The good old bad old days. Or, as time goes byte.

“Is digital photography making photographers lazy? Is it bringing in new talent who wouldn't otherwise have a chance to produce great "art" without understanding basic photographic techniques?”

In other words “Has digital made you a better photographer or has it made it easier for you to be a photographer?”

I got thinking about workflow and picture editing recently.

I read on Twitter about a cosmonaut who shot 35000 images during his time in space.

I see Tweets from photographers saying:

“A day of catching up on retouching”

“Catching up on retouching today”

“1300 images down to 107 selects… now to choose the final 10 images”

“Retouching marathon… 24 hours before I fly”

“1600 images down to 110 selects”

.. and so it goes on.

Don’t get me wrong. I’m not criticising these very talented photographers, but when I read that they are shooting several THOUSAND images on a job then I get to wondering. Is this a case of "Spray 'n Pray?" I.e. Take loads of pictures and some of them are sure to be OK.

I have never shot that many images on one job but it seems to be slowly affecting me also. I recently shot a friends’ wedding and was amazed afterwards to see that I taken 680 pictures! Granted I had to reject 47 of them due to people blinking or the flash not going off and I’d been photographing constantly for eighteen hours but I’ve NEVER previously shot so many pictures on one job. I guess that this is due to my being raised with film. Previously I always knew that there were only 36 exposures to play with and that they had to be developed and that I wouldn’t see the results until they came back from the lab. This taught me about trying to get it right first time in the camera. I certainly do not want to spend half a day messing about on a computer after a job.

I was reminded of this a couple of weekends ago. I was in the French part of Switzerland and had set up my tripod and composed a photograph for a brochure shoot. I did a last minute check through the viewfinder. All verticals vertical? check. Horizontal lines true? Check. Then I noticed about six metres (about 20 feet) away a white object on the floor. I looked up and saw that it was a cigarette packet. Discarded by some Neanderthal too stupid to deposit it a bin.

I thought to myself. It's barely a speck and will be nearly invisible on the final TIFF file. I can always correct it in post production. Then it hit me. Digital photography is making me lazy. I went and deposited the packet into the nearest bin.
 

I have Photoshop. Version six to be exact. I don't need more as there isn't enough time for me to learn all its nuances. I use it mainly to spot my images, slightly sharpen images that the RAW conversion programme hasn't done properly and to correct converging verticals in photos where I didn't have a tilt and shift lens / camera combo with me on site. ( For that particular feature I use a Photoshop addon called "PTLens" by Tom Niemann)

All these things I used to do in the days when I used a darkroom. Dust would be blown off with some canned air, focus could be checked with the loupe under the enlarger and verticals corrected (somewhat) by tilting the enlarger head or at the taking process by either raising the camera (if possible) or using a tilt / shift lens.

If it’s people photography, then I may retouch a pimple or two but that’s as far as it goes. I’d like to think that the subject likes my pictures because it shows him / her as they really are. I get dismayed when I see the heavily airbrushed magazine covers on the shelves here. Beaming faces with impossibly flawless complexions. 

This image hasn't been 'shopped

I’m really trying with this post, not to sound like some Luddite who is afraid of welcoming new equipment and ideas. I'm not against technology but I use it sparingly.  I love the histogram feature on my camera. It gives me instant feedback and lets me know (most of the time), if I’m over or under exposing. But for most of the time, I shoot with the camera on manual and about half the time with the lens on manual focus. I still carry a Minolta light meter with me for those times when I want to have peace of mind regarding exposure. Granted, the instant preview is also good because now I don’t have to worry if my subject blinked or if a car or other object encroached on the image whilst I was taking it. It’s also good to give feedback to the model about the pose. In the old days, I’d have a mirror behind me (on studio shoots), where the model could see themselves and how the pose looked.

But even if digital went away tomorrow, I'd still be in love with the medium of photography and I'd still be able to limit myself to 36 pictures.


How many of today's current crop of rising star digital photogrpahers could say that?


Tom

Interesting day

Photographing my friend Raphaela bodypainting the lovely Kisha today at the 15th Cruising Night party in Rothrist Switzerland.

 

More pictures to follow, .  .  .

The times they are a changing. Part two.

I've been trying to rescue space in my photographic cupboard at work.

The old stuff definitely has to go.

Stuff like these filters. Made superfluous by the march of digital photography and auto white balance.

 Glass artificial light conversion filters

Room now for drinks in the fridge

instead of Kodak Gel filters.

Amongst some of the other "memorabilia" I came across was a brand new, still in the box Canon Ni-Cd battery pack (I don't even know which motor-drive it fits into) and a film tongue extractor!

I'm sure there's more to discover.  :o)

One wedding and a reshoot

Two weekends ago I was asked to photograph a wedding for a very good friend of mine. 


Raphaela was marrying her fiance Lars, and as I've known her since 2002 and done previous photographic work for her, she was pleased when I accepted her offer to be both guest and photographer.


Raphaela asked me to provide documentary style coverage with a few of the "regular" pictures of parents and family etc thrown in. She didn't want the images presented in a traditional album but instead would use an online printing service to make a photobook.


The ceremony was due to take place at 13:00. I turned up bright and early at 09:30 and started my work. The pictures I took at the house included her getting here hair done, getting dressed and leaving for the church.


Everything went well until after the church. I had planned to get some shots of the couple outside the church but it began to rain so we went on to the post wedding Apèro. 


After the post wedding Apèro we all headed 58 kilometers to the reception. the weather got progressively worse and by the time I reached the hotel where the reception was to be held, it was pouring down.


To add to my worries, there were no free rooms at the hotel where I could make some nice portraits of the couple.


I explained to Raphaela and Lars that i wouldn't feel that I had done a complete job unless I had some nice intimate pictures of the two of them.


Watching the sky getting progressively darker and the rain getting heavier, I had an idea.


"How about you both just enjoy yourselves tonight and I'll come by your place next week and get some pictures of the two of you?" I suggested.


Raphaela explained that they wouldn't be having a honeymoon until later in the year so my plan seemed like a winner.


Breathing a heavy sigh of relief, I concentrated on covering the party. And what a party! There were games, an Elvis impersonator, a belly dancer and lots lots more. Raphaela and her guests certainly know how to enjoy themselves  :o)

 Elvis is on the floor  Uh Huh.

Raphaela is a big Elvis fan

 Time for Ulrika the belly dancer

 Nadja gets to grips with the belly dancer

 Everyone enjoyed themselves

Young and old as well

At the end of the evening (which was 02:30 for me), I had shot 680 images with my EOS 7d and the EOS 5d. The next day I looked through them using my Canon DPP software and had to reject 47, due to either the flash not activating or (mostly) Raphaela blinking!


As an aside. In the "old days" when I shot film at a wedding, I would ask my subject after taking their photo, to close their eyes and tell me if they could see purple blobs. If the answer was yes, then their eyes had been open when the flash activated. Nowadays I just check the monitor.


I shoot everything in RAW so my (very simple) workflow consists of pressing CTRL + A to select all the files, sharpen them all, give them all a half a stop underexposure, correct the lens aberrations, convert the lot into 300 dpi JPG's then go and have a cup of tea!


The day of the reshoot was yesterday. The sky clouded over again and for a very short while it threatened to rain. 


However, after a short wait the threat subsided and we began our "sequel".


Raphaela told me afterwards that the shoot was much more relaxed and stress free as there wasn't an actual ceremony and guests to worry about. This was evident to me because of the constant joking and smiles.


I used the EOS 7d for this shoot as my EOS 5d is getting fixed. This is a very small selection of what we took.

 EOS 7d, 430 EX flash and 28 -135 lens

  EOS 7d, 430 EX flash and 17 - 40 lens

   EOS 7d, 430 EX flash and 17 - 40 lens

   EOS 7d, 430 EX flash and 17 - 40 lens

   EOS 7d, and  70 - 200 lens

  EOS 7d, 430 EX flash and 17 - 40 lens

I took 121 images of which 107 went to the couple. Raphaela's blinking meant that I had to discard the other 14!!


That's it for now. Thanks for reading and please leave a comment.