Who would have thought this is where we would be?

FujiLove said:
I know almost anything can be done digitally, but then it has a different name. It's called, "fake".
Click to expand...

A bit harsh! Why fake? It's only a method of capture and massaging the image. Its always the final result that counts whether its film or digital. And yes that resides in the mind of the image creator. The thing I like about digital is that it has freed me to be much more creative firstly because I do not feel constrained from making images due to worries bout cost (though I have never been one to blaze away mindlessly and still do not) but most of all because I have been empowered to use post processing creatively as part of the image making process. Something that really was never an option for me when I shot film.
 
Prest_400 said:
On music recording side I am just a listener but am amazed at how a HDD can fit a large collection of digital HiRes audio files.

Keith mentions electric cars and I honestly would look forward to selfdriving electric vehicles. Perhaps now I like the idea as I got used to public transport conveniences (trains which have been electric here for a century). OTOH having a nice car for enjoyable driving would be nice, but not cheap at all or easy as amassing a few cameras! 😂


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk
Click to expand...

What problem does a self-driving vehicle solve?

HFL
 
hlockwood said:
What problem does a self-driving vehicle solve?

HFL
Click to expand...

You ask the same question about many products - the Sony Walkman for example. I suppose in that case, it served a frivolous but empty desire to avoid thinking. But it led to other things as new technologies often do.

In one way I suppose I agree with your question - I don't know if I have the faintest interest in owning a self driving car and from my viewpoint therefore its value proposition is zero. For people who enjoy driving, its value proposition would be negative. I suppose for someone who cannot drive or who is paraplegic perhaps, its value is high. We live in a democratized society for better or worse, so who would otherwise make a decision that this product is useful (therefore is good based on the implication in your question) or that a product is bad (and therefore should be banned perhaps). In a free and open society individuals make that decision for themselves and if enough people decide "its not for me" the manufacturer goes broke. And that is the way it should be in my book. In short we each decide if a self driving car solves a problem - for ourselves and other people decide it for themselves. I grant you that it raises some interesting legal issues - if my self driving car crashes itself into another car who is to blame and who gets held liable in a court of law. Is drinking while driving still an offence?
 
peterm1 said:
You ask the same question about many products - the Sony Walkman for example. I suppose in that case, it served a frivolous but empty desire to avoid thinking. But it led to other things as new technologies often do.

SNIP
Click to expand...

The Walkman served a very useful purpose; it brought on-demand music to the listener. I don't connect listening to music as frivolous or as avoiding thinking.

And I'm not suggesting the self-driving car is bad or should be banned. No need; it will self destruct - in the market, that is.

HFL
 
FujiLove said:
I used the word, "fake", because that's how a lot of aspects of digital photography seem to me. For instance, when you refer to being empowered by post processing images, I'm guessing you are manipulating RAW files inside a program such as Lightroom? When you look at the controls in Lightroom they mimic the same processes I use in the darkroom: cropping, changing the contrast, adding a vignette etc. They are digital recreations of things that people already physically do in the real world outside of the computer. And of course, depending on the skill of the programming team, some will closely mimic the darkroom process and others will not. Either way, they are as fake as scanning the Mona Lisa at 20,000 dpi, printing it using the finest inkjet on 3D textured paper that perfectly matched Leonardo's brush strokes and hanging it on your wall. Maybe an expert couldn't tell the difference even when both were hung side-by-side, but your's would still be a fake.

And the point I'm making is that knowing something is fake can have a real effect on how you perceive a process, how satisfying it is, and how you view the end result. Of course, this is only really applicable to the photographer themselves, because only they know how something was produced. I'm a hobbyist, so I'm only talking about how my photography relates to me, not about paying clients or magazine readers etc. Of course, this won't matter anywhere near as much for professionals simply trying to get a shot out the door and be paid for it.

Going back to my use of the word, "fake", also consider how many photographs are processed to emulate film these days. VSCO plugins to make your shots look like Tri-X, Portra and Velvia (good luck with that, by the way!), Instagram filters, Fuji camera film simulation modes for Acros and Velvia, phone apps like Hipstamatic, crammed full of 'films' and 'lenses' desperately (and unsuccessfully) trying to re-create a real-world object and process. It's all completely fake.

And how about the biggest fake of all: the digital image file. An image which you cannot touch or see without the aid of a computer interpreting it. An 'object' which doesn't exist. Nothing but electrons excited into a state of zeros and ones. Until it's printed, of course. And where has digital photography taken us in that regard? A few decades ago photos where something to be cherished, hung on walls to brighten our homes. Beautiful and fascinating objects to be looked at. Now the vast majority of photographs exist not to be printed, or even viewed. They are produced and shared on social media platforms simply to be 'liked'. You are lucky if someone lingers for two seconds.

This matters because we are human animals which evolved over tens of thousands of years handling and manipulating objects in the real world. We can kid ourselves into believing that digital things are somehow 'real', but the illusion only goes so far. Maybe people would be happier if they stopped kidding themselves and shot some film? Who knows?

The lovely thing is that the younger generations are beginning to understand this and starting to reject the digital crap that their parents have been gorging themselves on for the last twenty five years. They've started picking up instant cameras, film cameras, vinyl records and all the other analogue goodies and realising how great they really are.

And for those who still don't 'get it', I'll leave you with the immortal words of Lester Burnham: "You have no idea what I'm talking about, I'm sure. But don't worry... you will someday."
Click to expand...

yep film photography the real thing, digital is just computer graphics.

Thats How often feel about it.
I can shoot real TriX and print it on real photographic paper. It looks like TriX smells like TriX it is TriX.

I can shoot with a digital camera process in silver FX pro. It kind of looks likes film but its not, its a computer simulation of what a software engineer though it should look like. I can tweak the setting but its still not TriX even if I can make it look like TriX its not TriX.

Shoot film it's the real thing digital is what it is, computer graphics.
 
edge100 said:
In this regard, the Leica M10 is the best digital camera in the world. Every single parameter that affects exposure (shutter speed, f/stop, ISO speed) can be adjusted without resorting to a single menu. Similarly, there are no focus modes; just a rangefinder. Shame about the cost.
Click to expand...

My Nikon FM2n can do this, except it cost me $200. I've been shooting it since 2009. 2 sets of batteries during that time.
 
FujiLove said:
I used the word, "fake", because that's how a lot of aspects of digital photography seem to me. For instance, when you refer to being empowered by post processing images, I'm guessing you are manipulating RAW files inside a program such as Lightroom? When you look at the controls in Lightroom they mimic the same processes I use in the darkroom: cropping, changing the contrast, adding a vignette etc. They are digital recreations of things that people already physically do in the real world outside of the computer. And of course, depending on the skill of the programming team, some will closely mimic the darkroom process and others will not. Either way, they are as fake as scanning the Mona Lisa at 20,000 dpi, printing it using the finest inkjet on 3D textured paper that perfectly matched Leonardo's brush strokes and hanging it on your wall. Maybe an expert couldn't tell the difference even when both were hung side-by-side, but your's would still be a fake.

And the point I'm making is that knowing something is fake can have a real effect on how you perceive a process, how satisfying it is, and how you view the end result. Of course, this is only really applicable to the photographer themselves, because only they know how something was produced. I'm a hobbyist, so I'm only talking about how my photography relates to me, not about paying clients or magazine readers etc. Of course, this won't matter anywhere near as much for professionals simply trying to get a shot out the door and be paid for it.

Going back to my use of the word, "fake", also consider how many photographs are processed to emulate film these days. VSCO plugins to make your shots look like Tri-X, Portra and Velvia (good luck with that, by the way!), Instagram filters, Fuji camera film simulation modes for Acros and Velvia, phone apps like Hipstamatic, crammed full of 'films' and 'lenses' desperately (and unsuccessfully) trying to re-create a real-world object and process. It's all completely fake.

And how about the biggest fake of all: the digital image file. An image which you cannot touch or see without the aid of a computer interpreting it. An 'object' which doesn't exist. Nothing but electrons excited into a state of zeros and ones. Until it's printed, of course. And where has digital photography taken us in that regard? A few decades ago photos where something to be cherished, hung on walls to brighten our homes. Beautiful and fascinating objects to be looked at. Now the vast majority of photographs exist not to be printed, or even viewed. They are produced and shared on social media platforms simply to be 'liked'. You are lucky if someone lingers for two seconds.

This matters because we are human animals which evolved over tens of thousands of years handling and manipulating objects in the real world. We can kid ourselves into believing that digital things are somehow 'real', but the illusion only goes so far. Maybe people would be happier if they stopped kidding themselves and shot some film? Who knows?

The lovely thing is that the younger generations are beginning to understand this and starting to reject the digital crap that their parents have been gorging themselves on for the last twenty five years. They've started picking up instant cameras, film cameras, vinyl records and all the other analogue goodies and realising how great they really are.

And for those who still don't 'get it', I'll leave you with the immortal words of Lester Burnham: "You have no idea what I'm talking about, I'm sure. But don't worry... you will someday."
Click to expand...

Beautifully written, and well argued.
 
Stuart John said:
yep film photography the real thing, digital is just computer graphics.

Thats How often feel about it.
I can shoot real TriX and print it on real photographic paper. It looks like TriX smells like TriX it is TriX.

I can shoot with a digital camera process in silver FX pro. It kind of looks likes film but its not, its a computer simulation of what a software engineer though it should look like. I can tweak the setting but its still not TriX even if I can make it look like TriX its not TriX.

Shoot film it's the real thing digital is what it is, computer graphics.
Click to expand...

Which "real Tri-X": the current iteration or the classic version?
 
Yes we know TriX today is different from the old stuff but it is film made by Kodak and named TriX. Unlike the computer simulations that come from computers and digital photography.
 
In response to the OP: looking back at the 80's, when digital technology was just beginning to emerge, and then into the late 90's when digital cameras were horrible things which used giant floppy discs for memory, it's remarkable to see how far we have come. Even until that time, film was still the medium of choice if you wanted good quality images, and it wasn't until about 2000-2001 that halfway decent digital imaging was available to consumers.

That's about the time I got into photography in earnest, and I've enjoyed the steady evolution of digital technology since then. I do shoot film from time to time, but the sheer convenience and cost effectiveness of digital makes it primary for me.

In a funny sense of irony, in a couple of weeks, I'll be returning to a place I have not visited in almost 30 years, and I'll be taking my Olympus XA2 in an attempt to fulfill what I wish I'd had at that time. Sure, I'll also shoot digital and get images of far better quality and infinite, lossless copyability, but I'll also have images that will look like what I would have shot in the late 80's. I could do that in post with digital, but the easiest and most authentic way will be to shoot film.
 
People have and will continue to debate the "film vs. digital" issue until one or the other goes away. Arguably, a more important question/consideration here might be to ask how "digital photographic technology has changed the public's cultural and aesthetic attitudes towards the 'photograph'?"

Just a suggested question from someone who has been looking at and making photographs since the mid 1970's.
 
The former.

And make no mistake, my interest in photography has been active for almost 50 years. But I'm interested in photographs and in making photographs more so than I'm interested in what technology is being used in the making. Of course, this forum and most other photography websites concern themselves with cameras, lenses, films, sensors and pixels so much the photographs can become secondary. If we place too much emphasis on the means we can fail to appreciate the ends.

So when it comes to "film or digital", I say it doesn't matter.
 
ptpdprinter said:
I have never been a fan of grain simulation. If you want grain, shoot film.
Click to expand...
Check out True Grain 2 for when you do have to shoot digital. It's the only way I will shoot digital black and white. It overlays real film grain onto the photo and it looks pretty accurate. I can't stand Lightroom's grain anymore (not that I enjoyed it in the first place).
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top