Are you and your photography stuck in the past?

Interesting thread. Really. And the different opinions too. A few of those touched partly my own opinions. Let me just point out that for me photography is a hobby.
This makes it possible using (also, not only) "past" gear, "past" film types and formats as well as dithering enough time to get a few good images directly out of the camera. Also a "past" approach opposite to the "modern" machine gun like digital fps shooting of many pro(sumer) photograph, deleting 90 % and fiddling in postprocessing a whole day.

What's about my "picture of the day"? No problem. You can have mine of December. Maybe. Or better from November last year 😛 Just to emphasize the slow workflow which is imposed using film and which I like. Having a hybrid workflow I duplicate that tardiness also for my digital pictures and this brings both technologies together.

I explained why I like the (electro)mechanical older gear and the slow film based photography approach. That's definitly kinda retro 😱
But what's about my images? Nine times out of ten it makes no difference! I grab a camera body mostly based on size, readiness and delight, not for a specific photography "type".
 
Maybe because I'm old & that's what old people do? 😉 Why should I be "embracing the latest technology and trends in photography" when I don't do that in the rest of my life (e.g., no skinny, hipster jeans or Arcade Fire downloads for me)?

But seriously, . . . I really don't have a problem w/digital cameras or all modern photography (just some). I have digital bodies & even though I still shoot mostly film, I scan all my slides & negs, work on them in Photoshop, & almost always print digitally. I haven't been inside a darkroom in over 10 years. Moreover, since I'm mostly a hobbyist shooter, I want to maximize the fun factor & I just don't like using most modern (i.e., post AF) cameras, film or digital. Personally, I find that because they're harder to use manually, they are inherently less engaging & therefore less fun to use. So it's not nostalgia, as most of my favorite cameras are from way before my time (I'm not that old).

As far as trends in modern photography, I guess I'm just a traditionalist @ heart & care more about content than anything else, but that's my approach to art in general. Not that I've seen very much that's truly new, anyway.

jsrockit said:
. . . What I wanted the jist of my OP to be was why do some use vintage gear and techniques while trying to emulate the work of past photographers instead of embracing the latest technology and trends in photography. It wasn't a judgement... we all do it here (including me) in some form or another.
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I'm always amazed by the willingness of people to buy into the business model according to which consumers pay (through the purchase of incremental upgrades and immature product lines) to participate in product R&D (through extensive internet forum feedback). It's like photography is caught in the infancy of the digital medium.

There is no question that we are living through a "bridge" era. On the other side of the bridge are ways of incorporating images into human social relations that will be totally different from 2D still image spectatorship. Sometimes I wonder if "photography" itself isn't specific to a very particular social configuration of a certain era?

Being out of step with the era doesn't necessarily have to be anti-social and nostalgic. It can be gregariously eccentric. It doesn't have to be about the past so much as a disruption of the all-too-facile representations of linear progress based solely on the fantasy of technological advance.
 
noimmunity said:
I'm always amazed by the willingness of people to buy into the business model according to which consumers pay (through the purchase of incremental upgrades and immature product lines) to participate in product R&D (through extensive internet forum feedback). It's like photography is caught in the infancy of the digital medium.

There is no question that we are living through a "bridge" era. On the other side of the bridge are ways of incorporating images into human social relations that will be totally different from 2D still image spectatorship. Sometimes I wonder if "photography" itself isn't specific to a very particular social configuration of a certain era?

Being out of step with the era doesn't necessarily have to be anti-social and nostalgic. It can be gregariously eccentric. It doesn't have to be about the past so much as a disruption of the all-too-facile representations of linear progress based solely on the fantasy of technological advance.
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Well said...why couldn't I have said that?😛

Overall, though, it is not being out of step with anything. No more so than appreciating the Master artists and their oil paintings. A contemporary oil painter is not out of step with anything, he or she has chosen what they want to do and it has nothing to do with Photoshop.🙂

In fact, those taking up oil painting (including me when I can find some cash lying around), are highly regarded and appreciated unlike so many photo snobs that think old film cameras and film photography is less than...well, less than real photography or "old school"😡...damn I hate that terminology.
 
furcafe said:
Maybe because I'm old & that's what old people do? 😉 Why should I be "embracing the latest technology and trends in photography" when I don't do that in the rest of my life (e.g., no skinny, hipster jeans or Arcade Fire downloads for me)?

But seriously, . . . I really don't have a problem w/digital cameras or all modern photography (just some). I have digital bodies & even though I still shoot mostly film, I scan all my slides & negs, work on them in Photoshop, & almost always print digitally. I haven't been inside a darkroom in over 10 years. Moreover, since I'm mostly a hobbyist shooter, I want to maximize the fun factor & I just don't like using most modern (i.e., post AF) cameras, film or digital. Personally, I find that because they're harder to use manually, they are inherently less engaging, & therefore, less fun to use. So it's not nostalgia, as most of my favorite cameras are from way before my time (I'm not that old).

As far as trends in modern photography, I guess I'm just a traditionalist @ heart & care more about content than anything else, but that's my approach to art in general. Not that I've seen very much that's truly new, anyway.
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Heh, heh...would you rather drive a manual transmission in a 60's era Mercedes SL or drive a 2012 Camry with automatic transmission?😛 Different personalities will choose differently. Me....NOT the Camry!
 
jsrockit said:
Again, I'm not trying to be offensive because I see nothing wrong with being stuck in the past. There is nothing dismissive in my tone in this thread. Everyone here is in the same boat somewhat... we are all stuck in the past one way or another.

The M9 is certainly stuck in the past... and I'm glad it is.
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Sorry, I didn't mean to dismiss your viewpoint, but as several others have said: the past is what we photograph, using the cameras of the past, because we can't photograph the future with the cameras of the future. It's all a question of the time-scale of 'the past'.

Also, I don't agree that the M9 is stuck in the past. It's like when people talk about 'primitive' animals, such as the shark. Today's shark isn't the shark of half a million years ago. It is today's shark. It is just as 'evolved' as the latest of Darwin's finches. It's just that there's been less change in the M9 (or the shark) because there was less need for it to change to fit into a current evolutionary niche.

From that argument, we're all stuck in the present, and it becomes a question of how easily we can spot evolutionary dead ends and empty marketing.

Cheers,

R.
 
Another question is why we should accept whatever new technology that's fed to us? Everyone is talking about innovation and new technology but we could well be moving backward with each "new" technology.
 
Araakii said:
Another question is why we should accept whatever new technology that's fed to us
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Very true. I much prefer fly-buttons to zips, and leather jackets to plastic ones. And my house is heated by a combination of wood (10,000 year old technology) and electricity (mostly from nuclear power stations because I live in France).

I think the flaw in the original question lies in 'stuck', with its inevitable connotations of helplessness, laziness, stupidity, etc.

Personally, I'd say that I live in the present (as do we all, perforce) but that I am more than happy to embrace the best of the past alongside whatever I can afford of the best of the present; 'the best', of course, being in most cases a matter of opinion.

Cheers,

R.
 
Araakii said:
Another question is why we should accept whatever new technology that's fed to us?
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We shouldn't. I didn't mean to imply that we should. My initial question was a light-hearted one. The people that accept every new thing as better than the last are generally pretty obnoxious IMO. 🙂
 
If the latest crop of digital cameras from Fuji is concerned, "retro" is very much in vogue.

Personally, I use film almost exclusively, these days. My rangefinders are:

- M6TTL
- M4-P
- Voigtlander Perkeo

I tend to agree with Roger Hicks on this one as I don't shun nw technology but I do analyse it and will only embrace it if I believe it will give me something that what I use now can't.
 
Well,i sold my digital gear(D700,flash and lenses) and bought a M6 TTL
It does feel like im going backwards when everyone around me is shooting digital
 
Paul Jenkin said:
If the latest crop of digital cameras from Fuji is concerned, "retro" is very much in vogue.

Personally, I use film almost exclusively, these days. My rangefinders are:

- M6TTL
- M4-P
- Voigtlander Perkeo

I tend to agree with Roger Hicks on this one as I don't shun nw technology but I do analyse it and will only embrace it if I believe it will give me something that what I use now can't.
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wow!like you im shooting film exclusively now
have you considered getting a digital cam for times when you need it?
 
Paul Jenkin said:
If the latest crop of digital cameras from Fuji is concerned, "retro" is very much in vogue.

Personally, I use film almost exclusively, these days. My rangefinders are:

- M6TTL
- M4-P
- Voigtlander Perkeo

I tend to agree with Roger Hicks on this one as I don't shun nw technology but I do analyse it and will only embrace it if I believe it will give me something that what I use now can't.
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Well you could call them retro (cause they are that too) but you could also look at it like fuji listen to the market and make/deliver products that works and handles easily. Its so intuitive, no need to go through a menu to get to manual and then press a button while you select using the commandwheel etc. The handling of the X100 seems from the brief time I had to play with one straightforward and self explaining.
Best regards
 
Redsun said:
wow!like you im shooting film exclusively now
have you considered getting a digital cam for times when you need it?
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Well, I said "almost exclusively" so not all film. I have a Nikon D700 (which my wife uses 99% of the time) and I have a Panasonic Lumix LX3 for the few occasions when I want a point and shoot digital.

If I want point and shoot film, I use my Ricoh GR1s and I have some MF and LF gear for when I'm in the mood to slow down and try to make something "deliberate" rather than 35mm - which I find to be much more spontaneous.
 
Soeren said:
Well you could call them retro (cause they are that too) but you could also look at it like fuji listen to the market and make/deliver products that works and handles easily. Its so intuitive, no need to go through a menu to get to manual and then press a button while you select using the commandwheel etc. The handling of the X100 seems from the brief time I had to play with one straightforward and self explaining.
Best regards
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I'm using "retro" as a compliment. Fuji is the one manufacturer that seems to be appealing to those of us who appreciate the looks of a rangefinder.

My "ideal" (digital) camera would be a digital version of the Nikon F3. No menu whatsoever, just ISO/Compensation, shutter speed and DoF indicator. An option to use AF lenses might be nice but far from essential.
 
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