David Alan Harvey on Leica M10 and iPhone

[Nowhereman]

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[aizan]

davidalanharvey@vincentbgirard [...] In your case for sure you need to be thinking about what it is you are trying to say. Looking at your IG stream I would have no idea. No authorship or style or focus. Get that down and then choose whatever camera works best for you.

aww snap! i love dah.

 

[Emile de Leon]

Yeah...but Leica would go out of business..lol...

 

[PKR]

This is the wrong forum to be preaching that the photographs made are more important than the instrument/tool they were made with.

Few on this forum would agree, or agree and really think otherwise about their cameras. Just look at the list of sub-forums; they are about cameras, for the most part, and not photography. No knock on Stephen, he knows where interests lie, just like the plethora of camera based forums and blogs on the web.

I think that most people, who are interested in "Photography", and the end result, "a Photograph", will agree with Dave Harvey.

Thanks for your post NWman

 

[robert blu]

Great DAH, thanks for posting this. Thinking of the size of most books, no surprise at all in my view. And anyway I'm more interested in the content, subject, story, emotion than in sharpness etc...
robert
PS: now having said this my new camera is a pleasure to use 😀 but this is a different story...

 

[PKR]

Great DAH, thanks for posting this. Thinking of the size of most books, no surprise at all in my view. And anyway I'm more interested in the content, subject, story, emotion than in sharpness etc...
robert
PS: now having said this my new camera is a pleasure to use 😀 but this is a different story...

Robert; We, who make photographs all pick the tools that best suit our needs or the needs of a project. Nothing wrong with that, I think it's expected. Knowing that your interests lie in the image and not the tool is a given.

I would ask the "camera people":
If you were to die today, what do you think your loved ones and friends would hold most valuable... your cameras or the pictures you left behind?

 

[krötenblender]

And yet, the guy shoots with a Leica and a GFX (also not really a cheap camera...) and tries to convince another person to spend his/her money for his workshop instead of new gear.

I might be wrong, but I see a little bit of conflict of interest here...

 

[krötenblender]

If you were to die today, what do you think your loved ones and friends would hold most valuable... your cameras or the pictures you left behind?

Given the choice, would they prefer crappy 8bit per color phone jpegs or high dynamic 14bpc high res raws, that you can enjoy on display technologies available in 20 years...? 🙄

 

[raid]

I will get the iPhone 8 for the better camera when it gets out for sale. I like having at all times "a camera" with me.

 

[PKR]

And yet, the guy shoots with a Leica and a GFX (also not really a cheap camera...) and tries to convince another person to spend his/her money for his workshop instead of new gear.

I might be wrong, but I see a little bit of conflict of interest here...

The guy makes his living with his cameras (tools). He earns enough money to be able to afford the tools he likes.

I'm sure that Harvey, not being a fool, would see the possible conflict, but went ahead anyway with his SEEING comment. I'm sure he would also agree that you don't need to visit His Workshop in order to improve your seeing.

I don't know much about workshops. I have three pro friends/acquaintances who hold them. These people aren't wanting for attendees. The portfolio review requirement is needed to separate those who will benefit from those who wouldn't. Workshops, at their highest level, are more valuable as networking vehicles than peer/pro critiques. Another reason for the portfolio review. If I were holding any kind of teaching sessions, I would want to be sure of some advancement of each of the students. Harvey could have taken on a commercial job, using the same allotted time, and earn ten times the money a workshop would provide him.

 

[Ko.Fe.]

I printed from 8MP iPhone (28 2.8), 8MP P&S with normal Leica Zoom, 10 MP M8 with Industar-69 28 2.8 and negative scans from M with some fancy lens. Difference is visible starting from 4x6 prints, but not critical.

DAH needs to sell his workshop, this is it. End of story.

But if he really can't see the difference on large book prints between iPhone and more less dedicated camera, his vision is alive, but eyes are shut. He needs to see eye doctor for new glasses.

 

[Lss]

For many people the technical quality of iPhone photos is sufficient. I am happy I am not one of them.

 

[PKR]

Given the choice, would they prefer crappy 8bit per color phone jpegs or high dynamic 14bpc high res raws, that you can enjoy on display technologies available in 20 years...? 🙄

Well, I work in both film and digital, megapixel race aside, I would prefer a good picture in any media over a bad one .. in any media.

Billboards were made with images from (2006) 6MP files. And. I'm not so sure all those digital images will survive 20 years unless printed.

 

[Nowhereman]

And yet, the guy shoots with a Leica and a GFX (also not really a cheap camera...) and tries to convince another person to spend his/her money for his workshop instead of new gear.

I might be wrong, but I see a little bit of conflict of interest here...

No he doesn't "shoot with a Leica." As he states in the Instagram discussion quoted above, he used the iPhone for many of the photos in his prize-winning book, From a True Story. The Fuji GFX medium-format digital that he's shooting with right now is a camera he uses only occasionally. Currently, he's shooting mainly with the Fuji XT2. I think he still has his M6 that he likes but shoots with rarely. In addition to the iPhone, last year or so he also occasionally shot with an Olympus underwater point-and-shoot camera, the TG5 (?).

I like his camera-agnostic attitude and, as I said, his openness to new technology. He is very approachable and does a lot of free mentoring as well. It's easy to question peoples' motives, but he doesn't have a conflict of interest simply because he isn't the sort of guy you're suggesting — it's easy to question the motives of people you don't know. Also, as you can read above in the last statement, DAH says he's looked at the pictures of the person he is writing to and gives his judgment of what that persons needs.
_______________
Alone in Bangkok essay on BURN Magazine

 

[Nowhereman]

...DAH needs to sell his workshop, this is it. End of story.

But if he really can't see the difference on large book prints between iPhone and more less dedicated camera, his vision is alive, but eyes are shut. He needs to see eye doctor for new glasses.

Have you seen his prize-winning book, From a True Story? I have it and what he says is true: it's impossible to pick out which pictures are shot with the iPhone and which with the M9. Actually, your statement that DAH should "sell his workshop" is offensive in additional to being ignorant: how do you sell a workshop?
_______________
Alone in Bangkok essay on BURN Magazine

 

[PKR]

DAH needs to sell his workshop, this is it. End of story.

.

You don't know this! I suggest you send him your portfolio and see if you're accepted for the workshop. Requesting a portfolio review is a refusal process. I know one friend turns many applicants away for lack of talent or room for improvement. He commented that before requiring the review, he had some attendees, so advanced, that he felt he didn't really help them. One he spoke of was a surgeon with a photo hobby. He said the guy's work was really good and didn't need any help from him. Some, who have the money, are so bad that they too wouldn't benefit from his time. I think he must take about 25% of those who apply for the yearly.. "Kept Small" workshop group. If it were about the money, he would have places for a hundred students instead of the 8-12 he teaches yearly.

 

[krötenblender]

simply because he isn't the sort of guy you're suggesting

I don't question his good character, because I simply don't know him, as you stated correctly. - But I always ask myself, where is the real win, when someone follows someone else's advice.

What I really suggest is, that even if you like a guy and his opinion (because it may be resembling yours), you should ask, if it is really The Truth ™.

The citation in itself includes an implicit suggestion, that the differences between these camera types are negligible and the only real things is SEEING.

In my opinion - and please note, there is no absolute truth in my statement, just a preference for an opinion - all of these extremes (camera does not matter, only the image vs. camera and gear is everything) are on the same level of credibility.

 

[krötenblender]

Well, I work in both film and digital, megapixel race aside, I would prefer a good picture in any media over a bad one .. in any media.

Sure, as would most people. But the same image in bad vs good technical quality... That was, what I was asking about.

 

[PKR]

Sure, as would most people. But the same image in bad vs good technical quality... That was, what I was asking about.

Well, given that.. I have a lot of really great Kodachromes that I wish had been made on 8x10 Ektachrome. Also, some 6MP files that I wish were made on a 20MP camera. But, I'm happy to have them for what they are. They all print up 8x10 or larger.

I have no problem with iPhone photography. I prefer a viewfinder, but, that's me. I really don't care how people make their pictures. I think some of the "camera people" find phone photography threatening. Good phone images may be better (not in image quality) than the ones they produce with their expensive cameras.

Photo marketing people, especially with digital cameras changing every 18 months, sell idiots new, more expensive cameras, by telling them it's the road to better pictures. Better picture tech quality maybe, but better pictures, doubtful. I don't think you can teach creativity, and you surely can't buy it.

I think, some people don't like the fact that Dave Harvey, a talented guy, can make and publish good imagery with an iPhone. It troubles them.

 

[krötenblender]

Photo marketing people, especially with digital cameras changing every 18 months, sell idiots new, more expensive cameras, by telling them it's the road to better pictures. Better picture tech quality maybe, but better pictures, doubtful. I don't think you can teach creativity, and you surely can't buy it.

+1 to that. However one of the biggest selling points for mobile phones recently is the quality of the camera and what great pictures you can take with them ("Shot with an iPhone"... yeah, sure...). So the race already started there, too. Do you really think, phone-photographers will stop the GAS...?