Luminous Landscape Forum
The Art of Photography => The Coffee Corner => Topic started by: ErikKaffehr on December 12, 2013, 12:24:34 pm
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Hi,
On a different thread I stated that without science and technology we would have no cameras but would still carve stones. I would say that there is a lot to that statement. Photography has always been linked with science. Chemistry to begin with. The first photography was made by Joseph Nicéphore Niépce, a french inventor. Incidentally, Niépce also invented the first internal combustion engine.
The discovery of film based photography is usually attributed to Henry Fox Talbot, another inventor. But Henry Fox Talbot was also a photographic artist. Victor Hasselblad was an industrialist with a passion for photography. Science, technology and art can go hand in hand. But would you ask Victor Hasselblad what he was doing for living, I guess he would say that 'I am leading a firm making the finest cameras in the world' instead of saying 'I am photographic artist, making pictures of birds using a camera my company has developed for my pleasure'.
Something to keep in mind is that there is a mass market, essentially paying for most of the developments. The elite could not be without the mass market.
Once I read a book by Marc Rochkind an inventor in software development. I saw him posting here, and I think he took part in the PODAS workshops. I also met a gentleman called Forest Baskett at that time vice president research and development at Silicon Graphics, another participant in LuLa workshops.
Bill Atkinson, the principal developer of HyperCard among other things is an Artist. He published a book 'Within the Stone'. Publishing that book he implemented colour management and modified the printing process at the Japanese company printing the book.
Science and art can go in hand. So you can be a scientist and an artist. But photography is based on technology and I guess that scientists often feel the urge to understand the technology they are using for living or pastime.
Best regards
Erik
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Incidentally, "Capturing the Light (http://books.google.com/books?id=AWpEAQAAQBAJ): The Birth of Photography, a True Story of Genius and Rivalry".
"An intimate look at the journeys of two men—a gentleman scientist and a visionary artist—as they struggled to capture the world around them, and in the process invented modern photography"
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Define your terms (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Techne).
For what it's worth, stone carving most definitely requires … know-how.
Doing science makes knowledge. Doing art makes things. You can't do art without know-how. Know-how is science.
Any human can do both.
(Typo corrected.)
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Hi,
I don't say that Art doesn't need knowledge. What I say is that photography needs tools, which we would not have without science. I also listed quite a few scientists who are are great photographers.
Know-how is not science. Science is going deeper. Expose to the right is know how, the Poisson distribution behind is part of the science. You can make great pictures without knowing about Poisson distribution. You can even make great pictures without ETTR.
A great picture is often well composed. Composition rules don't belong to natural sciences, and they definitively don't teach composition in a basic physics course.
Just saying, lot's of people here on LuLa who like photography as an art but also are interested in the physics behind.
Best regards
Erik
Define your terms (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Techne).
For what it's worth, stone carving most definitely requires … know-how.
Doing science makes knowledge. Doing art makes things. You can't do art without know-how. Know-how is science.
Any human can do both.
(Typo corrected.)
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There is a high grade of technique involved into the art of making images, and obviously,
the mastering of the scientifical aspect for the artist is not an option but an obligation.
Now...what do we call technical and for who?
A photographer does not need to be able to take to peices a camera and rebuilt it like in fabric
to be an image genius. We're not Dalsa engineers.
A good director does not even need to touch a camera.
The "problem" I generaly see in the web forums regarding technical aspects, is that very Little
really relevant technical aspects for the shooter are treated, while a lot of what I'd call tech masturbation
abunds.
If the scientists of the forums want to bring on the table their knowledge, wich is good, why don't we see
more high-end technical tesis on lightning, ergonomics and optics engineering for ex, instead of those
easy sensor pixels peeping monothemism and charts stuff outside the contexts of real life use?
The tech and scientific aspects have never been the problem. It's IMO what's really usefull and what's just
tech for tech entertainment.
We should never forget that photography, video, cine, are disciplines of comunication. Comunication with people,
with a landscape, with models, with objects, and within the team itself between different specialities.
And this comunication habilities is an art that has also its technical parts but can not be taught
from the benches of Polytechnique only.
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We should never forget that photography, video, cine, are disciplines of comunication. Comunication with people,
with a landscape, with models, with objects, and within the team itself between different specialities.
And this comunication habilities is an art that has also its technical parts but can not be taught
from the benches of Polytechnique only.
And there we have the problem: it becomes a matter of personality and instinct.
I often think that street-market traders, given the opportunity, would make better photographic business managers than most photographers that I know, myself included. Chutzpah.
You can't buy that - you are born to it, or not.
Rob C
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Chutzpah....
You can't buy that - you are born to it, or not.
Rob C
Well - you certainly can't buy it, except I guess in the person of a well-chosen lawyer. I am not sure I agree that you can't learn it. Not to be great at it, sure, but to be ok, even if at the cost of overcoming anxieties and aversions. I don't like to bargain, would always prefer to pay too much, but after a few weeks in some countries I can do it, or at least fake it, passably.
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When I lived in the Middle East I had to learn how to bargain. It's a skill you can acquire, though it certainly comes easier to some people than others. (Count me as an other.) In that part of the world it's actually as much about respect and decorum as establishing an acceptable price for both buyer and seller. I can't even count how many times a well-executed bargaining session—where I and the seller knew the value of the item in question and also knew that the other knew—ended with both of us sitting at a table jovially enjoying coffee, hummus & pita.
-Dave-
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I am not sure I agree that you can't learn it. Not to be great at it, sure, but to be ok, even if at the cost of overcoming anxieties and aversions.
As a course assignment, one of my colleagues was required to ask to see the manager at their local big supermarket and then try to negotiate a discount on the price of one apple.
Plenty of anxiety and embarrassment and something learned about being able to do what was never seen as a possibility.
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If you carve a stone into something of art, aren't the hammer and chisel also tools developed by science? How does shooting pictures differ?
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Same thing with Painting, Alan. Chemistry always has been involved, though I'm sure there was a time when it wasn't called chemistry.
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A Canadian neurologist (can't remember his name) studied Einstein's brain. He identified a 15% size increase in the area of the cortex where mathematical calculations occur. He also discovered an unusually dense network of connections from that math part of the brain to the part of the cortex that processes visualization. Einstein noted that he used visualization skills to formulate his theory of relativity. He imagined he was riding on a beam of light. So if that is not a perfect example of art and science, what is?
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Erik,
Yes, they do.
Now, the angle I find interesting is the foreseable evolution moving forward.
As of now, even those of us able to comprehend the mechanisms at stake have little ability to impact the image capturing process much. We can, to a degree, select what lens we put on our camera, we can split hairs to tune the way we process the files the camera generates, but that's pretty much it.
The scientist does have little active role in the process of designing the capturing device.
I believe that we are in the middle of a revolution called the "fab revolution" that will soon enable many of us to engage in a much more active fashion in the end to end creation process, including the genesis of the capturing device itself.
That will enable us to get back to the roots of art when the act of manufacturing tools was an intimate, essential and differientiating part of the artistic process. Color photography and SLRs had essentially turned the industry into a mass market where little freedom was left for tool customization/personnalization.
Panoramic imaging is in fact a rudimentary version of this already in that it enables the photographer to free himself from the constraints of sensor size and aspect ratio. I expect a lot more liberation to come soon to those with the imagination needed to push the enveloppe.
Cheers,
Bernard
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The definition of scientist does not include photographer.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Scientist
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Interesting discussion. In my opinion, the camera is a scientific tool for capturing images of reality that closely correspond with what we actually saw, and sometimes what we are not able to see.
Long before the chemical processes were developed to a stage where it was possible to get an imprint of the light passing through the lens, or the pinhole, we had cameras without film or 'light-sensitive material', called 'camera obscura' which literally means 'darkened chamber (or room)', from the Latin.
In the attached Wikipedia article it is claimed that the Camera Obscura in concept goes back to the days of Aristotle and the ancient Chinese.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Camera_obscura
Apparently, during the Renaissance when the quality of lenses was beginning to improve, the Camera Obscura was sometimes used with a lens in place of a pinhole, and sometimes mirrors were used to invert the image the right way up, which enabled artists of the day to produce marvelously detailed and realistic paintings, by projecting an image onto the canvas of what they wanted to paint, and tracing with pen or brush an outline of those elements in the scene. This enabled them get the perspective, shape and size of objects in their painting looking just as the eye sees them, and in so doing astound the viewer with their great skill.
It's understandable that such artists in those days would have been reluctant to reveal the secret of their technique. They might be accused of cheating, or they might even get into trouble with the religious authorities of the day. We all know what happened to Galileo.
It is therefore not surprising that artists continued to use the camera as a tool, as the camera became more sophisticated. Towards the end of the 19th century, and early 20th century, many artists despaired at the ease with which a camera could accurately capture an image which might take them days or weeks to paint.
It's no wonder that non-realistic, semi-abstract and fully-abstract painting styles began to take off, such as Impressionism, Cubism, Surrealism and so on. Why attempt to compete with the camera?
On the other hand, certain artists decided to apply their artistic skills to using the camera as a tool, together with the darkroom processing techniques that were available, and techniques which they could invent themselves, in place of the paint brush (which is also a tool), and thus was born the distinction between the 'fine art' photo and the 'point & shoot' snapshot, although in reality it's not a situation of either/or. There's a whole range of photographic styles. Henri Cartier Bresson considered himself to be a photographic journalist, capturing a meaningful moment in time, then handing the film over to others for processing.
In a sense, one could argue that the use of the camera to create so called 'works of art' is a trivial use of an amazing technology. The most significant use of the camera (in its various forms), which is of great assistance and benefit for mankind, is in its scientific applications. Where would modern medicine or astronomy be without 'imaging devices'?
The fact that such imaging devices can be turned into popular tools for entertainment purposes provides an increased economic basis for the development of better sensors and lenses.
In my view, it is the phenomenal capability of modern cameras to capture realistic, high resolution and wide dynamic-range images that is of great fascination for many of us, regardless of any arty-farty considerations.
Consider the following attached image as an example. This could be considered basically a snapshot. It was taken in a crowded part of the city in the early evening during a Christmas celebration and prior to a show. These two girls sitting on the steps, looked rather unusual and caught my attention. I took a quick shot, unobtrusively, as I walked by. The camera was the D800E with 24-120/F4 zoom lens which I'd set at 92mm for the shot. The ISO was preset at ISO 200 and the shutter speed at 1/200th. The shot was underexposed by 2.6 stops. An ETTR exposure would have required an ISO of 1250, but that would not have produced a noticeably cleaner or sharper image, in my experience.
Now, when processing this image, I noticed a few aspects of the scene which had not been apparent to me as I'd framed the shot. I could see that one of the girls had some sort of tattoo on her legs, but I couldn't see the details. I could see that the other girl had something in her hand, which I thought at the time was probably and iPhone, but wasn't sure.
If I'd been using 35mm film instead of a modern DSLR, I'd have been none the wiser regarding these details, and the image would have been of less significance to me as a result.
However, after processing the shot, and being able to see clearly what one girl had in her hand, which is a cigarette and a brochure with the words, 'Smoking Causes Heart Disease', and being able to see clearly the wording on the tattoo on the other girl, 'Follow the White Rabbit', the image took on new dimensions of meaning for me.
One girl is apparently concerned about her smoking habit, and she should be.
The other girl has a very seductive tattoo in an eye-catching location, the white rabbit of course being a mystical figure that leads one into a hole of psychological discovery. ;)
Three cheers for high-resolution cameras. ;D
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If I'd been using 35mm film instead of a modern DSLR, I'd have been none the wiser regarding these details, and the image would have been of less significance to me as a result.
While the details of the tatoo are interesting, we can't be dependent on catching things like that to make a picture interesting, film or DSLR. Then it's just luck. Had the fellow above been leering down at the girls and you saw that and then captured it, in film or DSLR, you would have had a picture with real interesting content and comment. Then you could honestly say that you were the artist that did it. No luck involved. The quality of the film or DSLR wouldn't have mattered in that case at all. In the end, it's the picture that counts.
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While the details of the tatoo are interesting, we can't be dependent on catching things like that to make a picture interesting, film or DSLR. Then it's just luck. Had the fellow above been leering down at the girls and you saw that and then captured it, in film or DSLR, you would have had a picture with real interesting content and comment. Then you could honestly say that you were the artist that did it. No luck involved. The quality of the film or DSLR wouldn't have mattered in that case at all. In the end, it's the picture that counts.
You seem to have missed the point, Alan. The scene was sufficiently interesting for me to take the shot regardless of whether the guy at the back is leering, (and from his position there was probably no reason to leer), and regardless of the fact I couldn't read the tattoo or the brochure that the other girl had in her hand.
If one takes a photo of a high resolution scene, and most scenes have far more detail than even an D800E can capture, then one can always be surprised by the additional detail one discovers during processing. Sometimes that additional detail will add to the general interest of the photo. Sometimes it might be a distraction.
Sometime the presence of that additional detail will enable a more interesting composition to be created through cropping.
I don't know where you get the idea that one might take shots of uninteresting subjects in the hope that the high resolution of the camera will make it interesting. Unless one is a commercial photographer who has to please the client, one takes the shot if one finds the scene interesting, period.
If the camera is low resolution with low SNR and dynamic range, as my first digital camera was, the 6mp Canon D60, then one often gets unpleasant surprises during processing. That's the only reason I ever upgraded my cameras.
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Hi,
No, but scientists can be photographers and photography can be used in science.
Best regards
Erik
The definition of scientist does not include photographer.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Scientist
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An interesting example is Carl Zeiss.
He studied mathematics, experimental physics, anthropology and optics. Later he started making microscopes. In order to make better microscopes he teamed up with Ernst Abbe, a physicist. The third person behind Carl Zeiss was Otto Schott a young glass chemist who recently got his doctorate.
The developments by these scientists led to what is known as Zeiss today.
In development, science turns into engineering, but a piece of science is always around.
Best regards
Erik
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Nope, you're the one missing the piont, Ray: the point being, why on Earth would anyone photograph such an unattractive pair? Those hideous pop socks would have been enough to put me off for life. Their purpose, however ugly they may be per se, is to be worn under trousers and eliminate the need for tights, whilst allowing the while the more comfortable wearing of shoes; tights of course, being yet another foul, misogynistic invention of the rag trade. As for tattoos, they represent such a vile insult to both human kind and common sense that the wearers pass themselves into a category at which cameras should never be raised; rather should one call the large gentlemen in white coats.
Rob C
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Nope, you're the one missing the piont, Ray: the point being, why on Earth would anyone photograph such an unattractive pair?
That's not a point, Rob. That's a question. I took the shot because I found the pair of young ladies interestingly dressed and representative of a class of young chicks who are striving to be 'cool'. They stood out (or sat out ;D ) against the surrounding, milling crowd of conventionally and rather boringly dressed people.
Those hideous pop socks would have been enough to put me off for life. Their purpose, however ugly they may be per se, is to be worn under trousers and eliminate the need for tights, whilst allowing the while the more comfortable wearing of shoes..
Oh! You've got rules for wearing clothes, have you? As a person who claims to have an artistic streak, you should know that it's sometimes okay to break the rules. ;)
I don't mind if you think the photo is hideous, but surely you can see the logic to the argument that it must be you who are missing the point, the point being that which causes me to find the shot interesting.
I also find a bit of humour in the image, thanks to the high resolution of the D800E. On the one hand we have the symbolism of the message on the tattoo, which is well-described as follows.
"Going "down the rabbit hole" has become a common metaphor in popular culture, symbolizing everything from exploring a new world to taking drugs to delving into something unknown. (Think The Matrix, for example, where "following the white rabbit" and later choosing the "red pill" starts Neo off on a journey of philosophical realization from which he cannot return.)
In Alice's Adventures in Wonderland, the rabbit hole is the place where it all begins. It's Alice's unthinking decision to follow the White Rabbit that leads to all of her adventures. The pop culture version of this symbol perhaps doesn't take into account the "unthinking" nature of this choice quite enough. After all, Alice's decision is pretty foolhardy; if this weren't a magical fantasyland, she'd probably be killed by the fall, and she has no idea where she's going, what she's facing, or how to get home. You may also notice that going down the rabbit hole is a one-way trip – the entry, but not the exit, to the fantasy world."
And on the other hand we have the rather contradictory and alarming message of pictures of gaping mouths with fangs on the lady's miniskirt. ;D
Have you got the point now, Rob. ;)
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The scene was sufficiently interesting for me to take the shot regardless of whether the guy at the back is leering, (and from his position there was probably no reason to leer), and regardless of the fact I couldn't read the tattoo or the brochure that the other girl had in her hand.
I'll be kinder than Rob and say that the girls, while not my type, are someone's type so they make an interesting pair. However, the boy at the top is looking out beyond the girls and beyond the frame of the picture. Why is he there? He adds no interest to the picture. He has no relation to the girls. Where you zoomed in on the girls, well that wouldn't work either. The boy's shoes are in the background messing up the view of the girls. There has to be some relationship between the players. http://www.flickr.com/photos/alanklein2000/5344384185/
The point is that resolution to find tatoos or whatever is no substitute for content. You can't be hopeful that it will be somehow hidden in the millions of pixels any more than a film photographer hopes to find content in grains.
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"That's not a point, Rob. That's a question.
Ray, that's artful dodging on your part.
"Oh! You've got rules for wearing clothes, have you? As a person who claims to have an artistic streak, you should know that it's sometimes okay to break the rules."
Not rules, Ray: raisons d'être for pop socks and many items of apparel. If one is to break rules, it's incumbent upon one to know why the rules exist and what they happen to be. The same is often said of photography, and in that context make similar sense. These two unfortunates are babes in the woods.
I've sometimes thought that Alice would have been a better invention had she come from the mind of Warhol instead.
;-)
Rob C
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However, the boy at the top is looking out beyond the girls and beyond the frame of the picture. Why is he there? He adds no interest to the picture. He has no relation to the girls. Where you zoomed in on the girls, well that wouldn't work either. The boy's shoes are in the background messing up the view of the girls. There has to be some relationship between the players.
Of course there's a relationship. Isn't it obvious that all three people are waiting for something or somebody.
The picture doesn't tell one precisely what they are waiting for, but all three people are definitely engaged in the same activity of waiting, and all three are preoccupied with something different, as is often the case in any street scene. The young man seems a bit disturbed, pursing his lips whilst staring along the direction of the rail. The girl with the black hair is on the phone to somebody, "Where the heck are you? I've been sitting on these hard stone steps for ages", and the other girl appears to be a bit worried about her smoking habit.
However, I agree that the guy's blue shoes are not ideally positioned. Nothing's perfect, but he is a bit out of focus, which is more apparent on the full size image. I would change the color of the shoes before making a print, or if making a crop of just the two girls, remove the shoe and replace with the background of the step.
The point is that resolution to find tatoos or whatever is no substitute for content. You can't be hopeful that it will be somehow hidden in the millions of pixels any more than a film photographer hopes to find content in grains.
All photographic content is defined by resolution. No resolution... no content. All content in film consists of grain.
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I find myself in agreement with many of Rob’s observations here on LuLa, but really, when it comes to matters sartorial should I trust a man who sports a pigtail and wears a bandana?
;-)
Trust him with your soul - well your Leicas, preferably - Keith; the two realities have sound reasons for being. In the case of the ever-thinning nag's appendage, it exists because my wife used to cut my hair as and when she though it required it, and I returned the compliment - we both abandoned hairdressers in '64 or so and I saw no reason to take up the slavery when she was no more; the bandana remains - usually - reasonably well-attached to the head in mild winds where the baseball hat vanishes, as recounted before. My very first one (bandana) got quite a good airing on our old friends' boats, where I like to believe I lent the entire enterprise a distinctively fetching piratical air...
But be assured: the tail doesn't project through the opening in the rear of the baseball cap. Ever. It grows far too low to be able to take advantage of that particular rabbit hole. I think the younger Agassi did that hat's-hole-piercing trick rather well.
;-)
Rob C
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Ha. I can tell youse guys are not smokers. That girl is not worried about her smoking at all. That thing in her hand is the tobacco pouch with the government mandated warnings printed on. Ha. 36 megapixels of resolution beaten by a guy with poor eyesight, no hair, few teeth left and a lot of bad habits.
Bernard, I don't think we're on the brink of a manufacturing revolution either. 3D printers may suggest that way, and their prices are indeed coming down a lot, but I think some materials will remain the realm of specialist shops to print in. Take for now titanium which is very expensive to print (in something the size and precision of a camera body for instance). Not to mention that forged materials have strength given by the very treatment they underwent and that can not be replicated by 3D printing nor do I see how it would ever be. It's like copiers and faxes. At first they were clumsy and expensive, and you had to walk down to the corner shop to get a copy of your birth certificate for 2 bucks or some such, now everybody owns a printer. Not a top end one though. And getting the most of a top end A0 printer requires knowledge most of us can't be arsed to assimilate.
Likewise CNC. Sure, you can get anything done these days (we are at the stage where the service is offered to the large public) but some things are more expensive than others. I have seen an engine block carved out of a block of forged aluminium, but how many of us would be able to afford the machine, or the price of doing it for that matter? Or how many would actually have the knowledge needed to program the machine to do it?
In the end, I see it like the story of the copier. In the future some of us will probably have a household grade 3D scanner-printer/CNC machine at home for menial duties like printing a door handle or machining a screw, but when necessary we'll email a CAD file to the shop doing the serious stuff for a fee. Difficult/specialist materials will remain the realm of expensive specialised services. Just think a specialist coating or some such. Your car will still be manufactured in China/Taiwan/etc, your camera likewise and parts for it will still have to be ordered from the manufacturer. Not too bad if it keeps prices down.
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I agree that few people will own at home the high end tools needed for some applications. But I believe that:
- the design software and electronic building blocks are a lot easier to access already,
- some fab labs will soon be easily accessible in urban centers that will cut down manufacturing prices dramatically.
Cheers,
Bernard
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Ha. I can tell youse guys are not smokers. That girl is not worried about her smoking at all. That thing in her hand is the tobacco pouch with the government mandated warnings printed on. Ha. 36 megapixels of resolution beaten by a guy with poor eyesight, no hair, few teeth left and a lot of bad habits.
Nonsense! In Australia we have 'plain' packaging mandated by law. There are no brochures inside or outside a packet of cigarettes.
It's also clear the girl has a 'roll your own' cigarette between her fingers. It might not even be tobacco. ;)
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Yes, sir, we do.
And if you look closer the "brochure" is actually the rolling tobacco pouch with the exact same warnings/pictures we have here as well, which fits in with the rollie she's smoking.
I can post a picture of my pack of tobacco with the same picture if you want.
Bernard, yes, that's pretty much what I think too. But I am not sure we'll ever manage to get as close as you suggested when you said we'd actually become involved in the design of cameras (or other fine mechanical/electronic devices) even if at some point we'll have access to very good specialist services. 3D printing for instance a tooth implant or a dental bridge or bones or articulations is already here, but not for everybody. Precision machines cost a pretty penny, the material is very expensive and an hour's time of the engineers who use them is not cheap either.
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Yes, sir, we do.
And if you look closer the "brochure" is actually the rolling tobacco pouch with the exact same warnings/pictures we have here as well, which fits in with the rollie she's smoking.
I can post a picture of my pack of tobacco with the same picture if you want.
I stand corrected. I'm not a smoker and I'm not familiar with rolling tobacco pouches. However, 36 mp of resolution is not sufficient for me to determine the origins of the brochure. Perhaps the girl is studying the brochure so intently in order to work out how to light the cigarette she's just rolled. ;)
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I stand corrected. I'm not a smoker and I'm not familiar with rolling tobacco pouches. However, 36 mp of resolution is not sufficient for me to determine the origins of the brochure. Perhaps the girl is studying the brochure so intently in order to work out how to light the cigarette she's just rolled. ;)
Now you are discovering the real social significance of your image!
You've captured another commercial plot to hook the young on weeds. For my generation, it used to be Hollywood cool wot dunnit. Just like Robert Mitchum taught a generation to walk. He was cool; far more cool than Steve McQueen who, in celluloid reality, needed a Mustang and/or motorbike in order to get there. All Mitchum needed was a suit.
True stars of Silver Screen and Photoplay. Now we have pretty boys, weightlifters and plastic girls. Louella, Hedda and Walter would be turning in their graves! But boy, would they have had material to crush!
Rob C
P.S. I have just realised that I no longer watch tv programmes that are less than an hour in length. I may have stumbled upon another item of social significance almost as strong as Ray's: if the makers can't be bothered to persevere with the thing for an hour, why should I?
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Now you are discovering the real social significance of your image!
You've captured another commercial plot to hook the young on weeds. For my generation, it used to be Hollywood cool wot dunnit. Just like Robert Mitchum taught a generation to walk. He was cool; far more cool than Steve McQueen who, in celluloid reality, needed a Mustang and/or motorbike in order to get there. All Mitchum needed was a suit.
True stars of Silver Screen and Photoplay. Now we have pretty boys, weightlifters and plastic girls. Louella, Hedda and Walter would be turning in their graves! But boy, would they have had material to crush!
Rob C
P.S. I have just realised that I no longer watch tv programmes that are less than an hour in length. I may have stumbled upon another item of social significance almost as strong as Ray's: if the makers can't be bothered to persevere with the thing for an hour, why should I?
What are you on about, Rob? There's no commercial on the cigarette packs/pouches. Just the govt regulated warnings.
PS. I was more partial to the Charlie Chaplin school of cool.
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I think that there are many scientific/rationalist minded people out there who admire and dabble with art.
I think that there are some subjectivist/intuition-driven people who take a very aggressive stand against the relevance of science and scientists.
(Perhaps) more specifically, there is a number of (educated) culture/arts/social science people who are very negative towards natural science. Either because it is "hard", because it is "emotion-less", because natural sciences have been highly "successful" in what it does compared to some humanity sciences, because (they believe that) it carries an inherent cynical view on man, society and religion, or something else.
I have an interest in both camps, and I think that life would be less interesting if I had to choose only one for both work and spare-time.
-h