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| Zoom (Photo: Simon Meeds) |
Some of us grew up with film photography, others came straight in to digital. Some still use film regularly or from time to time, others no longer use it or have never used it. There may be some correlation between film experience and photographic traditionalism, but it is not 100%. I for example had about 26 years' experience using film before I bought my first digital camera and in theory at least, I continue to use film from time to time. However, I think I am very liberal in my attitude to different people's approaches to photography as well as being varied in my own approach to it.
That's important because I'm not attacking anyone here, just acknowledging that different approaches are perfectly valid. There are some things that ring alarm bells for me, but I wouldn't attack people simply because they use a particular tool in a particular way. If their results suggest to me they use their tools inappropriately then I may criticise.
In Outdoor Photography issue 291, Nick Smith interviewed Mark Gilligan. Here are some excerpts...
NS: So, you don't do much post-processing?
MG: Because I spend most of my time composing and setting the image up, that releases me from spending ages working on lots of layers and manipulating the shot digitally to create what I think it should be. I find looking at the view is a more practical way of getting what you want than sitting on your backside at a screen. That's why most of my images are processed in less than a minute.
NS: Some people might call you an old-fashioned photographer?
MG: Well, I don't shoot many frames, if that's what you mean. I was out in the field last October and in a full day, I took six pictures, but you could have put every one on your wall or in a magazine. Because I come from the film era, you have to be economical with what you shoot. When you take a picture, you're taking a decision and it has to be the right decision. I call it 'the click'. I'll spend more time looking at the composition, using spot metering, which means I know I'm going to get it as right as possible. But you've got to understand the light. So, I'm a bit old school.
NS: Do you think film was harder to master?
MG: Well, you just had five things: aperture, speed, focus, ASA (as ISO was in those days), and then the most important thing, you.
Without you, the little box wouldn't do anything. We didn't have all these menus and software. All we had was a box.
Gilligan's way of working is perfectly valid, but it is not the only one. He falls into some of the traps, but not all of them.
Trap 1 - Post-processing started with digital
Post processing is as old as photography whether it's work done while developing a film, while enlarging a print, or on a toning or cutting desk afterwards, it has all been done. There's very little that we can imagine doing in digital editing that hasn't been done in "wet photography".
Even the idea that it's always easier to do things digitally only holds true in part. Dodging and burning for example can be easier done in a darkroom than on the computer screen. The main benefit in this case of the computer is that once the work is done we can repeatedly print the results or add to them rather than having to start again from scratch.
Trap 2 - Time spent behind the camera is better than time spent in front of the computer screen
Each of us has a view of what we would rather be doing: taking photographs, editing digital files, eating a nice meal... Just because you prefer one over the others doesn't mean everyone feels the same, and it doesn't mean your way is better than anyone else's. It's your way, that's all. I'm happy doing either activity: sometimes it's great to be out with my camera, other times I enjoy relaxing into some editing.
This is no different to trying to argue that time spent on the hillside is better than time spent in the studio, never mind time spent in the darkroom.
Trap 3 - Machine gun photography is a new phenomenon
This one is half true. In film days it was possible to have a motor drive to run film through your camera at a rate of knots. It would quickly get through your 36 exposure roll, so you might also consider a bulk film back - and they were only available for select cameras. Generally such set-ups were used only by sports photographers (only rarely by nature photographers even).
Now with digital everyone can take several frames per second. There is still though value in the skill of being able to press the shutter at the right time. If you take 10 frames per second at 1/1000s you are missing 99% of the shooting opportunities ((1000-10)/1000 = 99%). It can still be better to just hit the shutter button at the right time.
Trap 4 - Every image I take is a good one
I often paraphrase a quote I once heard from well-known people photographer,
Patrick Lichfield. He said that some amateur photographers (perhaps meaning family "snappers") would complain when they thought they had one or two "bad" photographs from a roll of 36 frames, while he would be pleased if he got one or two "good" ones.
Lord Lichfield was of course dealing with real people, even if they were often models, who may or may not perform as expected every moment. A landscape photographer on the other hand is generally dealing with a view which develops mostly predictably and while it may occasionally change by the second, it is more usually changing by the minute. Therefore the landscape photographer may expect a higher hit rate than the portrait worker.
We often say that certain ways of working slow the photographer down and therefore increase his or her hit rate. Perhaps it is using a medium or large format camera, or using a tripod. While it is true that we can use almost any type of digital camera to take quick snaps, it is largely a state of mind, and while these physical constraints may help us be disciplined, there's no real substitute for discipline coming from the photographer.
Trap 5 - Film is harder
Gilligan is talking about the facilities supplied by a digital camera which might seem to make it easier to take a photograph than with a film camera, but is this really the case?
Many film cameras, certainly from the late 70s or early 80s onwards, provided some form of automatic exposure, and some from the late 80s or early 90s provided automatic focusing. Maybe all of the modes now available in digital photography weren't there, but there was something to help out.
But to what extent do they really help?
Automatic exposure is helpful to the extent that it finds some sort of baseline. It should be a little more difficult than with manual exposure to get it totally wrong in the heat of the moment. Actually it's still quite possible to get it wrong, but that's a different matter, and when time isn't an issue manual exposure should be at least as accurate as long as there's a light meter in the camera or the photographer has an external one.
I'm a fan of automatic exposure, not donning the hair shirt of some photographers who insist on manual, though I want to be the master of the auto-exposure, not its slave.
You see, the issue with exposure isn't getting a "valid" exposure, but rather getting the exposure which delivers the desired effect. The camera will work out some reasonable exposure in most cases, but the first question to ask is whether it's the desired exposure.
We don't want snow at 18% grey, and neither do we want coal with that tone. We therefore need to apply some experience and knowledge in terms of exposure compensation. Even that gives us not one correct exposure, but a continuum of exposures where shutter speed, aperture and ISO vary around a single "Exposure Value" (EV).
We now need to apply more knowledge and experience to work out what shutter speed we need to deliver a frozen or blurred subject, what aperture to deliver the required depth of field, and what ISO to deliver the required noise level and dynamic range. That doesn't sound very easy. We can of course just let the camera get on with it, but sometimes we just need more control.
Then there's focus. Auto-focus mechanisms and algorithms are improving all the time, but still we often want to control what is in or out of focus, and the camera, left to its own devices may make the wrong assumption. I would argue that auto-focus is in fact more difficult to use than manual focus was in film cameras, and manual focus is significantly hampered by the lack of the old focus aids (microprisms and split screen).
Then there's...
Trap 6 - Chimping
"Chimping" is a derogatory term for looking at the image you've just taken on the back LCD screen of your camera. Of course, with the exception of instant cameras, this option was (and is) not available to the film photographer. Advice against over-chimping is not without foundation. While you are looking at the last photograph you took you could be taking the next, and by chimping you may be missing the action.
Going back to traps 3 and 4 though, it is not always the speed of shooting that matters, but the timing, accuracy and intent. By selective chimping we can more quickly learn how to deal with a scene. We don't need to wait until we download and process the images by which time the moment has gone, we may not be able to remember the precise situation, and we may not be able to learn in order to improve how we deal with future situations. Chimping can be a valuable tool.
Trap 7 - Is it sharp?
Intentional Camera Movement (ICM) may be a trend and perhaps intentional out-of-focus is too, or maybe they are just enabled by digital photography. People have surely been doing these things since the dawn of photography, but digital allows us to take several or many shots with little or no financial cost. That means we can experiment, throw away the failures and keep, even exhibit, those which we think are successes. When using these techniques there are people who think that there can be no success, but why does photography have to be literal? Can it not be impressionistic? There's a whole new discussion here in the intertwined histories of photography and painting. That's something for another day.
Postscript
I'll sign off with a quote from
Terry Pratchett's first Discworld novel, The Colour of Magic.
Twoflower stood on tiptoe to whisper, "I expect you know what this is, don't you?"
Rincewind stared down at the box. It had a round glass eye protruding from the centre of one face, and a lever at the back.
"It's a device for making pictures quickly," said Twoflower. "Quite a new invention. I'm rather proud of it but, look, I don't think these gentlemen would - well, I mean they might be - sort of apprehensive? Could you explain it to them? I'll reimburse them for their time, of course."
"He's got a box with a demon in it that draws pictures," said Rincewind shortly. "Do what the madman says and he will give you gold."
The Watch smiled nervously.
"I'd like you in the picture, Rincewind. That's fine." Twoflower took out the golden disc that Rincewind had noticed before, squinted at its unseen face for a moment, muttered "Thirty seconds should about do it," and said brightly, "Smile please!"
"Smile," rasped Rincewind. There was a whirr from the box.
Rincewind looked at the tiny square of glass in astonishment. There he was, all right - a tiny figure, in perfect colour, standing in front of a group of Watchmen whose faces were each frozen in a terrified rictus. A buzz of wordless terror went up from the men around him as they craned over his shoulder to look.
Rincewind... added, "I don't think it looks very like me, though."
"It's easy to operate," said Twoflower, ignoring him. "Look, all you have to do is press this button. The iconograph does the rest. Now, I'll just stand over here next to Hrun, and you can take the picture."
Rincewind was amazed to find, half a minute later, that he was holding a little glass portrait of Twoflower wielding a huge notched sword and smiling as though all his dreams had come true.
It was... in the Plaza of Broken Moons that disaster struck.
Twoflower had posed alongside a bewildered charm-seller, his crowd of new-found admirers watching him with interest in case he did something humorously lunatic.
Rincewind got down on one knee, the better to arrange the picture, and pressed the enchanted lever.
The box said, "It's no good. I've run out of pink."
A hitherto unnoticed door opened in front of his eyes. A small, green and hideously warty humanoid figure leaned out, pointed at the colour-encrusted palette in one clawed hand, and screamed at him.
"No pink, see?" screeched the homunculus. "No good you going on pressing the lever when there's no pink, is there?" If you wanted pink you shouldn't of took all those pictures of young ladies, should you? It's monochrome from now on, friend. Alright?"
"Alright. Yeah. Sure," said Rincewind. In one dim corner of the little box he thought he could see an easel, and a tiny unmade bed. He hoped he couldn't.
"So long as that's understood," said the imp, and shut the door. Rincewind thought he could hear the muffled sound of grumbling and the scrape of a stool being dragged across the floor.
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