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Thread: Thoughtful Photography

  1. #11

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    Re: Thoughtful Photography

    Quote Originally Posted by Brian K View Post
    I guess in a day and age when photography for many requires no thought thanks to automation, giving thought to a photograph at the time of capture is a novel idea and worth notice......
    Interesting comment, and largely true. I chuckle every time i see someone with a camera shooting 50 frames to capture (possibly) that which may of us would only shoot 2 or 3 frames.

    But for many people, like a bunch who hang out on this forum, the "thoughful" part is rather intuitive. Sure it gets done but not fussed over. Perhaps this is a situation where it is obvious how different people thinka nd express themselves. As an insightful but "private" person I tend to think but not hash intuitive ideas out loud. Others think and express themselves mer, ummm... expressively.

  2. #12

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    Re: Thoughtful Photography

    Quote Originally Posted by Brian C. Miller View Post
    As a matter of fact, in the first sentence, "PhaseOne IQ 180 Field Review" should have been a dead giveaway that the source of the quote was a product review. You weren't really confused about that, were you?

    The "On Photography" section of the forum is exactly the place to discuss things like this. What is "thoughtful photography" to you? Is it nothing more than setting up the camera and making a good exposure? Or is there more to it than that? Is there any philosophy of photography at all in your life? Why persue "art" if there is no philosophy behind what is produced? Without philosophy, doesn't art devolve into some kind of repetetive psychosis? Why touch brush and paint to canvas? Why bang on a rock with hammer and chisel? Why load up a cumbersome box and expose film?

    The basis of what we do is the art of communication. We are trying to communicate an idea from noggin A to noggin B. Our medium of artistic expression is photography. If we are choosing to express something, thinking about the final product should be de rigueur.
    Did you actually read my message? Of course I wasn't confused that it was product review since I pointed that out to you. I thought you were confused since you seemed to expect to find an essay on what one should consider in making a photograph in a product review. And I said nothing about discussing "thoughtful photography" in the "On Photography" section of this forum so I don't know what your point is with that.

    I have no problem with discussing what should go through one's mind when making a photograph if you like those sorts of discussions. My problem with your message was that you incorrectly described what the reviewer of a product meant by "thoughtful photography" and used your incorrect description as a launching point from which to to disparage the reviewer (and, by implication, the product being reviewed as in "look guys, here's what these digital people think of as 'thoughtful photography' ").
    Brian Ellis
    Before you criticize someone, walk a mile in their shoes. That way when you do criticize them you'll be
    a mile away and you'll have their shoes.

  3. #13
    Abuser of God's Sunlight
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    Re: Thoughtful Photography

    The guy's point seems reasonable to me. He's talking specifically about what a nuissance framing and focussing used to be with a medium format technical camera—much more so than with a 4x5 or 8x10 (his observation, not mine—I have yet to use a tech camera). He's found that this new back of gear let's him streamline the process and spend less time fussing over a tiny ground glass, a sliding camera back, an ultra-powerful focussing loupe, etc. etc.

  4. #14
    Richard M. Coda
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    Re: Thoughtful Photography

    A little off topic, but I took a workshop 11 years ago where Mark was in attendance. This was back when he was doing 8x10 color and making his own color carbon transfer prints. The thing that struck me about him back then was that he was a perfectionist. He explained his metering routing to me and it blew my mind. Seeing him say "guess the exposure" makes me wonder what has happened to him. ???
    Photographs by Richard M. Coda
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  5. #15
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    Re: Thoughtful Photography

    Quote Originally Posted by Richard M. Coda View Post
    Seeing him say "guess the exposure" makes me wonder what has happened to him. ???
    I imagine that he cares about the results, not about how he gets there. And that with this particular back, with its high dynamic range, he can get the exposure he wants with one or two guesses more quickly than he can through elaborate metering.

    More than half the time shooting 4x5 black and white, my method was to guess the exposure, shoot, and then meter afterwards to check myself. This proved much faster in most circumstances than metering first. I didn't have to worry about the light changing, a helicopter invading the sky, the wind picking up, etc. etc...

    He's talking about the same thing, but is able to dispense with the meter entirely because the screen on the back lets him check the exposure directly.

  6. #16
    Mark Sawyer's Avatar
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    Re: Thoughtful Photography

    ...and I imagine the histogram tells him more than the meter.

    I'd agree that he was talking more about the the process-level thought process than the heart/mind/soul thought process. Both have their place.
    "I love my Verito lens, but I always have to sharpen everything in Photoshop..."

  7. #17

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    Re: Thoughtful Photography

    Having read the article all I can say is that his process still sounds a hell of a lot more complicated than it should be, and if he's having to give that much thought to the process then it's taking away from the thought that the image itself should have. The very fact that he's writing a camera review shows that his priorities are still hardware oriented.

    I've played piano for nearly 40 years and don't consider myself a musician or even a piano player. Because unless it's a piece of music that I've played a million times I still have to think about the technique. I still see notes, a musician hears notes. It's a quantum difference.

    For the most part all of my camera systems have become point and shoot for me, at least on the technical end. I use "sunny 16" and experience for most of my exposures.
    To me photography works best when you can just see the image without having to think about it too much. It becomes instinctual or intuitive.

  8. #18
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    Re: Thoughtful Photography

    Quote Originally Posted by Brian K View Post
    I still see notes, a musician hears notes. It's a quantum difference.
    You are overstating this. A musician translates from the written note (or, more correctly, the written phrase) and hears the execution as they execute it. They do not waste conscious thought on such things as "that note is the second line of the treble clef, which is a G. And a G is the white key between the two black keys in the group of three. And this note is marked forte, and is market with a legato articulation. So, strike that key softly and leave your finger down until the next note is struck..."

    But then you can read a sentence aloud without thinking "first inhale. Then observe the characters on the page. If the first phoneme is 'th' followed by 'e', place the tongue on the roof of the mouth and exhale a hum through it, and then spread the mouth wide and shallow and hum through that, spending approximately 1/4 second..."

    The reason you don't is because you can look at the words on the page and hear the sentence spoken aloud, as you speak it. The mechanics are handled sub-consciously.

    It does not take a superior musician to do this, just as reading aloud requires no more than a second-grade skill.

    The better the musician, the bigger the chunk of music they can stuff into a buffer to be executed without reading in detail. But even this is a skill of practice--practice playing unfamiliar rather than familiar music.

    As photographers, the application of technique during photography is not a performance skill as is music. It does not have to be fluid. We have time--usually. It does have to be subservient to our artistic goals, and that is the same as with music. That's why I took a music lesson (not a tuba lesson) from a violinist, some years ago, and the first thing he had me play was "twinkle, twinkle, little star".

    Rick "who makes both music and photography harder than it needs to be" Denney

  9. #19
    Mark Sawyer's Avatar
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    Re: Thoughtful Photography

    Quote Originally Posted by Brian K View Post
    I still see notes, a musician hears notes. It's a quantum difference.
    Quote Originally Posted by rdenney View Post
    You are overstating this.
    Not really. When I photograph, I not only see the subject, I see tonal gradations in grey, and I see intensities of light. I honestly do. And I think a lot of other photographers do too, especially in the LF black-and-white crowd. We could hardly help it! And someone new to it would still meter to see what the "zone spread" is. Same thing...
    "I love my Verito lens, but I always have to sharpen everything in Photoshop..."

  10. #20

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    Re: Thoughtful Photography

    Quote Originally Posted by rdenney View Post
    You are overstating this. A musician translates from the written note (or, more correctly, the written phrase) and hears the execution as they execute it. They do not waste conscious thought on such things as "that note is the second line of the treble clef, which is a G. And a G is the white key between the two black keys in the group of three. And this note is marked forte, and is market with a legato articulation. So, strike that key softly and leave your finger down until the next note is struck..."

    But then you can read a sentence aloud without thinking "first inhale. Then observe the characters on the page. If the first phoneme is 'th' followed by 'e', place the tongue on the roof of the mouth and exhale a hum through it, and then spread the mouth wide and shallow and hum through that, spending approximately 1/4 second..."

    The reason you don't is because you can look at the words on the page and hear the sentence spoken aloud, as you speak it. The mechanics are handled sub-consciously.

    It does not take a superior musician to do this, just as reading aloud requires no more than a second-grade skill.

    The better the musician, the bigger the chunk of music they can stuff into a buffer to be executed without reading in detail. But even this is a skill of practice--practice playing unfamiliar rather than familiar music.

    As photographers, the application of technique during photography is not a performance skill as is music. It does not have to be fluid. We have time--usually. It does have to be subservient to our artistic goals, and that is the same as with music. That's why I took a music lesson (not a tuba lesson) from a violinist, some years ago, and the first thing he had me play was "twinkle, twinkle, little star".

    Rick "who makes both music and photography harder than it needs to be" Denney
    Rick I used to date a concert pianist, trained at the highest levels in Russia and at Julliard, when she looked at written music she heard it as music, when she heard music she could just write it down verbatim or just play it verbatim. It's a different level of musical ability than most people can understand. And that's why I considered her a musician and myself not much more than a guy who owns a piano.

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