Gear is far outdone by visual impressions

[gavinlg]

I have a d3 on my desk that has about an inch of dust collected atop. I have been shooting assignment work on point and shoots for a long time.

Through a whole load of luck, circumstance and possible BS on my end, I have met many and count friends amongst top shelf photographers working today. Many of them have little interest in gear outside the actual dimensions of the capture medium.

Quoting this because many seemed to have missed it.

 

[Ranchu]

My point was more to this point: if an influential photographer (one whose images are known as 'powerful') could only use some run-of-the-mill camera and lens, I think they'd still be able to produce powerful images. This is not some big idea, I think. But its a useful one if, for example, you're like me and find that you're spending a LOT of time chasing gear around and little time trying to perfect the imagery. If you're someone like that, I'd suggest that you could stop worrying about the quality and quantity of your gear and get on with the business of making photographs.

I'm not suggesting that there isn't some different looks to images produced by a well-made lens and a not-so-well-made lens.

Like a mental exercise to stop yourself getting more gear, rather than a statement about what photographs look like. Tell us next time.

 

[YYV_146]

That's why I'm talking about two 35mm f2.8 lenses.

Frankly a 35mm F2.8 is an even more specialized tool than a 35mm F1.4.

Two stops less light in film means lots more detail lost to grain, in digital things are better, but also comes with at least two stops of lost dynamic range and color depth. Whether people want the extra OOF aside, faster lenses do serve a purpose in maximizing output quality when shooting under available light.

The importance of equipment is not how good it performs - that I absolutely agree. What's important IMO is how fast a lens is, whether it has AF/stabilization, and if it's weather proof.

 

[Ranchu]

All that matters is how it looks, that's what it's for. I don't care if it's fast, stabilized or weatherproof. Life's too short.

 

[YYV_146]

My point was more to this point: if an influential photographer (one whose images are known as 'powerful') could only use some run-of-the-mill camera and lens, I think they'd still be able to produce powerful images. This is not some big idea, I think. But its a useful one if, for example, you're like me and find that you're spending a LOT of time chasing gear around and little time trying to perfect the imagery. If you're someone like that, I'd suggest that you could stop worrying about the quality and quantity of your gear and get on with the business of making photographs.

No, but chasing equipment IMO is an entirely different hobby from photography. You don't have to be a good driver to enjoy fast cars, neither do you have to be a great musician to collect antique instruments. The violin and the race car are means towards another hobby just like the camera and lens, but they can also be hobbies in their own right.

I know people who are both photographers and gearholics, and I don't think either identity takes away or adds to the other. You can choose to only care about the result, or also care about the medium - and as someone who highly values manual focusing, I can certain understand why people may think that making an image with a particular camera, lens or shooting method lends something more to the image. Imagine using the lens HCB once used...won't that make you feel at least a little special?

 

[hepcat]

...I can certain understand why people may think that making an image with a particular camera, lens or shooting method lends something more to the image. Imagine using the lens HCB once used...won't that make you feel at least a little special?

Ok... maybe we're beating the proverbial deceased equine now, but does the viewer care that it was HCB's lens you used? That's the question here.

 

[YYV_146]

Ok... maybe we're beating the proverbial deceased equine now, but does the viewer care that it was HCB's lens you used? That's the question here.

Maybe, maybe not. Depends on if the viewer is another photographer or is a fan (or critic) of HCB's work...

I guess the philosophical question is: do we take pictures to please and inspire others, or is it simply for making ourselves happier?

 

[Jamie Pillers]

One experience I had recently that helped move me toward creating the original post was this. I met a local amateur photographer at our annual street fair. He's middle-aged like me and, like me, had used film SLRs for his hobby for years. Around him were displayed a couple dozen poorly framed b&w street scene photographs. The images are astoundingly great! I bought six of them immediately, $20 each. We sat and talked about photography for awhile and eventually the subject of gear came up. All of the images he was selling were made with a little old Canon digital p&s camera (If I remember right it was something like 6mp). Looking at these images now (I've had them propped up around my desk now for 6 months... they provide serious inspiration.), I can see that putting some new modern Fuji X camera and lens (or whatever) would not have made these images one bit better. What makes these images great is the photographer's eye... his ability to see the important moment as its happening and capturing just the right amount of stuff in the frame. Period.

So, as some of you have pointed out, gear can change the technical charactaristics of an image but will in no way make a great image. Great images come only by putting the right stuff in the frame. And the way to get there is by looking at lots of great images, making a lot of images, finding the ones that have the right stuff in the frame (via sharing, critique, or personal observation) and then figuring out how the right stuff got there. It didn't get there because you had a Zeiss lens, it got there because of your eye and your experience.

 

[thegman]

Sorry guys... gear doesn't matter to the viewer... and that was the premise of the OP's post. And he's right. We like images. There may be gear that gives a specific image a specific look... but as viewers, as consumers of images, we don't care. Nor, I think, should we.

You've met all the viewers?

I jest, but I don't think viewers of photos can be pigeon-holed any better than any other group.

Some people are interested only in the end result, some people are interested in the process.

I've been to restaurants, looked at a foam or something like that, and wondered how they made it. Then at home, I researched it, and then had a bash at making it myself. I'm not a chef, or even particularly enthused about cooking, but I am curious about things. I don't think I'm the only one.

On the other hand, when the phone engineer fixes my ADSL, I could not care less how he did it, even though I could probably be considered a massive geek when it comes to computers.

Sometimes people do care about the process, if they find it interesting.

People might find the idea of a photo being taken on a ULF pinhole an interesting proposition. People might not feel the same about the same photo being taken with a DSLR and being manipulated in Photoshop.

I saw some photos recently of the United States, in colour, using that old process of merging 3 BW shots, shot with filters. I found it interesting.

 

[koven]

Gear matters there is always a tool for the job but its not as important as some make it out to be. Some of my best photos would be that much better if I had a better sensor or lens while some others were perfect for my set up at the time.

 

[hepcat]

You've met all the viewers?

I jest, but I don't think viewers of photos can be pigeon-holed any better than any other group.

Some people are interested only in the end result, some people are interested in the process.

Your point is valid; however, we who visit forums such as this are but a small subset of consumers of photography. Quoting from an article in "The Art Newspaper" entitled "Mass exposure: why museums are focusing on photography:"

" 'Almost 5,000 people daily are visiting the show of works here by Henri Cartier-Bresson,' says Bernard Blistène, the director of the Musée National d’Art Moderne at the Centre Pompidou in Paris."

No doubt some of those 5,000 people a day are, in fact, interested in the process, but likely the vast majority of those folks are there to see the impact of the images themselves. The first (and only) exhibit I've seen of Frantisek Drtikol original prints left me awestruck. It wasn't until much later that I got around to wondering how he made them.

Millions of people view images online and in print daily who have no clue about any of the processes that made them or prepared them for display. Some of them are photographers. You and I are two... but most are simply looking at images for the sake of looking at the images, and are taking the impact of those images with them.

 

[thegman]

Your point is valid; however, we who visit forums such as this are but a small subset of consumers of photography. Quoting from an article in "The Art Newspaper" entitled "Mass exposure: why museums are focusing on photography:"

" 'Almost 5,000 people daily are visiting the show of works here by Henri Cartier-Bresson,' says Bernard Blistène, the director of the Musée National d’Art Moderne at the Centre Pompidou in Paris."

No doubt some of those 5,000 people a day are, in fact, interested in the process, but likely the vast majority of those folks are there to see the impact of the images themselves. The first (and only) exhibit I've seen of Frantisek Drtikol original prints left me awestruck. It wasn't until much later that I got around to wondering how he made them.

Millions of people view images online and in print daily who have no clue about any of the processes that made them or prepared them for display. Some of them are photographers. You and I are two... but most are simply looking at images for the sake of looking at the images, and are taking the impact of those images with them.

I don't doubt you're right, I'll say two more things though:

1) 5,000 people, daily, might be looking at photos by HCB. I'm sure you're right that most don't care about the process. I'd also say that most don't care about the photos either. I've been to the Louvre, seen the Mona Lisa, but I'd be lying if I said I cared one little bit about it.

2) Millions of people are looking at photos online, certainly. And I think they are looking at images for the sake of images, i.e. Oo! A cat! Oo! Kim Kardashian! There is generally though, zero impact. Most people don't care about the photos or the process, it's just a day out.

I think some are interested in only the end result, some are only interested in the process, some are not interested at all, and then there is everything in between.

 

[Richard G]

Sorry if I'm stating the obvious here but this seems to me to be turning into a dialogue of the deaf (so, what else is new).

The way I see it, there's a cloud of people who make images. In one direction, the artists, who care only for the end result. Off in another, the hobbyists, who love the kit and kaboodle. A third direction takes us to the craft folk, who are happiest breathing chemistry and massaging paper in some esoteric manner. Somewhere near the artists are the vast majority, who just point something with a lens and recording medium at what interests them and press the button. Some of the majority also rather like "sexy" camera kit. There are lots of other little groups as well, such as the mechanics, in their element taking cameras and lenses to pieces and putting them together again.

All these groups intermingle and only the rather odd, in my opinion, are pure examples of any of these types. The thing is, they're all absolutely correct in thinking that their views are the correct views, provided they add the magic words: "for them".

I reckon we'd all get more from the discussion, if we tried to think that way.

As I said elsewhere, I like Sejanus's posts. Your inspiring companion Jamie took some great photos on a 6MP camera, and any of the greats would have done the same. The more powerful the image conceived, the less important the camera used to record it. But there are many different types of photography and sometimes the emotion communicated in a photograph is almost wholly carried by the tonality or contrast or grain and there the photographer's familiar camera and chosen lens and film and development and years of experience all are required to bring it off.

The other thing about cameras, especially now, like with cars, is that they are all good. But you have to know your camera, backwards. Otherwise you'll miss that wonderful grouping at the kerb that "could have been taken with any camera". And those other more artistic photos will also not be taken if you're out in the rain with puddles and your unfamiliar camera with too wide a lens won't autofocus properly and the shutter lag sees the leaping man's boot splashing in the mud. There is a huge opportunity cost of not having one of your favourite cameras with you. That might just be the iPhone if you've worked at getting out of it what you want. For others their familiar Nikon F2 (or V1) or Leica IIIf (or Monochrom) or Rolleiflex (or Rollei 35) is what they must have with them. The illusion of the photograph that could have been taken with any camera is countered by all that led up to tripping the shutter. The corollary of "the camera you have with you" is the camera you chose to have with you. That's the one most likely to get the photo, and the only one that could have got this photo.

 

[Sparrow]

Sorry if I'm stating the obvious here but this seems to me to be turning into a dialogue of the deaf (so, what else is new).

The way I see it, there's a cloud of people who make images. In one direction, the artists, who care only for the end result. Off in another, the hobbyists, who love the kit and kaboodle. A third direction takes us to the craft folk, who are happiest breathing chemistry and massaging paper in some esoteric manner. Somewhere near the artists are the vast majority, who just point something with a lens and recording medium at what interests them and press the button. Some of the majority also rather like "sexy" camera kit. There are lots of other little groups as well, such as the mechanics, in their element taking cameras and lenses to pieces and putting them together again.

All these groups intermingle and only the rather odd, in my opinion, are pure examples of any of these types. The thing is, they're all absolutely correct in thinking that their views are the correct views, provided they add the magic words: "for them".

I reckon we'd all get more from the discussion, if we tried to think that way.

... kit and kaboodle, just so

 

[peterm1]

Absolutely I agree that the impression created is not necessarily a product of the gear used. While I love using the very best gear my favourite photos are almost invariably a product of my vision for the image and how I achieve this partly through the gear used and partly through post processing. Gear may certainly have some effect (think ultra fast lenses with razor thin depth of field and nice bokeh) but not necessarily. In particular super high resolution and superb sharpness often does not matter. In fact when I post process I will often take information carefully captured using that wonderful kit away to help create the effect I am looking for.

Here is an image I put up on Flickr today. I took that nice Nikon NEF image and then added vignette (something lenses are criticised for having), edge blur (likewise) and a diffusion filter to reduce resolution of the image (likewise) and removed color. All in the interest of creating the feeling I was looking for.

Alla at rest by yoyomaoz, on Flickr

 

[pieter]

Aren't all post processing options basically options that we have acquired through "gear"?

It's a nice sentiment that gear doesn't matter at all. But when using my M8 with it's lousy iso performance I found it very limitting when shooting some indoor event. And when I started using a M240 the usual viewers of my work certainly noticed a change in quality of my indoor work.
Sure, I could make arty pictures with long exposure times at night with my M8, but nice sharp pictures of dancing people just wasn't an option. Gear matters...

When I show people pictures from my Monochrom and they like the results I know a lot of the appeal is the way my ridiculously expensive gear renders things. Sure I'd love to think it is all me, but certainly my mediocre photography benefits tremendously from the impressive gear I use.

The other side of the coin is that a "real" artist could probably just take a **** on some paper and them paint an amazing artful picture with it, but then again I would say his choice of gear would still be part of how the end result looks...

Another question entirely is whether good gear needs to be ridiculously expensive. But yes, a good tool for the particular photograph you want to make is essential.

 

[peterm1]

Aren't all post processing options basically options that we have acquired through "gear"?

It's a nice sentiment that gear doesn't matter at all. But when using my M8 with it's lousy iso performance I found it very limitting when shooting some indoor event. And when I started using a M240 the usual viewers of my work certainly noticed a change in quality of my indoor work.
Sure, I could make arty pictures with long exposure times at night with my M8, but nice sharp pictures of dancing people just wasn't an option. Gear matters...

When I show people pictures from my Monochrom and they like the results I know a lot of the appeal is the way my ridiculously expensive gear renders things. Sure I'd love to think it is all me, but certainly my mediocre photography benefits tremendously from the impressive gear I use.

The other side of the coin is that a "real" artist could probably just take a **** on some paper and them paint an amazing artful picture with it, but then again I would say his choice of gear would still be part of how the end result looks...

Another question entirely is whether good gear needs to be ridiculously expensive. But yes, a good tool for the particular photograph you want to make is essential.

I certainly do not argue that gear does not matter.

But rather I say it matters less than vision and skill. DigitalRev TV on Youtube for example has a regular section named something like "Cheap camera challenge" (also known as "Pro photographer,crap camera") where they give a top notch pro a crappy (sometimes toy) camera and challenge them to go out and make images. You would be surprised (or may not be) how often there photographers turn in lovely and interesting images. Often with cheap $20 cameras.

Here is an example
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JnUavVTTjb8&list=PL7ECB90D96DF59DE5

I would certainly hate to have to rely on poor equipment when making images though. Perhaps its most correct to state the proposition in the dry way that mathematicians and scientists have and say that having good equipment is " a necessary but not sufficient condition" for consistently good image making.

 

[jonmanjiro]

As far as I'm aware he has never bought a camera. The ricoh he originally used was given to him by a photography professor? (can't remember). He definitely knows his darkroom stuff, but he't particularly interested. about what camera he uses as long as it's a point and shoot. Watch his documentary - the whole thing is on youtube.

In one of those Daido Moriyama documentaries on Youtube, Moriyama mentions how he went out looking for a camera one time and purchased a Pentax SLR. Not sure if its mentioned in the subtitles, be he definitely says it in Japanese. So, while he probably does get given most of his cameras, we know for sure that he has purchased at least one camera himself, and it wasn't a P&S compact 🙂

 

[RichC]

There's guff about "artists" who "point and shoot" in this thread! The unimportance of gear to picture-making is shared by most serious photographers - not just "artists".

Not having certain gear may mean taking a different kind of photograph from the one you initially intended. So, you adapt to what you do have and simply take another approach. Any half-decent photographer should be able to take meaningful photographs in any situation with any equipment. They'll look different of course, but those taken with "inferior" or "unsuitable" gear will work with these "deficiencies" not against them, so lens flare, blur, short focal length, etc., become positives that enhance the images.

You should be able to go to a football match with anything from a disposable point-and-shoot to a dSLR with a 500mm lens without feeling limited by the camera or producing poor photographs.

Excerpt from interview with Terry O'Neill:

"Amateurs worry about equipment…
I am not fond of cameras. Some photographers are camera mad! They own every model that comes out, but I am just not interested in them. In fact, they get in my way. The machinery is just a tool, a method of transferring the visualised image from the photographer’s mind onto a form everyone else can see. If we focus on the equipment and make that the centre of attention, we lose the reason for taking photographs in the first place – to record a moment or to tell a story."​

That's the point. You create the image, not the camera.

(If you're unfamiliar with Terry O'Neill, he's one of Britain's most celebrated photographers: see http://www.gettyimages.co.uk/editorial/frontdoor/terryoneill)

 

[Sejanus.Aelianus]

If you're unfamiliar with Terry O'Neill, he's one of Britain's most celebrated photographers

Only in the context of Amateur Photographer readers, I suspect. If you were to ask a hundred randomly selected people, in any High Street, who Terry O'Neil is, I rather think you'd get a hundred blank stares. Indeed, if you asked the question of a hundred camera club members, I'm guessing that around 10% would know who you were talking about.