Is it just me, or is it time for the aesthetic to morph?

[Steve M.]

OK, I looked at the images. Seen worse. It seemed as if I had clicked onto a science fiction link judging from a lot of the shots. I wouldn't call 95% of it photography, but that's just me. Just stuff that was juiced up and edited in Photoshop or whatever. People like that kind of thing though, and that's OK.

 

[shimokita]

Earlier this morning I was looking at a landscape from a friend... field of flowers, blue sky, white puffy clouds and my first thought was "why didn't they use a PL?" But a further look and it's "hey, I really like the soft natural tones of the photo"... Did I like the photo because it was different... that had to be part of the reason.

 

[retinax]

Funny thing is sometimes light really does look like that. I've seen it but it's not something that occurs every day. The Mesa Arch photo I mentioned done by David Muench was done with a 4x5 Linhof at sunrise very early in the morning after a long trek and climb to the right spot at the right time after much research. Light in that area can be magical under the right conditions and Muench worked the conditions for his photo. Today, you can arrive late, shoot what's left of sunrise and manipulate the files to look just like Muench's. Galen Rowell's photos were done on film without the digital manipulation we see today. He studied the weather conditions and was an experienced mountain climber, willing to work for his shots. He explains how he got some of his photographs in one of his book and it took an enormous amount of dedication and drive. Today, you can do the same images with Photoshop and computer skills. So a lot of photographers just say "Why not?", have another cup of latte and work with software. And even if they do put forth the same effort and dedication as Muench and Rowell did, they would never be able to do it better but they still have to make a living. It's a rationalization...a justification anyway.

I checked the photo by Muench out. It's certainly in the same genre. But the light in it doesn't look unnatural to me, it's not even that unusual for dusk or dawn. If the photographs we're discussing were manipulated to look like that, I wouldn't mind. But most of them don't look anything like it. I don't take issue with the manipulation of tones as such, but with leaving it to an algorithm (or results that look like it) rather than doing it deliberately, or if this is done deliberately, I challenge prioritizing local contrast over, well, everything else.

 

[sepiareverb]

Nice to see the same pictures are still used somewhere. I don’t think any single image there except perhaps the first portrait was not published in one of the big photo mags back in the 90s. Just now on sensor not film. Boring then too, but popular nevertheless.

I’ve been wanting a physical magazine about photography lately, something I can hold and read, but this is certainly not it.

 

[LCSmith]

because they are ugly, clearly false representations of natural scenes.

Yes, this has been the unanticipated revelation.

 

[Out to Lunch]

Well, the magazine -in MBA talk, provides an 'advertisement platform' for photo gear. And so the owners feature razzle-dazzle photos. Razzle-dazzle: "a confusing or colorful often gaudy action or display".

 

[zuikologist]

This.

They remind me of Nikon and Canon brochures of the 1980s, which I liked at the time. Once you know the content, the aspirational aesthetic is understandable and desirable to 99% of the population, if not on RFF.

First of all it is commercial, advertisement pages from some company which makes next to useless and overpriced gadgets.
It will be very surprising to find good photography in these. Just regular over processed digital dross. For primitive digestion. It is nice what RFF is very much free from it, BTW.
But even on those advertisement pages where are some good BW photos.

 

[LCSmith]

aesthetic is understandable and desirable to 99% of the population.

Which is precisely why it interests.

 

[02Pilot]

I find it interesting that, given the unprecedented selection of tools available for the creation and creative interpretation of photographs, everyone seems to be making the same picture. This tends to point to a lack of creativity in both producer and consumer, which sadly is neither surprising nor novel.

 

[ForestCap]

ＴＨＩＳ　ＩＳ　ＴＨＥ　ＡＥＳＴＨＥＴＩＣ，　ＴＨＩＳ　ＩＳ　ＴＨＥ　ＷＡＶＥ！

 

[x-ray]

Personally, i find that 95% of professional landscape shot on digital looks like stock images. It's just too sharp, processed, and perfect. My first thought is not "wow, what a view!", it's "jeez, how much post processing did they put into this?". It's incredibly unnatural. No feeling, no emotion, no direct attachment to reality.

Very well put. I'll add one comment, it as though there's an X marking the spots they all go to and shoot the same tired images. They we're cool the first couple of times but they're now worn out.

 

[x-ray]

While these guys did an excellent job on what they did, it's just another trend that will come and go. How many have I lived and worked through over the decades. Let's see, high grain, high contrast, HDR, cross process, the holga look, solarization, in the commercial world the Hose Master, over sharpened, over saturated and on and on. Trends come and go and a year down the road there'll be another that eventually is worn out and then another will come along.

I can't tell you how many landscape guys I know. I mean serious landscape shooters. As beautiful as their work is it's the same as everyone else does. Two of my friends teach workshops on how to do what everyone else does.

One of my friends took a workshop on how to shoot the milky way. Now that's all he shoots.

My philosophy is there'll always be interest in solid clean no gimick photography and that's how I've approached both my personal work and my commercial.

 

[Michael Markey]

I'll add one comment, it as though there's an X marking the spots they all go to and shoot the same tired images.

From what people tell me .... in the UK there is.
They just place their tripod in the tripod holes left by former photographers.

 

[x-ray]

From what people tell me .... in the UK there is.
They just place their tripod in the tripod holes left by former photographers.

Not a surprise. What about exposure recommendations?

 

[02Pilot]

In no small part due to this thread, I rattled off the following crotchety missive this morning: https://filmosaur.wordpress.com/2018/05/12/happy-little-photographs/

 

[Godfrey]

The argument the OP made is about the aesthetic these pictures exemplify, not about the pictures as such. Any thoughts on that?

As I said, there are a lot of photos I don't particularly care for. I think it's a bit simple to look at one stupid little ezine and consider it to be a typical aesthetic to take arms against.

There are some photos in it that I like. Most I'm not excited by.

G