Film photographs and Fine Drawing

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Denton

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One of the aspects of fine pencil or Conte drawings I appreciate is the quality and texture of the line and massed shaded areas. This attractiveness is a quality of the medium and the artist. More finished works which de-emphasize this "texture" are often less pleasing to me. I believe a similar effect makes grain in silver negatives/prints pleasing. Not attractive to everyone, but for those who draw do you see a similarity which you may appreciate?
Denton
 
Grain v no-grain has long been a battleground, in the same way as Zeiss V Leitz, film V digital or large format V 35mm.

All I'll say is that I've done deliberately grainy stuff that I liked and almost grain free stuff that I liked. I will now retire from the field and watch the battle commence.

:angel:
 
I definitely hear you, though I wonder if in the illustration world people debate digital vs traditional medium as hotly as we do in photography.
 
Not a grain vs grain thread

Not a grain vs grain thread

hopefully more of similarities between BW AgCl and graphite!
 
There's a place for it all. Photography spent a hundred years improving its emulsions and developing processes trying to be grain-free. Now folks want grain. It's all good. Some images work because they're grainy or grain-free. Some line drawings work because you can see lines... some work because they're just shaded. It's ok to like it both ways.
 
It boils down to what you the photographer are trying to say visually and what is the best tools and processes to best express that.
 
I don't draw but appreciate drawings and I believe I understand what you are describing. For instance shading by cross hatching vs. shading by smudging the graphite I think is similar to grainy vs. fine grain in photographs.
 
I'm not really one for too much grain, but I agree regarding pencil drawings. I personally do most of my sketching on toned paper with black/white/gray colored pencil and crayon, but fine-grade pencil done in a loose style on coarser paper has always held my interest. Similarly, I tend to favor digital drawings done in a more conventional pen-and-ink sort of style. I guess it's much like film, I like my images to be clean, but have a hint of grain to remind you what it is..
 
I'm a painter/printer that later came to photography. There aren't many similarities, to me anyway. You have to be mindful of tones, values, composition, light, the sense of space...that's a given w/ any medium. But drawing, (not Conte drawing) enables one to give many impressions by varying the quality of the line. It's not possible to put it into words, but when you look at drawings from someone that can draw, you'll see that pressing down harder w/ the pencil will give a sense of depth to the subject, or roundness if you will, while keeping the line light will make the object appear to be nearer. That sort of thing. I don't care for carefully controlled, tight drawings. I want to see freshness and spontaneity and mistakes and erasures. Lots of variety of line, not an overall sameness that kills things. The secret of drawing, as well as panting, is knowing when to stop. Once you go too far, it's cooked. Time to start over.

Also, w/ traditional film photography anyway, you're a slave to the subject and the lighting. When drawing, imagination and creativity can work at warp speed. You don't need to do time consuming proof prints or test strips, it's all there in front of you in real time. So, not a lot of similarities in terms of the actual making of the images, while the finished works may bear similarities.
 
I would sometimes process with 1000 speed recorder film and process with an acutance developer like Rodinal to further increase the grain effect if thats what I desired to do. Other times I would shoot with 8X10 tri x professional 320 and use a special dilution of HC 110 to give me amazing DR, sharpness and because of the format virtually grainless images.

Using the tools and the processes to achieve the look I need for the visual statement and the intent.
 
Yes. The feeling of Nr. O graphite softly rasping on rough paper. The dance of the line, from almost invisibly delicate to hard and strong and deep. However different, drawing with a pen gives a very similar sensory experience, one can feel ones pen being ever so slightly pushed from side to side by the grain of the paper. Microscopic chaos pushing back at your hand, leaving a trace made by both.
A chinese brush, used with water and ink, makes you feel the paper a little less - the bunched hairs act like a suspension, you are waving your hand over the paper, the brush stuck in it only touching at the tip, but the paper will impose it's texture on your brush-strokes. It will suck the ink where it wants to, and when your brush is dry, it will suck indifferently. There is the philosophy of the 'One Stroke', a treatise by Shih T'ao, which I deem to be a sort of 'must read' for any aspiring artist.

In one way, the gap between drawing and photography is much larger than the gap between digital and film. Photography captures what you see through a mechanical and chemical - or digital - process. Drawing is an interaction between eyes, hands, and medium.

However, Denton is quite right to point out the similarities between black and white film photography and drawing : in both, the inherent irregularities of the support are a large part of the creative as well as the aesthetic experience.
There are more : b/w photography can be very nearly abstract, like a fast line drawing. I'm thinking of Mario Giacomelli, who, in my mind, got very close to Shih T'ao's 'One Stroke' in photography. Salgado, on the other hand, is an inheritor of Rubens and Caravaggio, and the mad Italian who drew prisons.

In a way, the photographic camera is a very 'one stroke'ish instrument. That one hundred and twenty fifth of a second, at that spot, that frame, condensed into the 'One Stroke' of your finger…
 
lukitas said:
Yes. The feeling of Nr. O graphite softly rasping on rough paper. The dance of the line, from almost invisibly delicate to hard and strong and deep. However different, drawing with a pen gives a very similar sensory experience, one can feel ones pen being ever so slightly pushed from side to side by the grain of the paper. Microscopic chaos pushing back at your hand, leaving a trace made by both.
A chinese brush, used with water and ink, makes you feel the paper a little less - the bunched hairs act like a suspension, you are waving your hand over the paper, the brush stuck in it only touching at the tip, but the paper will impose it's texture on your brush-strokes. It will suck the ink where it wants to, and when your brush is dry, it will suck indifferently. There is the philosophy of the 'One Stroke', a treatise by Shih T'ao, which I deem to be a sort of 'must read' for any aspiring artist.

In one way, the gap between drawing and photography is much larger than the gap between digital and film. Photography captures what you see through a mechanical and chemical - or digital - process. Drawing is an interaction between eyes, hands, and medium.

However, Denton is quite right to point out the similarities between black and white film photography and drawing : in both, the inherent irregularities of the support are a large part of the creative as well as the aesthetic experience.
There are more : b/w photography can be very nearly abstract, like a fast line drawing. I'm thinking of Mario Giacomelli, who, in my mind, got very close to Shih T'ao's 'One Stroke' in photography. Salgado, on the other hand, is an inheritor of Rubens and Caravaggio, and the mad Italian who drew prisons.

In a way, the photographic camera is a very 'one stroke'ish instrument. That one hundred and twenty fifth of a second, at that spot, that frame, condensed into the 'One Stroke' of your finger…
Click to expand...

Nice thread question, and I certainly enjoyed reading this contribution. I'm going to re-read it.
 
I wish I could draw. If I could, charcoal would be my thing, and photogrphy maybe not an issue. Since I can't, I do often pinhole photography, which is as close as I get to charcoal, but from a medium I at least have a clue about..
transib1201.jpg
 
... thanks, out of practice these days though ... I trained as a commercial artist before they invented graphic designers ... ;)
 
Yes ... nice work Stewart.

From one who can't draw to save himself! :p
 
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