medium is based upon computer technology are, compared to silver and gelatin, limitless. Remember, we got to the Moon in 1969 with computer with 35k of memory. When I tried to get our department to go digital in 1995 we were at 10MB sitting on my Mac LCII, about 300 times larger and faster. Today, my iMac is about 30,000 times larger and faster. This is doubling every few years with computers designing computers.

Better? How good was film? Compared to what? Or is it just the devil we know?

 

[RPC]

Better? How good was film? Compared to what? Or is it just the devil we know?

Have you ever watched a typical Hollywood movie shot on film and thought it would look better if shot on digital? Likewise, have you seen a movie shot on digital and thought it looked better than the movies you have seen shot on film? If you want a standard, there is one for you.