Inkjet and Hunington Witherill

[Paddy Quinn]

"Ask yourself... I pose this question to kirk as he started the thread... Imagine you were holding in your hands a silver print on fiber paper and the same image shot on a digital camera and printed on an inkjet... Which looks richer, more dimentional, and more elegant?" As much as we'd like to squint and wish an inkjet had the impact as a fiber print, it just doesn't. However, I'm looking for the ultimate in results... I'm looking for what pleases me most. And, at the time, it happens to be traditional analog photography."

So, now you have two prints of the same image in your hands - one is a silver print on fiber paper and the other is a platinum print on alovely hand made japanese paper - which one is clearly the better now. Which gives the ultimate in results? Which looks richer, more dimentional, and more elegant?

[Jorge Gasteazoro]

Some people are so concerned with the method of capture, that they even go as far as claiming anything not shot with film is somehow less valuable....less of a photo

This is the lie that Witherill and people like you would like to make reality. Nothing can be further from the truth and clearly it would be dumb to believe the method of capture is the most important thing.

What many of us believe is that the method of reproduction has a greater intrinsic value, and that those like you who call your prints "platinum tone" are trying to deceive people and ride the coat tails of established processes pretending your brown ink jet print is just as good.

In the end for all his rant about the wonderfulness of ink jet printing, Witherill is still making contact silver prints from digital negatives.......wonder why that is?

[Paul Butzi]

re: Witherill's color work...

it reminds me of nothing so much as the state of the contemporary art quilt world a year or two back. Do you think, perhaps, that Witherill has committed the unpardonable sin of actually looking at art that's not photography, and is such a heretic that he's allowed himself to be influenced by it?

Could he have looked at a catalog from, say, the big annual quilt show in Paducah, and decided that it looked like an interesting artistic path to explore?

And meanwhile, the large format world, secure in its narrow, prescriptive and restrictive view of what Art is, had done what? Made another soul-petrifying mass of photographs of rocks and trees? Wow! Add that new pile of prints titled "Rock and Tree, Weston Beach, 2005" to the big pile of prints already there and you have... AN EVEN BIGGER PILE!!! Now, you have to admit, that's an artistic achievement of real significance, beside which Witherill's feeble effort to explore new ground simply pales. Talk about cheek! The man actually has the hubris to START A NEW PILE!

Get grip, folks. There are more things in Heaven and Earth than are dreamt of in your narrow, smallminded photographic philosophy.

Art isn't about a 100% success rate. Or, as my kids use to tell me when they were learning to rock climb, "if you're not flying, you're not trying" - in other words, if you aren't falling once in a while, you aren't making progress.

[Paddy Quinn]

"In the end for all his rant about the wonderfulness of ink jet printing, Witherill is still making contact silver prints from digital negatives.......wonder why that is?"

Simple: it isn't an either/or; take it or leave it proposition

[Jorge Gasteazoro]

Simple: it isn't an either/or; take it or leave it proposition

Oh really? then why does he make it sound like it is in his rant?

[Jorge Gasteazoro]

Get grip, folks. There are more things in Heaven and Earth than are dreamt of in your narrow, smallminded photographic philosophy.

The again, "big" minds can have a lot of wasted empty space in them.....

[Michael Gordon]

Thank you, Paul, for your sensible reply.

Once again, the LF forum endures yet another (yaaawwwnn) tedious traditional vs. digital debate, and a good artist takes a beating for making his art.

[David Luttmann]

It appears some here are just spoiling for another attack. I'll leave them to it.

As an aside, Witherill mentions this same type of attack and hate mail shortly after posting the article. I'll give you one guess at which side of the camp went on the defensive. I'll second Michael's comment on Paul's post.

[Jorge Gasteazoro]

Funny, how someone writes a piece of crap and then calls disenting opinions "attacks"....... typical of pixelographes, on the defensive when one does not agree with them.

[darr]

I happen to like Witherill's art and I have bought a couple of his books in support of it. As a photographer I remember when I got the job because my work was more creative than the other photographers they interviewed. I guess having an art and graphics background is sometimes intimidating to others that merely photograph the landscape or as Paul stated so correctly:

"And meanwhile, the large format world, secure in its narrow, prescriptive and restrictive view of what Art is, had done what? Made another soul-petrifying mass of photographs of rocks and trees? Wow! Add that new pile of prints titled "Rock and Tree, Weston Beach, 2005" to the big pile of prints already there and you have... AN EVEN BIGGER PILE!!! Now, you have to admit, that's an artistic achievement of real significance, beside which Witherill's feeble effort to explore new ground simply pales. Talk about cheek! The man actually has the hubris to START A NEW PILE!"

I have seen a few brown photos of someone who has posted in this thread that were posted on photo.net and my first thought was this guy really needs to take a class or two in graphic design, specifically "cropping". There is a reason it is called photo-graphics.