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"New Thoughts on Digital Photography" by Bruce Barnbaum
You might enjoy this recently updated article entitled New Thoughts on Digital Photography by photographer Bruce Barnbaum.
A long-time large-format darkroom printer, he has recently made inroads into digital photography, and shares some astute and well-considered observations.
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Re: "New Thoughts on Digital Photography" by Bruce Barnbaum
His concluding remark deserves a pull-out:
“It’s wise to fully assess the benefits and liabilities of each approach [digital and traditional] before plunging into either one. But I must add one final thought in support of traditional methods: nothing has the radiance of a finely crafted silver print. Nothing. Even after 20+ years of improved digital technology, the traditional silver print is still the epitome of b&w photographic excellence. Even with the many remarkable — truly remarkable — digital b&w prints that I have seen, the traditional silver print still ranks as the standard by which all others are judged. I recognize that this may change in the future, but as I write and update this article (most recently in February, 2012), it still remains true.”
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Re: "New Thoughts on Digital Photography" by Bruce Barnbaum
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Re: "New Thoughts on Digital Photography" by Bruce Barnbaum
Yes, I dislike the article as much, or more than I did the first time I read it. The whole article is an argument based on a straw man digital photographer. It's quite convenient to criticize a character whose flaws you've carefully constructed, but it has little in common with reality, and is of no practical use to anyone, as far as I can see. The article seems to me a very self conscious attempt by Barnbaum to assert his authority (upon which booking his workshops depends) at a time when his methods (on which his workshops are based) are becoming more alternative than mainstream. I'm sure there are many photographers (among others) from Barnbaum's generation who feel somewhat slighted after investing so much of their lives into a process that's being superseded by one that is not, in their eyes, the equal of the one they know. I sympathize, but I don't find his observations astute, or well considered.
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Re: "New Thoughts on Digital Photography" by Bruce Barnbaum
Quote:
Originally Posted by
Jay DeFehr
... The article seems to me a very self conscious attempt by Barnbaum to assert his authority (upon which booking his workshops depends) at a time when his methods (on which his workshops are based) are becoming more alternative than mainstream. I'm sure there are many photographers (among others) from Barnbaum's generation who feel somewhat slighted after investing so much of their lives into a process that's being superseded by one that is not, in their eyes, the equal of the one they know. I sympathize, but I don't find his observations astute, or well considered.
+1
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Re: "New Thoughts on Digital Photography" by Bruce Barnbaum
4500 words! I think I could edit it down to about 1/10 of that without trying hard. :) But I would still disagree with it (or, more accurately, think most of it irrelevant).
--Darin
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Re: "New Thoughts on Digital Photography" by Bruce Barnbaum
Logical/realistic and pragmatic. I loved it!!
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Re: "New Thoughts on Digital Photography" by Bruce Barnbaum
Quote:
Originally Posted by
Old-N-Feeble
Logical/realistic and pragmatic. I loved it!!
Pragmatic, maybe......
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Re: "New Thoughts on Digital Photography" by Bruce Barnbaum
Note, though, that the latest (but not greatest) Clint Eastwood movie J. Edgar, released in November, was shot on...yes, FILM - despite the higher costs associated with film production. Why do you suppose they bothered to shot it on film instead of digital capture?
http://www.panavision.com/spotlight/...shoots-j-edgar
Thomas
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Re: "New Thoughts on Digital Photography" by Bruce Barnbaum
Because Clint is "The MAN"!!
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Re: "New Thoughts on Digital Photography" by Bruce Barnbaum
When you consider the fine and expansive body of work that Bruce Barnbaum has created over the years, this article carries the weight of a thoughtful, knowledgeable photographer who has carefully assessed the current state of digital image creation vs. the traditional darkroom approach. I think his conclusions hold much merit.
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Re: "New Thoughts on Digital Photography" by Bruce Barnbaum
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Re: "New Thoughts on Digital Photography" by Bruce Barnbaum
Quote:
Originally Posted by
tgtaylor
Note, though, that the latest (but not greatest) Clint Eastwood movie
J. Edgar, released in November, was shot on...yes, FILM - despite the higher costs associated with film production. Why do you suppose they bothered to shot it on film instead of digital capture?
http://www.panavision.com/spotlight/...shoots-j-edgar
Thomas
So, if I provide an example of a film shot digitally, we should come to the opposite conclusion? What does this have to do with Barnbaum's article?
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Re: "New Thoughts on Digital Photography" by Bruce Barnbaum
Borrowing a quote from the link in the Eggleston thread:
"According to Joshua Holdeman, international director of the Christie’s photography department, the point of the sale was to establish a new market for Eggleston’s photography in the contemporary art world. “Eggleston has been kind of stuck in the old school world of the photography collectors for a long time, whose primary concerns are about process, print type, print date, etcetera,” says Holdeman.
Whereas the type of print and the exact date a print was made is “a huge deal” for photography collectors, Holdeman says, “for contemporary art collectors it’s much more about the object itself—they couldn’t care if it’s a dye transfer or a pigment print or whatever, as long as the object itself is totally amazing, that’s what they care about.”"
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Re: "New Thoughts on Digital Photography" by Bruce Barnbaum
"they couldn’t care if it’s a dye transfer or a pigment print or whatever, as long as the object itself is totally amazing, that’s what they care about.”......that seems to be the way modern society is going
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Re: "New Thoughts on Digital Photography" by Bruce Barnbaum
Quote:
Originally Posted by
Greg Y
"they couldn’t care if it’s a dye transfer or a pigment print or whatever, as long as the object itself is totally amazing, that’s what they care about.”......that seems to be the way modern society is going
That sounds a lot like what the painters said when photography started emerging.
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Re: "New Thoughts on Digital Photography" by Bruce Barnbaum
Guess I won't be buying one of your 'archival' prints then...:)
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Re: "New Thoughts on Digital Photography" by Bruce Barnbaum
Quote:
Originally Posted by
Greg Y
Guess I won't be buying one of your 'archival' prints then...:)
You, and millions of other earthlings ;) I'm OK with that, as I am sure that you are too.
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Re: "New Thoughts on Digital Photography" by Bruce Barnbaum
Jay's criticism seems valid to me. The article does seem to set up a "straw man." In any case, I'm not sure that we can even begin to think about digital photography without thinking about Digital Everything. That is, the whole world of superficial convenience and incredible marketing that we live within--and, like it or not, that we support. This mercantile world seems pointedly devoid of both truthfulness and imagination. And in this world (which includes the culture industry) there are plenty of arrogant immature highly-articulate young fools occupying just about every nook and cranny. The straw man that Bruce sets up is, in fact, all too easily found. Still, here and there one occasionally encounters thoughtful young digitally-oriented artists. If left alone long enough to construct their own particular sense of mindfulness, these oddball youngsters may (with luck) become the Westons and Sudeks of the future.
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Re: "New Thoughts on Digital Photography" by Bruce Barnbaum
Ah, the big environmentalist comes out in favor of using precious metals and timber products.
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Re: "New Thoughts on Digital Photography" by Bruce Barnbaum
I respect Mr. Barnbaum, but my reaction to his essay was very similar to Jay's.
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Re: "New Thoughts on Digital Photography" by Bruce Barnbaum
Quote:
Originally Posted by
jloen
Ah, the big environmentalist comes out in favor of using precious metals and timber products.
It is a lot cleaner and greener than the computer industry, but by no means clean and green.
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Re: "New Thoughts on Digital Photography" by Bruce Barnbaum
So what about his essay? Criticize it all you like, the essay is Bruce Barnbaum's opinion, and that's it. On the same page index for that article, he has essays about Alan Greenspan, the economy, GDP and RDP, the environment, and timber. Once again, so what?
I bought his book, The Art of Photography. I was really disappointed with the section on darkroom printing. I can sum up the chapter with two words: "wing it." He works by approximation and experience. Publishing a book with so little information from such an experienced darkroom worker really devalued the book for me.
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Re: "New Thoughts on Digital Photography" by Bruce Barnbaum
After the negative comments about Bruce's writings, I re-read it. I still find it to be a well thought out and even-handed article. It does not trash digital and even praises it. A bit wordy, perhaps, but without repeating himself too much.
I can see where those who do not consider their own photography (traditional or digital) as being an artistic pursuit might miss Bruce's main point...or just see it as not important nor as meaningful. A valid POV, but not mine, so I appreciated Bruce's point -- "Thought can — and should — be injected into the digital process right from the start." And as he points out, this also holds true for traditional photography.
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Re: "New Thoughts on Digital Photography" by Bruce Barnbaum
A lot of nonsense in that article. Barnbaum doesn't seem to know what he's talking about, he's just making things up.
He talks about an "over-reliance on Photoshop to make everything right". Really? Serious digital photographers try hard to "get it right in camera" and minimize the need for post processing. Less serious one's upload straight to facebook without any post processing.
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students who approach photography digitally seem to universally ignore the idea of learning about light, about composition, about the relationship of forms in both black-and-white and color, and even fail to understand their own emotional relationship to the subject matter they have chosen
He's either making this up or has really bad luck with student selection (and that latter alternative carries some obvious implications).
Quote:
there is a great deal of misinformation written about traditional photographic methods by noted digital practitioners
Then he debunks one example of misinformation he found in a magazine and proceeds to devote many paragraphs to nonissues in the section titled "Problems with the Digital Approach".
Bruce Barnbaum is a great photographer but here he's writing about stuff he just doesn't understand.
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Re: "New Thoughts on Digital Photography" by Bruce Barnbaum
Among many other logical fallacies, he consistently makes the false distinction between "digital photographers" and "traditional photographers", ascribing various and contradictory characteristics to each, when the reality is that more often than not, any given serious photographer probably belongs to both "categories". He seems to want us to believe a photographer's entire approach changes with his camera. Barnbaum should not write about digital photography from a position of authority, as he wants to do here; he's clearly out of his depths.
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Re: "New Thoughts on Digital Photography" by Bruce Barnbaum
I do not get that impression from Bruce's article, Jay.
None of what he wrote refers to "serious" photographers, but instead, about those who are just getting into photography -- and how the characteristics of the equipment and process can help or hinder the learning process if the person is not aware of the possible traps. The basic trap being using the shotgun effect instead of thinking about such things as the quality of light and composition before one clicks the shutter. He only points out that the trap is easy to fall into with digital because of relative ease and the large number of tools available to making corrections with digital after the fact. He does neglect to point out that much learning can be done by looking at one's results.
His whole point is that digital photography requires as much thought and "seriousness" as film-base photography to be successful. In that respect he makes no distinction between film and digital users.
Except for the last bit where his bias towards silver gelatin prints surfaces, he goes to some length to not be anti-digital. His bit about costs, etc, seem to be right on...at least from my experience of running a 20 enlarger darkroom for 20 years, and seeing the expense of maintaining and upgrading a 24 station Mac digital imaging lab (along with printer/ink and paper costs).
But, that is just how I approached his writings...YMMD, and probably will.
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Re: "New Thoughts on Digital Photography" by Bruce Barnbaum
Bruce is right-on! There may be those who achieve greatness thru utilizing some aspect of digital; but it won't be achieved by merely being a proselytizer for the superiority of those digital methods/equipment. Get back to work in whatever is your chosen medium.
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Re: "New Thoughts on Digital Photography" by Bruce Barnbaum
Quote:
Originally Posted by
Ken Lee
You might enjoy this recently updated article entitled
New Thoughts on Digital Photography by photographer Bruce Barnbaum.
A long-time large-format darkroom printer, he has recently made inroads into digital photography, and shares some astute and well-considered observations.
Same old BS as before Barnbaum.
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Re: "New Thoughts on Digital Photography" by Bruce Barnbaum
Quote:
Originally Posted by
Doug Howk
...Get back to work in whatever is your chosen medium.
The best advise! Time for me to develop the last carbon print of the evening (early morning, actually...)
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Re: "New Thoughts on Digital Photography" by Bruce Barnbaum
Quote:
Originally Posted by
Vaughn
It is a lot cleaner and greener than the computer industry, but by no means clean and green.
This is an old argument that has never made sense. Most people have a computer anyway, whether or not they use it for phtotography. It lasts years. I know people love to talk about the instant obsolescence of digital stuff, but my desktop computer was made in 2008. I bought it used, and in a few years when I outgrow it will sell it to someone who will use it for years more. This is becoming more and more typical ... hence the diminished growth in the PC market.
Film, chemistry, paper etc... are consumables, and the need for them is directly proportional to the work you do. As is the effluent. The ecological costs are heavily tilted against traditional methods.
It's not terribly relevant in these circles. Most of the photographic waste in the world came from snapshooters, and most of the silver effluent came from institutional darkrooms (minilabs, schools, hospitals, dental offices, etc.). A few fogies with view cameras are a minor source of the polution, whether using silver or silicon.
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Re: "New Thoughts on Digital Photography" by Bruce Barnbaum
Quote:
Originally Posted by
Michael Alpert
That is, the whole world of superficial convenience...
Another argument the painters made against photography in the mid-nineteenth century.
http://www.paulraphaelson.com/downlo...nology_art.jpg
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Re: "New Thoughts on Digital Photography" by Bruce Barnbaum
Quote:
Originally Posted by
Vaughn
I do not get that impression from Bruce's article, Jay.
None of what he wrote refers to "serious" photographers, but instead, about those who are just getting into photography -- and how the characteristics of the equipment and process can help or hinder the learning process if the person is not aware of the possible traps. The basic trap being using the shotgun effect instead of thinking about such things as the quality of light and composition before one clicks the shutter. He only points out that the trap is easy to fall into with digital because of relative ease and the large number of tools available to making corrections with digital after the fact. He does neglect to point out that much learning can be done by looking at one's results.
His whole point is that digital photography requires as much thought and "seriousness" as film-base photography to be successful. In that respect he makes no distinction between film and digital users.
Except for the last bit where his bias towards silver gelatin prints surfaces, he goes to some length to not be anti-digital. His bit about costs, etc, seem to be right on...at least from my experience of running a 20 enlarger darkroom for 20 years, and seeing the expense of maintaining and upgrading a 24 station Mac digital imaging lab (along with printer/ink and paper costs).
But, that is just how I approached his writings...YMMD, and probably will.
Vaughn,
I think you're moderating Barnbaum's writing. As I read it, he paints "digital shooters" with a much broader brush:
Quote:
...I find it hard to make an exposure — a digital capture — without doing at least an initial quick assessment of some basic compositional elements within the scene...and also give thought to the quality of light before pressing the shutter. Unfortunately I see far too little of that from most (emphasis mine) digital users, especially those who have started with digital equipment.
Even when he is (ostensibly) writing about students, his straw man is the kind of caricature that results when observations follow conclusions:
Quote:
Yet students who approach photography digitally seem to universally ignore the idea of learning about light, about composition, about the relationship of forms in both black-and-white and color, and even fail to understand their own emotional relationship to the subject matter they have chosen. While they are determined to become experts in Photoshop, they seem oblivious, and indeed hostile to the absolute need to understand the fundamentals of light, composition, and their relationship to their chosen subject matter. What results is inevitably: "Garbage in; garbage out."
This brief passage succinctly sums up Barnbaum's view of digital photography and those who, through defects in their very personalities, it seems, fail to recognize its inherent inferiority. His use of universally, fail, oblivious, inevitably, and the old computer axiom, garbage in - garbage out, leaves no room for the reader to come to any conclusion but his. GIGO sums up the entire article and Barnbaum's muddled thinking on its subject. To wit, I'll close with this hilarious tidbit:
Quote:
But also be aware of the most critically important fact: you can't really change the lighting, the basic relationship of forms, or your "feel" of the subject matter through Photoshop.
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Re: "New Thoughts on Digital Photography" by Bruce Barnbaum
I probably do moderate and you take it to the extreme. As far as that last bit, if asked, I am sure that Bruce would also say that the same is true when working in the darkroom. Same with GIGO -- start with a crappy badly-seen image on a negative, you'll end up with a crappy image on the print.
But enough, we read and get different things out of the article...that's cool.
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Re: "New Thoughts on Digital Photography" by Bruce Barnbaum
Quote:
Originally Posted by
paulr
This is an old argument that has never made sense. Most people have a computer anyway, whether or not they use it for phtotography. It lasts years. I know people love to talk about the instant obsolescence of digital stuff, but my desktop computer was made in 2008. I bought it used, and in a few years when I outgrow it will sell it to someone who will use it for years more. This is becoming more and more typical ... hence the diminished growth in the PC market.
The problem with your argument is that "disruptive technologies" interfere with the norm.
My cell phone replaced my home phone long ago, and since moving to film and buying an iPad with 3G and using "the cloud" I have essentially eliminated my need for PC's and even a personal cell phone, and I'm not alone.
The company I work for got my group (19 of us) iPhones and took away our laptops, only kept 2PC's; one for the boss, one for the admin.
There are programmers replacing their PCs with iPads and online computing.
Running and maintaining a PC is becoming like running a Hummer, a high cost endeavor compared to the alternatives.
We are quickly entering the post PC world where they won't be the norm.
Quote:
Originally Posted by
paulr
Film, chemistry, paper etc... are consumables, and the need for them is directly proportional to the work you do. As is the effluent. The ecological costs are heavily tilted against traditional methods.
It's not terribly relevant in these circles. Most of the photographic waste in the world came from snapshooters, and most of the silver effluent came from institutional darkrooms (minilabs, schools, hospitals, dental offices, etc.). A few fogies with view cameras are a minor source of the polution, whether using silver or silicon.
Shifting the snap shooting to cell phones isn't all that bad in my mind.
For my creative work though LF is very economical because I can take and develop a single sheet of 4x5 with very little waste and 1/4 the effluent of a 35mm roll.
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Re: "New Thoughts on Digital Photography" by Bruce Barnbaum
One can make prints every bit as good as Barnbaum's without buying into his personal lockjaw ideology. If his style of teaching works for you, fine ... otherwise there is more
than one way to skin a cat. And I'm not referring to simply dkrm vs digital printing. So
obviously, I do not consider him authority on printing, but just one more opinion.
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Re: "New Thoughts on Digital Photography" by Bruce Barnbaum
As Mr. Barnbaum writes:
"There is nothing about digital photography that forces lack of thinking, but there is much about digital photography that encourages it."
There is nothing about this forum that forces people to be rude and uncivil, but there are several members who encourage it.
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Re: "New Thoughts on Digital Photography" by Bruce Barnbaum
My immediate analogy is music.
I remember a time when I used to sit and do NOTHING but listen to music.
How many do this today?
I bet not many, especially young people.
Music has been cheapened to be background noise.
And Amazon wants to sell me mp3s?
Uhm, no thanks.
I STILL like old vinyl and my tubes!
Quote:
Originally Posted by
Greg Y
"they couldn’t care if it’s a dye transfer or a pigment print or whatever, as long as the object itself is totally amazing, that’s what they care about.”......that seems to be the way modern society is going
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Re: "New Thoughts on Digital Photography" by Bruce Barnbaum
Quote:
Originally Posted by
Ken Lee
As Mr. Barnbaum writes:
"There is nothing about digital photography that forces lack of thinking, but there is much about digital photography that encourages it."
....
This is summarizes the misinformation. There's nothing about digital that encourages lack of thinking. Does a Kodak Instamatic encourage more thoughtful consideration than a Phase One back on a technical camera?
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Re: "New Thoughts on Digital Photography" by Bruce Barnbaum
Though not a particular fan of Barnbaum's work (too dark tonally), or some of his more extreme views even in the traditional realm, I didn't find anything in the otherwise well written article to disagree with, except its verbosity!. It's hard to know who this treatise is aimed at, though I suspect it may have been more of a mea culpa regarding his own feelings about digital. Come to think of it, the oppressive overtones of the article are entirely consistent with the heaviness I feel in his photos. All I can say is that you won't catch me writing such a lengthy article on the web – without pictures! Not that anyone would care to read anything I publish anyway.
I've spent far too little time in my darkroom in the past 2 years, primarily due to financial stresses. Meanwhile, ever increasing physical limitations have forced me to investigate digital as a way to keep the juices flowing. But I have found that even, or especially, with the addition of easily obtainable video with the same device, it is no match for the process of traditional photographic methods. Still worrying about composition, lighting, and phantom "film" costs, it has taken awhile to get to the shoot first (hose) and ask questions later (Photoshop post processing) possibilities of digital. For me, the ends, if you can call a mass machine produced print an artistic end, simply do not justify the means.
Coincidentally, I saw the film Everlasting on the Sundance Channel, recently. While not a very good flick generally, the life journey of the female protagonist, whose most transcendent moments occurred standing over a developing tray, reminded me of how much really do need to make more time for my own darkroom.
Well, that's my story and I'm sticking to it.
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Re: "New Thoughts on Digital Photography" by Bruce Barnbaum
Quote:
Originally Posted by
Ken Lee
As Mr. Barnbaum writes:
"There is nothing about digital photography that forces lack of thinking, but there is much about digital photography that encourages it."
There is nothing about this forum that forces people to be rude and uncivil, but there are several members who encourage it.
True. Ken, thanks for the link.
Bruce will be 70 next year and has been steeped in traditional photography for more than half of those years. I would place more emphasis on his knowledge of that process, and less on what he has yet to learn about digital.
However, among those who have been at this for decades and derive their livelihood from photography, I have heard the same concerns addressed in the article. In particular, the immense cost of constant upgrades and the future accessibility to past imagery.
These are not necessarily concerns of the dilettante, but paramount to many serious workers in the medium.
Bruce has had his share of detractors, but I would not dismiss his message; there is some truth within.
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Re: "New Thoughts on Digital Photography" by Bruce Barnbaum
It is clear from the article that Bruce has very little experience with computers, let alone digital processing. Future accessibility is a non-issue. You can still inexpensively get data copied from 5 1/4" floppies (or even 8" floppies) by many service bureaus (assuming that there is even any meaningful data on 5 1/4" floppies that have not been copied to new media years ago). And files saved in a tiff, or psd formats will be readable by many applications for generations to come. There is nothing new in problems related to data backups and data portability that hasn't already been solved by the millions of businesses who have been storing data for the past 50 years. How many photographers here actually store their negatives in a proper archival manner? There are pros and cons either way, so anyone pointing out the negatives of digital file storage should also point out the negatives of analog negative storage. But the pros for digital files (that Bruce failed to mention) is the ability to store multiple first generation copies in multiple places, with the possibility to copy them endlessly for centuries with much less degradation than a single first generation negative.
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Re: "New Thoughts on Digital Photography" by Bruce Barnbaum
Quote:
Originally Posted by
paulr
No, Paul, this discussion has nothing in common with the old question about photography and "art." It was generated in response to B. B.'s unhappy observation that people using little screens sometimes seem strangely unable to work with commitment or to think in a deliberate, constructive manner. Although I implied that B. B.’s essay presents an incomplete (and therefore distorted) view, I actually share some of his concerns.
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Re: "New Thoughts on Digital Photography" by Bruce Barnbaum
It's always fascinating how much controversy anything Barnbaum writes can actually generate. I sometimes think the man could just comment in writing that, "daytime is usually brighter than nighttime" and face a firestorm of criticism.
FWIW, I liked the article. There is some "straw manning" going on, but it seems a rather valid form of such to me. All the points of his straw man are indeed very commonly encountered, in my experience. I doubt even Bruce would claim they are necessarily found all in the same person. So he's addressing some of the most common points, and if some folks see that as an attack on some hypothetical digital photographer that view seems to me more rooted in a sort of defensiveness than in what Bruce actually wrote. Yes, it's longer than it could be. Yes, he's off base on a few things like the 5-1/4 floppies. (I had a 5-1/4 drive in my machine up until a year and a half ago and still have the drives and boards with controllers for them in my basement junk box. If I needed to do so, I could assemble a computer that could read them and transfer the files via network within a few hours, not to mention using service bureaus.) But his criticisms of some of the more common pitfalls of digital seem accurate to me in general. Nowhere do I read him saying that this makes digital bad or inferior (except in ultimate black and white print quality, a judgment I concur with so far and that even he says could easily change) just different and with different pluses and minuses.
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Re: "New Thoughts on Digital Photography" by Bruce Barnbaum
When I was a kid I had a great teacher (Hello Mr. Pugh, if you're out there!), working in a poor school system, with little support from his administration. One year he suddenly inherited a group of "gifted" students orphaned by their regular teacher. Literally overnight he designed a curriculum for his students, based on critical thinking and decision making. He taught us to recognize a wide range of logical fallacies and cognitive biases in writing (others' and our own), and to analyze arguments. We read Orwell's Politics and the English Language and made truth tables. Every class period began with a logic puzzle. It was fantastic! Not that I didn't love Poe and Twain, but I didn't miss our former teacher one bit. A regular exercise was to "break down" a piece of writing selected by Mr. Pugh, and identify the biases and logical fallacies therein. I smile thinking what my thirteen year old classmates would have made of Barnbaum's essay.
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Re: "New Thoughts on Digital Photography" by Bruce Barnbaum
13 year old aspiring logicians might well have a different opinion from adult photographers.
While I see the value in that kind of thing too I would be crying "foul!" long and loud if it fully supplanted Poe.
Of course it's biased. It's not an academic argument or a legal one. It's his personal view. Love it or hate it or anywhere in between; I doubt Barnbaum cares very much. He doesn't seem too concerned with who disagrees with him.
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Re: "New Thoughts on Digital Photography" by Bruce Barnbaum
Quote:
Originally Posted by
Roger Cole
13 year old aspiring logicians might well have a different opinion from adult photographers.
While I see the value in that kind of thing too I would be crying "foul!" long and loud if it fully supplanted Poe.
Of course it's biased. It's not an academic argument or a legal one. It's his personal view. Love it or hate it or anywhere in between; I doubt Barnbaum cares very much. He doesn't seem too concerned with who disagrees with him.
Nor, given his success, need he be. :)
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Re: "New Thoughts on Digital Photography" by Bruce Barnbaum
Quote:
Originally Posted by
Roger Cole
13 year old aspiring logicians might well have a different opinion from adult photographers.
While I see the value in that kind of thing too I would be crying "foul!" long and loud if it fully supplanted Poe.
Of course it's biased. It's not an academic argument or a legal one. It's his personal view. Love it or hate it or anywhere in between; I doubt Barnbaum cares very much. He doesn't seem too concerned with who disagrees with him.
Roger,
The 13 year old logicians needn't have any opinion about the subject matter at all to recognize the logical fallacies and biases in the essay, which might go some way towards informing their judgments of the material as presented.
I think critical thinking dovetailed quite nicely with Poe and Twain.
Yes, it's biased, but Barnbaum is presenting himself as an authority, and the ways it's biased are important in weighting his opinions.
I don't think Barnbaum's feelings about my analysis of his essay (and there's no reason to believe he has any feelings about, or knowledge of it) are at all relevant to the discussion.
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Re: "New Thoughts on Digital Photography" by Bruce Barnbaum
Quote:
Originally Posted by
Roger Cole
...and if some folks see that as an attack on some hypothetical digital photographer that view seems to me more rooted in a sort of defensiveness than in what Bruce actually wrote.
I'm not sure why pointing out flaws in logic needs to be perceived as coming from someone feeling attacked, or being defensive. It's just pointing out flaws in logic. It doesn't have to come form some emotional state.
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Re: "New Thoughts on Digital Photography" by Bruce Barnbaum
Quote:
Originally Posted by
Old-N-Feeble
Nor, given his success, need he be. :)
Incidentally, this is an example of one of the common logical fallacies we were taught to recognize-- it's an appeal to authority-- as if Barnbaum's supposed authority has some bearing on an analysis of his writing, which of course it cannot. It reveals a conflation of Barnbaum's abilities as a photographer with the strength of his argument. And he is making an argument, though not a strong one.