I think you're making the irrational assumption that sharpness is tantamount to good technique - or that, if the print is not fully sharp - then it's shoddy. I'd agree that if it's the author's sole intent - to have print that exhibits 'fine sharpness' and the prints fails on these terms - perhaps it approaches the 'shoddy' but under no other circumstances. I'm guessing you haven't seen a whole lot of art (??).Originally Posted by Neal Shields
Are all platinum prints therefore 'shoddy'?
Platinum is probably a bad example, as it is capable of extremely fine resolution and sharpness, if the original negative has it as well. The greatest source of loss of sharpness came from the arrival of enlarging images instead of contact printing. Go look at a daguerrotype or wet-plate work printed on albumen. Detail out the gazoo! The biggest change was the downsizing of negatives and the use of enlargers to make prints.
Perhaps too much emphasis on one aspect over other aspects. I recall the GigaPXL Project at MOPA, and they had magnifying glasses (like a loupe) available for anyone attending the exhibit. I noticed that hardly anyone took one to look at the images, despite there was more detail in these large prints than the unaided eye could see. There was another exhibit of painting I attended recently that involved magnifying glasses near the images; they were so small that you needed them to see details. Interesting as a curiosity item, but I think it was a bit strange approach.
I have a printers loupe for checking commercial prints and proofs. However, this is mostly to judge registration issues, or to evaluate for greater (larger) print sizes. Other than that, I do look at transparency film with a loupe, but probably a common practice.
Some people want to quantify anything, so measuring is a way to do that. Take a look at other forums about photography on the internet, and people want to see images on their computer monitor for comparison. Monitors are low resolution, so sharpness can help make one image seem better than another. There is also PhotoShop, and an emphasis on Unsharp Masking. I see way too many prints that indicate over-sharpening. So maybe PhotoShop usage is driving some of the over-emphasis on sharpness?
Ciao!
Gordon Moat
A G Studio
That's called "drawing."
I made a sharp photograph of fog a few weeks back...
Guess I've seen the wrong platinum prints then... most of what I've seen have been quite 'fuzzy'... anyway - I'm sure you know what I'm trying to say. Yes -I'd concur vis-a-vis the daguerrotypes, etc..
"I'm guessing you haven't seen a whole lot of art (??)."
Because I don't agree with you?
I have traveled over 1.5 million miles to over 30 foreign countries in 57 years and taken advantage of those travels to see all the art I can, especially art from the prospective of different cultures.
The Yorba tribes in Africa deliberately leave their tool marks as part of their art. That doesn't make it shoddy. In fact part of the idea is that it glorifies the work, the materials and tools used to make the art.
If the vision says "fuzzy" and the art is sharp, that would be shoddy.
I forget in the last post to point out that Ctien, who has done some of the best work defining sharpness, does mostly dye transfer where much of the sharpness captured in the original large format negative is lost. However, it is lost deliberately.
I have no problems at all with, for example, Sally Mann's work. Her art is undoubtly better because it isn't sharp.
About 30 years ago I saw an exhibition on the Fauves which included some of Henri Matisse's early and late works hung side by side. An early work of a bowl of fruit, could have been a high resolution photograph and a much later work had taken almost exactly the same scene and boiled it down to its essential essences. Both were world class works of art. The fact that the impressionists in most cases (I have also seen a similar comparison of Picasso's work before he entered his cubist phase. Note: I saw "Guernica" before it went back to Spain and while definitely not "sharp" it is one of the most moving works I have ever seen.) chose to leave out what they considered superfulous didn't make there art shoddy, it simply worked better for what they wanted to do.
The point is, getting sharpness of greater than 60 lp/mm to film is a chore. If you avoid that chore because you don't need it to complete your vision fine. In fact it is probably harder to make a striking photograph that isn't sharp than one that is.
However, if you decide that your vision doesn't include sharpness just to get out of the extra work, then that is probably "shoddy".
I haven't heard anyone here maintaining that unsharp photographs are somehow less worthwhile and they don't seem threaten by them. Why do you seem to be threatened by sharp ones?
"There is nothing worse than a sharp image of a fuzzy concept."
-Ansel Adams
Neal - I asked you that because I've seen TONS of 'non-sharp' (let's call it that) art over lots of years... maybe you should qualify it by saying that you're talking about representational art only?
ANYWAY - I made the comments I made simply because you seemed unduly fascistic about the sharpness issue - without allowing too much room for alternatives. I'm not sure where I said anything that suggests that I disliked 'sharp' prints. Quite the contrary. In fact - I used to be a maniac about such things when I was just starting out - examining negs in a microscope, etc... I was simply defending the rights of those to do work that suits their vision.
You seem to extract a lot more from my words than I intended. I'm happy to discuss it if you have certain issues with it though.
"Guernica" was probably a bad example, now that I think about it, because unlike an impressionist painting that limits itself to one or a few impressions of a usually simple subject: “guernica” shrank an entire war onto a single canvas. Rather than giving you an impression of a war, it overwhelms you with the details of a war. Therefore it is probably more analogous to a sharp photograph than a fuzzy one. Also like a sharp photograph it suffers a great deal from reproduction, but I am not sure why.
Anyone that isn’t moved by the actual painting, is either intellectually or morally stunted.
What?
You've never moved in to see the brushwork on another painter's work? You've never stepped up to a sculpture to feel the texture of the stone? That is the same visceral experience that print sniffers are looking for when the inspect a print up close.
From now on, never be closer than 6 feet from the world around yourself. Take off your glasses. Don't read anything unless it's on a billboard. Become a stoner. Dull your senses. Only listen to music with no individually discernible instruments. Type with your palms (or knuckles, either will work effectively well). Don't comb your hair, or better, don't bother washing as well. What's a few details along the way?
Detail, while not the only thing important in life, is often a very important aspect of the experiences that make life satisfying, even if you discount the details along the way as simply subconscious stimulus.
Detail is an important part of some people's photographic expression, and who are you to knock them for it? It's an individual choice and thankfully there are no rules to photography, as there are no rules to any other form of personal expression. If you don't like it, then don't do it.
Oh, and Tim, a bad photograph isn't made better by being out of focus, but it does actually come a little closer to obliterating it, which maybe is better, in a way.
---Michael
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