> I was saying that I don't want to rely on PS to adjust what I can do while > taking the photo. > I hate having a debate on E Mail, you can't ever really know what the other > person is saying!!!!! Russ Leading on from something Karl said earlier: It's interesting how auto has become the norm and what Jim talks about is seen as futz (sic). Would you let your camera apply auto-levels and decide how much sharpening to apply? Jim's route is more true to the days of the darkroom:use the camera to get as much information from the scene as you can then let the Photographer use thier skill and experience to turn that into prints in the darkroom. Obviously, with digital, the lightroom replaced the darkroom, but now for many it seems we are to avoid doing too much in the lightroom. How would Ansel have handled all this? Would he have allowed the camera to pre-ordain his zones? Rememeber, once the camera has done it it is done. You cannot recover the fine detail in PS later if it's not there in the image file. What you are doing, hundred shots on the fly, is a trifle different of course. With film you didn't have to make the decision so early. The film held ALL the information film could hold. A contact print let you concentrate but then, admittedly, you had a lot more work to do. I keep thinking though: photographers need an edge over snappers. If it's only about what you see through the lens (and of course setting up good lighting) then you do have an edge - your vision - but no longer when it comes to the printing stage. Remeber again: this is not about your specific work, but about all sorts. Is it really that the limitations of the technology (slowness/cost of digital transfer/storage) have driven the methods? If storage were instantaneous and cheap there would be no discussion. No-one would be using jpegs at the capture stage. What Jim suggests is not the exception (the futz) but the baseline. Everything else is compromise. Sometimes compromises are unavoidable - but compromises they remain. Bob
