This is one of the most enlightening conversations I've seen on Photoforum in a long time. I have my own simplistic opinions on how older technologies tend to morph into art and become niche markets where the most highly talented are either ignored or celebrated depending on the goddess Fortuna; sometimes she smiles on the happy idiot ignoring the true genius. It is a market, after all is said and (little) is done. Bill Pettit -----Original Message----- >From: karl shah-jenner <shahjen@xxxxxxxxxxxx> >Sent: Jun 12, 2013 10:31 PM >To: List for Photo/Imaging Educators - Professionals - Students <photoforum@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx> >Subject: Re: golden age layoffs > >Jan: >The reason trained photographers are no longer in demand began in the 1980’s >when ‘great work’ was no longer a necessity as computers hit the streets and >various creative jobs were farmed out to secretaries, salesmen, and nearly >anybody who could turn on a PC. Quality standards fell and ‘great’ work was >replaced with ‘good enough’ work. A secretary with a single course in >Pagemaker graphics cannot create strong art day in and day out. Photoshop >can’t make art great either. It is crap in, crap out. > > > >precisely. > >the collection I spoke of is examples of calendars (with each month >alernating colour casted skies, cyan for Jan, yellow for Feb, blue for >March, red for April etc), wobbly horizons.. Pixelated 1/2 page news images, >badly retouced prospectuses (is that a word?) - all 'professional' work, >all worthy of a slap and another round in the classroom. > > > >Paladin wrote: >> 2. The need for a blend of technical/visual balance to achieve a good >> result has changed from say 50/50 to more like 5/95, or maybe even 1% tech >> to 99% visual > >that too. I had a friend return from India send me her flickr link and the >photos were lovely, a few criticisms about converging parallels and a couple >of wonky horizons which were hard to spot but once corrected gave better >balance - but on the whole the perspectives were excellent, the framing >(shut up Randy) was good, it was a very nice and coherant collection. I >presumed she's taken some classes on the quiet and got better gear than I >last knew her to have.. there was no metadata for me to pry through but I >asked, not out of snobbishness but as I was curious how her photography had >progressed. The reply I got was she had used her phone. > >> 4. Also, a LOT of people are becoming visual technicians via Photoshop > >that too. it's all a creative process hey? Heck, C-Bresson had someone >else print his negs and were that printer not so damned good then C-Bressons >fame may not have been.. If as a kid I'd been given the opportunity to >create images with Bryce and the like, why would I ever have bothered >learned pencil technique?!? > > > >For quite some time I've maintained that for pro photographers to stay alive >in the game film was the way forward .. That little episode I related where >I snapped a polaroid pos/neg in front of some young un's with an 'old' 4x5 >and showed them the negative and the resulting print only reinforced this. >Their reaction to seeing how complicated it was (relative to using a phone), >and how much depth and detail there was in the print - the fact that I knew >what settings to use without reference to a light meter, that I picked a >lens and didn't just zoom about .. they saw and recognised skill and it >seemed pretty darned special to them. > >Yeah a furniture maker will amaze someone the first time they crank out a >piece on a CNC machine and yes it's near to perfect as you can get, but it >ain't nothing when you finally get to watch an old man with a rusty hand >tool take a lump of wood and turn it into a chair. > >the art is the craft is the technique, all the words are interchangeable. >when the automated robot machine tool thing does all the work, sure people >are free of all that complicated stuff and can just concentrate on their >vision, but wow - watch a master chef making food sure beats watching the >factory cranking out sausages. > >I know in the education game, students eyes light up when they experience >film and darkrooms.. but student numbers have cascaded away from the photo >courses locally now they are almost exclusively digital. Everyone has a >computer these days, a camera, can do online courses .. what's the draw? > >Yes film is inconvenient, it's slow, expensive, messy if you're a klutz .. >as is anything worth doing. If I do bother to get back into taking pictures >I'll rather only do it with film. > >k >
