civilized ku # 2059 ~ reading / being drawn into a picture, or, what I dislike about "serious" amateur photographers
Wednesday, January 25, 2012 at 08:39AM ;)
Reflection / dish rack ~ Au Sable Forks, NY - in the Adirondack PARK • click to embiggenOne sure sign of my returning health is my returning desire to start writing words like "moron", "idiot", "dumbass", and the like. That desire, even as my actual puking recedes into memory, is fueled by my having read, on a couple different sites, a couple recent blog entries that make me want to puke, figuratively speaking.
Both articles, despite their at-first-glance topical differences, are essentially about grinding the same old photography ax(iom) - how and with what gear/technique a picture is made really matters. One entry states quite emphatically that "...[T]he bottom line is that Medium Format Images are superior to smaller format images regardless of the size of the print or the image on the screen ... larger format captures always look better...".
The other entry states that, for the author, some pictures "... make enormous demands on resolution, and doesn't work for me unless, no matter how big the print is, examining it at reading distance reveals a wealth of detail with convincing description of the subject matter. A print that looks OK at 'normal viewing distance' but falls apart if you move closer to view it at reading distance doesn't cut it."
Relative to the statement "larger format captures always look better", IMO, that is a grossly misleading notion. Yes, a "larger" format, film or digital, does have some undeniable technical advantages but to state unequivocally that bigger "always looks better" is to deny or be grossly ignorant of what can be accomplished, relative to "smaller" formats, with the skillful use of the tools of the medium. Even with web viewing, it should be quite obvious to anyone without a preconceived bias that there are many picture makers out there who are making very finely technically crafted pictures independent of format.
Would those pictures "stand up" to direct side-by-side, same subject / same time comparisons? I suspect most would compare quite nicely but, yes or no, who the f**k cares? That's quite simply not what making pictures is about. All that matters / the only thing that matters, despite the author's contention that Everything Matters, is that the picture maker be able to adequately represent and communicate his/her picturing intent. Period. End of discussion.
Relative to the "examining it (a picture) at reading distance" malarkey, IMO, examining a picture at reading distance is the absolute worst way in which to "read" a picture. A good picture is much more than the sum of its visual parts. It is all-of-a-piece.
A good pictures demands to be taken/viewed whole. Even though most pictures have a dominant visual referent, in a good picture that referent is always presented in relationship, within the frame, to other "parts" of the picture. That relationship has undoubtedly been created by the picture maker with the intent of seeing the referent in the strongest manner possible (Edward Weston: composition is the strongest way of seeing). Moving in to "reading distance" is the best way I can think of to disregard / ignore the picture maker's strongest way of seeing - what's the point of that?
Despite the author's somewhat idiotic disregard for judging a picture's success/failure goodness/badness at a "normal viewing distance", a picture's success or failure must be judged solely by its effect and affect at precisely that distance. Viewing a picture at an appropriate "normal" distance is the only way to see, in its illustrative and illuminative totality, what the picture maker saw, pictured, and intended to say. Period. End of discussion.
All of that said, therein is what I really dislike about "avid"/"serious" amateur photographers. They simply can't help themselves - every picture they see is most often a foil against which they can demonstrate (verbally) their "mastery" of the medium. Every picture could be made better with the use of better gear and/or technique ("I would have ..."). And, it seems readily apparent, every picture has an implanted and irresistible nose magnet which draws them in for a closer inspection.
They seem to be totally clueness as to why people may like a given picture. IMO&E, it's not because it's sharp and full of detail at reading distances. It's because the viewer has been drawn into a picture, not in a physical sense, but rather by the emotional and intellectual affect, together with its visual effect, a picture has upon their visual and aesthetic sensibilities.
In a gallery crowd, avid/serious photography practitioners can usually be spotted clustered together, in their little gear/technique-head ghettos, clucking and chortling like a flock of know-it-all hens pecking at barren ground. I always avoid them like the plague upon the medium they actually are.
There, I've said it. I'm starting to feel better already.
Reader Comments (5)
Hi Mark.
Yup, I agree. That must be the reason I hardly ever print bigger than A4 with a generous border included as well; and yes I own all the megapixels I could want and the printer too, but I just like small personal prints. "Move up to reading distance" with my prints and you'll go cross eyed and be deeply disappointed!
Yes, I read the "Everything Matters" article by Mark Dubovoy as well.
He builds a good "case" and I went along with it, but at the end of the article I thought to myself "This approach obviously works for you but you can't apply it to everyone".
Going back over it, I can see where he went astray. Mark Dubovoy is obviously a super-technical kind of guy and details are his emotional hot button. Of course, he can "rationalise" that details are important but that's simply a mechanism to justify is emotional response to detail.
His concept of the "unseen" is a good one -- another way of saying this is the picture has to "say something of interest". Dubovoy's definition of the unseen -- being a super-technical guy -- is super-detail or "hyper-realism".
In photography, you can only get super-detail from top end equipment & technique.
What Dubovoy fails to acknowledge is that there is more than one kind and more than one way to show the "unseen" in an image.
I was reading Dubovoy's article and my eyebrows kept going up at each more outrageous claim. I just about stopped reading when he got to the part about changing the power cable on the amp. It's like hearing the music without "listening" to the music.
Check out Brooks Jensen's response to his article. I thought it was pretty right on:
http://daily.lenswork.com/2012/01/my-response-to-mark-dubovoy.html
Judging a photo from "reading distance" seems bit like trying to judge a dish (let's say lasagna) by eating the component ingredients seperately. Nothing tastes good at that resolution.