the great schism of photography

Sirius Glass · May 27, 2015

frank said:
So why focus on/bother with the extremes?

There are basically two types of people. People who accomplish things, and people who claim to have accomplished things. The first group is less crowded.
Mark Twain

blansky · May 27, 2015

jnanian said:
hi frank

do they worry about technique more than artistic endeavors, or the other way around ... some say
composiiton is the ultimate melding of technique and art, there are rules but they bend like lead ..

I think everyone who takes photography somewhat seriously values both technique and artistic endeavors. Although artistic endeavors for me is not the others side of the debate, it's impactful pictures.

But obviously where the divide is, is which is more important. And this goes back more to the left brain - right brain thing.

Which is better Ansel Adams Yosemite stuff or Migrant Mother.

Perfect printing or moving subject matter.

blansky · May 27, 2015

Michael R 1974 said:
I've never found Migrant Mother to be quite as overwhelmingly moving as people tell me it is.

I'm not sure "overwhelming" is a term I'd use for any photography.

That's a pretty high bar.

But it does display a visceral sense of despair.

Old-N-Feeble · May 27, 2015

blansky said:
I'm not sure "overwhelming" is a term I'd use for any photography.

That's a pretty high bar.

But it does display a visceral sense of despair.

Absolutely.

Old-N-Feeble · May 27, 2015

I disagree. Well executed technique definitely enhances what one 'feels' when viewing an image.

blansky · May 27, 2015

Michael R 1974 said:
Ok forget the "overwhelmingly" part. While it is a fine photograph, it doesn't affect me on a visceral level. Unhappy, yes, but despair is a strong word. I know that emotion very well, and this picture doesn't communicate that strongly to me. In that case, when it comes to emotionally moving content, I might then find something by Adams as moving as Migrant Mother. Although it would be moving in a different way, perhaps in an entirely aesthetic way, my broader point was that the dichotomy between print quality and moving subject matter is a false one (just my opinion).

I understand your point.

I guess my point is the following, the divide here is and always has been, and was substantially added to with digital coming in, is the two camps of, and to put in rather bluntly, is pretty pictures over moving pictures.

And that will never change, although it could be a live and let live, truce.

And to me it comes down to the left brain vs right brain theory of what photography is about. Granted craftmanship should be an underlying goal of both camps. But neither side is able to really buy into what the other side is selling.

Is the impact of the picture on the wall, whether digital or analog more important than the process one took to making a print in the first place.

As I said, is a masterpiece of printing like an Ansel print more "important" that say McCurry's Afghanistan girl.

And the answer here is the schism that I believe the OP suggested.

TheFlyingCamera · May 27, 2015

Which brings to mind Henri Cartier-Bresson's criticism of Ansel Adams, Edward Weston and the other West Coast f/64 crowd - (I'm paraphrasing) "how can you sit there taking pictures of rocks when there's a war on?".

I think part of the problem with Migrant Mother is one of timeliness. We've seen that image, for most of us using this site today, for our entire adult lives. It is held up as emblematic and totemic. It has in effect become divorced from the original meaning - heck, it even gets used in advertising. The visceral impact has been diluted by time and space - in the 1930s, if you saw that picture, you probably KNEW someone like her, personally. Today, we look at it and go, "oh, Migrant Mother. Dorothea Lange, FSA, 1936, photo history, blah blah blah. Got it. Same with Lewis Hine's photos of children laboring in sweatshops. We can look at those today with detachment because for most of us, it's so far removed from our reality. Steve McCurry's Afghan Girl means more to people today because they can remember seeing that cover of NatGeo when it was published.

To tie this back in, though, it's the question of HOW one uses one's art, not is it art or not, or anything else for that matter. HCB was poking a sharpened stick at Ansel & Co because they were not using their talent to fight or even comment on the war that was directly affecting him. HCB cared very much about the war because he was personally invested. This isn't to say that Ansel & Co were disinterested or didn't care; they did, but they had their own issues they were invested in, and their art would not have been well-suited to anti-Nazi propaganda.

jovo · May 27, 2015

As a cellist, no matter how musically I play something, if it's out of tune or played with a sound that's not intrinsic to the music, it's not successful. My photographic and musical techniques are honed to the degree that the cello sounds good and in tune, and the photographs reveal whatever was the reason for their being taken. If all I produced, however, was technically well played music without communicable expression, or sharp photographs that convey nothing, I'd still be unsuccessful. I've seen a lot of empty sharp photographs, and heard a lot of inexpressive performances that were nicely in tune.

blansky · May 27, 2015

Iluvmycam said:
OP, yes I generally agree...the anal and non anal photog. That is how I separate.

My prev discussion of the topic.

nsfw

(Digital and film examples)

https://danielteolijr.wordpress.com/2015/05/13/what-is-the-best-camera-in-the-world/

Loved your site.

Only disagreement is that I believe there is room for both kinds.

I laughed when I saw the 8x10 studio guy you showed. Those lights are Photogenic Studiomasters of which I still have 4 . Bought then in 1976. Incredible lights.

pdeeh · May 27, 2015

https://danielteolijr.wordpress.com/2015/05/13/what-is-the-best-camera-in-the-world/ said:
. Large format appeals to the egomaniac, the anal, the perfectionist, control freak and Ansel groupie.

except, of course, that it doesn't appeal to only to people who are all those things, or even only one of those things,.

and that quote is exactly the excluding sort of generalisation that I think the OP was inviting us to discuss ...

blansky · May 27, 2015

pdeeh said:
except, of course, that it doesn't appeal to only to people who are all those things, or even only one of those things,.

and that quote is exactly the excluding sort of generalisation that I think the OP was inviting us to discuss ...

I think it's akin to the reformed cigarette smoker.

A person sort of becomes a loud evangelist.

In this case it may have to do with a person toiling in one area and finally, as he did, had an epiphany and found his calling, his home.

There is sometimes a sort of bitterness that he wasted so much time on "the other".

The problem is that sometimes other people actually go the other way and find their niche in slow deliberate studio photography.

Either way this type of epiphany is a lot better than the mouthy troll that bad mouths something with no real knowledge or open mind to the "other".

As for me I've been mouthy about shit before, I just sort of grew out of it.

Old-N-Feeble · May 27, 2015

The following quote from the website https://danielteolijr.wordpress.com/2015/05/13/what-is-the-best-camera-in-the-world/

"Large format appeals to the egomaniac, the anal, the perfectionist, control freak and Ansel groupie".

The amusing irony is that quote has its own egomaniacal tone.

frank · May 27, 2015

Stay away from evangelicals!

pdeeh · May 27, 2015

blansky said:
I think it's akin to the reformed cigarette smoker.

None so pure as the purified

dpurdy · May 27, 2015

Everyone is in the middle. Also everyone changes all the time. I am in the middle though as I have done photography both commercially and artistically my whole life I have developed technical skills and with that I have come to know very precisely what I want to do. That comes from being old and sticking with something for 45 years. This is a brand new image, part of a 20 or so image series, it is very technically involved at every step. But the image is not about technique at all.

Dennis

jovo · May 27, 2015

Old-N-Feeble said:
"Large format appeals to the egomaniac, the anal, the perfectionist, control freak and Ansel groupie".

]

And to people who prefer things bottomside up.

pdeeh · May 27, 2015

Michael R 1974 said:
Then we're all agreed - the most expensive gear wins.

the final word

removed account4 · May 27, 2015

"Large format appeals to the egomaniac, the anal, the perfectionist, control freak and Ansel groupie".

if that is what large format users are like I'm hosed cause I've been using a large format camera for almost 30 years
and I am not a control freak, an ansel adams groupie an egonist or an anal retentive perfectionist ....
I must not have expensive enough gear, and be doing it all wrong

Old-N-Feeble · May 27, 2015

jovo said:
And to people who prefer things bottomside up.

Jovo, please quote me in full. That looks my quote but it's not.

Old-N-Feeble · May 27, 2015

Michael R 1974 said:
Then we're all agreed - the most expensive gear wins.

Oh please... not more of this underdog mentality. No one stated smaller formats are bad... just that larger formats are better at making huge prints when it comes to technical quality. Every format has its strengths and weaknesses.

Alan Klein · May 27, 2015

It's both to varying degrees.

jovo · May 27, 2015

Sorry, OnF, I was not quoting you nor anyone else. It's not a unique comment, so i guess it's easy to assume what's been written earlier has been hijacked. Well, not knowingly by me.

Old-N-Feeble · May 27, 2015

jovo said:
Sorry, OnF, I was not quoting you nor anyone else. It's not a unique comment, so i guess it's easy to assume what's been written earlier has been hijacked. Well, not knowingly by me.

It's okay, jovo. It's just that the quote was edited from my post so it looks like I wrote it and it's opposite of my opinion.

eddie · May 27, 2015

I started with a very technical background, in college, and continued with it for a long time. Then, some fortunate circumstances sent me in a different direction. But, even in what I'm drawn to do now, the technical is still there, though it takes a back seat to the images I'm trying to create. Photography resides at the intersection of science and art. You can't do one without the other. You just have to balance how much influence each gets.

alanrockwood · May 27, 2015

What about us poor souls who are neither any good with the artistic side nor the technical side of photography?

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