Overrated photographers...

FrankS said:
Let's try to avoid beginning negative threads like this in the first place, for the sake of RFF.
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Agreed, but one individual was attempting to end it with some rather nasty stuff. It looks like a MO ..

I noticed his last two posts were removed as per my previous post.. got me
 
Juan Valdenebro said:
Have you ever felt any photographer, even if having merits, is being overrated?

Let's name a few of those we don't consider as great as others seem to consider them... (We know there will be different opinions, so let's keep this cool and interesting...)

I will start: Ansel Adams is an overrated photographer to me. Way overrated!

Cheers,

Juan
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Being the one who started this thread, I just want to quote that first post inviting to good manners... If there were harsh comments, I've really missed them...

I think the intentions and results were and are not negative: of course any posting against RFF rules and spirit can and should be deleted, but the subject is an interesting one, and discussing it is certainly positive, as it was positive when Susan Sontag discussed Diane Arbus' public beyond-photography boom decades ago... This theme is also treated long ago in best or art-oriented photography schools...

Cheers,

Juan
 
Hi Juan;

I enjoyed the thread. And, I likely, was one of those who took it a stray .. so apologys.. It had some great comments.

pkr
 
Surely, a important aspect of 'overrated' is "I'm totally unfamiliar with any other great photographers in the same genre, so the only photographer I know is GOD!" The role of GOD (with capitals) is most commonly played by AA for landscape and HCB for street.

In other words, this thread automatically incorporates 'underrated photographers' because those who've heard of (for example) Rodchenko or Brassai or Brandt or indeed Weegee are inclined to point out that HCB was part of a tradition, not a deus ex machina who singlehandedly transformed photography.

Overrating is normally in the eye of the uninformed.

Cheers,

R.
 
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I'll put my vote in for Adams. Master printer, yes. Only a competent photographer.

Also, Capa. His bravado and arrogance are what brought him fame. "If your pictures are not good enough, you're not close enough" is him calling out all the other photojournalists for not rushing into the heat of battle to snap away. Apart from "Death of a Loyalist Soldier" and the surviving frames from D-Day, what else has he done? Just an average photojournalist producing good work like hundreds of unknowns. Capa was the Lindsay Lohan or Paris Hilton of the day. Known by everyone for doing very little.

Anne Geddes by default.

Annie Leibovitz. I've seen videos of her at "work". Great stage director but hardly a photographer. Maybe the greatest art director?
 
All digital photography is junk.

All digital photography is junk.

Before the digital camera the camera and photographer had some credibility. Today all photography is way over rated. If you think I’m wrong take a look at some of HDR junk that’s being displayed as photography.
 
whatever said:
Before the digital camera the camera and photographer had some credibility. Today all photography is way over rated. If you think I’m wrong take a look at some of HDR junk that’s being displayed as photography.
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That does not prove that ALL photography is overrated. Even if we accept your assertion that HDR is junk, and even if 95% of the photography produced today was HDR, that wouldn't prove that all photography is overrated.
 
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