A question for the old timers.

STM

Senior Member
As I was shooting today something came to mind. This question is really for those of us who have spent (or still spend) a lot of time in the darkroom.

Although one could ever dispute that programs like Photoshop and Lightroom have given photographers of all skill levels a powerful tool to tweak and manipulate photographs, providing options that are either very difficult or even impossible to do in the dark room.

But here is my question, have programs like PS and LR made us lazy? What I mean by lazy is are we willing to live with things in the image that we can later fix in PS that we would not have been able to do 20 years ago? Back then you had to change viewpoints, deal more with color temperature (resorting to using the right kind of film and/or CC filters) and chose shutter speed and aperture for proper exposure. This was especially important in slide film where the exposure latitudes were not nearly as wide as with color negative film. Color negative film could tolerate a fair amount of overexposure, but color slide film would just go clear with no detail whatsoever left.

I know I have caught myself doing it too but fortunately my firewall is still intact enough and that voice tells me to stop and revert back to the film days and try to get things as right in the camera rather than relying on fixing them afterwards. Over the years I would say I have honed my PS skills to what are considered above average, as least as far as a photographer goes, but to be honest I hate having to spend a lot of time on an image where more attention to detail before the shutter was tripped would be better than hoping I can fix it later in Photoshop.

Your thoughts?
 
I think the digital revolution has made the ones of us who really care about our photography work even harder. We now have to not only know our more complex cameras but now we have to learn and keep up with the latest photo processing software and equipment.
 

Anco

Senior Member
Looking back at my old film photos, I have to say I don't think I got anything right in camera.

I have to agree though I'm definitely guilty of looking at the image after the shot and thinking that'll do, I'll fix it later instead of recomposing. But I'm not sure if this is laziness or simply convenience. Most of my shots will go no further than the computer screen at home. If I am setting up for a shot that I want to be a great shot, I'll spend the time to get it right in camera.
 

johnj167

Senior Member
I have often wondered the same thing. The great photographers of the past had to get it right. I have always wanted to be a great photographer, but through being lazy or not taking the time needed to get that perfect shot I find myself using post processing instead of doing what it takes to be a good photographer much less a great one.

I think I would rather have that one great shot than know how to fix a mediocre shot in post processing.

this is all my thoughts and I try to do this every time I leave my house with my camera.
 

Ruidoso Bill

Senior Member
It has been about 45 years since I spent time in a darkroom. Yes, in the film days I was much more conservative with every shot. I carried a light meter (still do) and thought about what I would do in the darkroom to bring the image into what I wanted. I remember going to medium format so I could work with larger negatives (fx/dx) today. I remember using different acids to increase "ASA" and bleach and q tips to remove power lines etc. The experience gained is more applied in how I use my cameras today, I do many more captures than back then but I hopefully take much better photos than I have ever been able to do. I love Lightroom and Photoshop and the amazing resolution of the D800, even better than medium format film. I am just plain thankful to have been in for the ride, every day is but another day to improve, master a new technique, but one thing remains the same, if you don't get it in the camera to begin with, it's lost. Keep shooting and enjoy!
 
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aroy

Senior Member
Yes we had to get it right especially for colour slides. When I developed and printed B&W, there was much more latitude for correcting exposures. For slide film, especially crucial ones there was always three shot bracketing. In general I think life is much easier now, what with wide DR sensors and great PP tools. Ultimately you can do all you like in PP, but you have to get the framing and mood right there, no PP will help.
 

johnj167

Senior Member
I think your right Aroy, PP can't change the composition or framing but I think it can certainly change the mood of an image.
 

J-see

Senior Member
I think PP made us as "lazy" as any other technology.

We could ask ourselves the same question about the cam. Does all that technology make us lazy as a photographer? After all, we could just shoot 500 shots and then pick the best. I clearly remember taking way less shots in the past but it has little to do with me investing more time in the actual shot and all with me, back in the day, knowing each shot costs money.

It's not different with the darkroom-post. After the initial buy, post costs as much as shots cost; only the time and effort. If back in the day it all would have cost nothing, we'd have been doing exactly what we'd be doing now.
 

aroy

Senior Member
Basically with digital one can take as many shots as one likes, without money at the back of the mind. It does not matter if I get a shot right in 2 tries or 200.
 

traceyjj

Senior Member
Even though i did very little D&P myself I still think we are treating the art/act of photography in a very different manner. As much as I want to get every shot to count (as I tried to on film) we all realise that we are no longer limited to 36 shots before we have to change the film... or HAVE to use all the film before we change the films ISO.
I am certainly not of the spray and pray group of people, but I am now taking more "risks" to try out something new, knowing that it might be fixable in PP.
Years ago, when I used a film camera, I used to go on holiday and take 6 36exp films and I would rarely use them all... now I find I can take that many in a day out!
Sorry, thats not really answered your question as such has it :(
 

aroy

Senior Member
Even though i did very little D&P myself I still think we are treating the art/act of photography in a very different manner. As much as I want to get every shot to count (as I tried to on film) we all realise that we are no longer limited to 36 shots before we have to change the film... or HAVE to use all the film before we change the films ISO.
I am certainly not of the spray and pray group of people, but I am now taking more "risks" to try out something new, knowing that it might be fixable in PP.
Years ago, when I used a film camera, I used to go on holiday and take 6 36exp films and I would rarely use them all... now I find I can take that many in a day out!
Sorry, thats not really answered your question as such has it :(

My holiday snaps were limited to one or two roll, as not only was the roll and developing expensive, but you had to print (and distribute in some cases). Time was when Kodak charged upwards of 60 cents per post card sized print. Then at the fag end of the era QSS labs came and offered prints at one third of that, with a turn around of 2 hours instead of a week for Kodak.

Today not only is taking snaps free, but in most of the cases the images are distributed electronically. Only in rare case is a print made.
 

STM

Senior Member
I think PP made us as "lazy" as any other technology.

We could ask ourselves the same question about the cam. Does all that technology make us lazy as a photographer? After all, we could just shoot 500 shots and then pick the best. I clearly remember taking way less shots in the past but it has little to do with me investing more time in the actual shot and all with me, back in the day, knowing each shot costs money.

It's not different with the darkroom-post. After the initial buy, post costs as much as shots cost; only the time and effort. If back in the day it all would have cost nothing, we'd have been doing exactly what we'd be doing now.

The old expression "film is cheap" no longer true. But when you had a finite number of shots you carried with you, you were more conscientious about making things count. Nowadays digital is essentially "free" and you have 10x-100x the storage capacity on a flash card.

One thing that makes me kind of chuckle (and at the same time, grimace in pain) when I see photographers on modeling sites like Model Mayhem, One Model Place or Model Brigade (now called "Publicize Me") advertise that they will shoot "250 shots" per shoot and guarantee "10 good ones". Man, that is some kind of PITIFUL success rate!! I have sent PM's to many a photographer telling them to drop that crap from their profile page because it makes them look like a "spray and pray" hack, which of course many of them are. They are usually referred to as GWC's (Guys With Cameras) who go get a low end consumer camera at WalMart or Best Buy and the kit lens and then call themselves "photographers". And their "work" shows it. I may shoot at most 40-50 images during a 2 hour shoot and this will include makeup and wardrobe changes. But I would rather have the client agonize over which of those 40-50 images to find the ones they like the best rather than put them through the misery of having to wade through 250 or more, mostly crap images just to find those "10 good ones".
 
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J-see

Senior Member
I wasn't exactly cruising the Queen Elizabeth II when I was young so the amount of film I could carry with me was largely defined by the little money I could spend. After all, there was girls and such too.

A large part of investing more time in a shot was also defined by the inability to directly check that shot taken. You better did everything right else that film only revealed wasted effort. That's why you checked the light three times and considered different options to each shot before pressing the button. At least I did. The fact that photography back in the day wasn't sci-fi forced us.

I borrowed a Praktica of my dad, a cam that crawled here out of the good old DDR. It might not have been the best but if I'd ever shipwreck, I could crack a coconut with it too. There wasn't much high tech on it. An automatic light meter that sometimes worked but sometimes not and thus forced you to do it manually anyways. That was about it. You were forced to do effort because taking shots was like playing darts blindfolded. I still rarely check the images taken and will only see most after upload. I do miss some shots doing that but it confronts me with my limitations and learns me to put as much trust in myself and my cam as I did back in the day.

The same is true for post. What I remember most is much of it being a very boring affair. I never remember feeling excited when developing film. "Woohoo where's me shaker! This is gonna be so much fun!" Sure there was some charm to the actually "print" process but there was much more bore and repetitive labor. Don't even mention retouching.

All the options we have at our disposal might indeed influence carefulness or our investment in the shots we take but they too boost our creativity. The fact we can try anything we want and, this is best of all, go back and try something else when it didn't work out is a phenomenal improvement.
 

jazzjunkie

Senior Member
I still try and do as much as possible in camera because I like taking pictures a lot more than I like sitting at a pc using software I don't really understand, I like to spend no more than ten minutes touching up a photo, but i don't really do anything crazy with them anyway. I do take an awful lot more shots now than in the good old days though, but I'd like to think I'm quite self critical and disciplined enough to throw away bad photos without trying like crazy to polish them into something that is still a bit pants...
 

J-see

Senior Member
I personally pretty much like post. It gives me something to do when it's dark outside. Yet I never have post in mind when taking shots. I consider them two separate things.

I'm pretty critical myself. I do try a lot and take plenty a shot when out there but not much survives. My cam's closing in at some 20k shots taken and besides maybe a 100 of my dogs, I have about 30 of those 20.000 that managed to survive until today. Each time I move a step forward, I turn back and swing the ax at all previous shots that can't live up to my new standards.
 

RON_RIP

Senior Member
In my chosen profession, woodworking, new technology has forever altered the way I do my constructions; and I embrace it. The same is true of photography. The cameras have more features and are, in and of theirselves,great teaching tools. And modern post prossesing allows to achieve more than we ever could " in the old days". That being said, we still must strive to get the image correct in camera. I just find it easier to do today and am thankful for it.
 

Marcel

Happily retired
Staff member
Super Mod
I've spent years in a darkroom and I certainly don't miss it much. It took so much time just to do some experiments that were NOT reversible. Yes we did take a little more time before we pressed the shutter, but this was in a commercial large format (5x7, 8,10) color transparencies that cost money to get and process. So what we did is spent more money on polaroids just to test for exposure and focus. All these things can now be done on the spot before moving on to the next shot.

So I guess we might be getting a little more careless, knowing that somethings can be done in post processing, but what can't be changed is the actual composition (except crop) and the lighting. No post processing will get back the image that was NOT taken because the photographer was NOT looking at the right thing that was happening right there. But the power of post processing software I praise because I can see what I'm getting and correct as I go along. The problem with younger photographers that haven't worked with film is that some of them don't know what a good print should look like and lack the basic knowledge of high light and low light limits (print vs transparencies).

So at least I'm glad I'm not spending my time in the dark, smelling chemicals and waiting for a print to reveal itself under the red light or blindly doing steps with the Kodak drum processor... How many of you have worked with this one?
 
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