Luminous Landscape Forum
The Art of Photography => The Coffee Corner => Topic started by: Stefan.Steib on January 31, 2015, 04:45:29 pm
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Ladies and Gentlemen
I would kindly ask you to read that article and then post your thoughts. I think there is a really interesting approach here.
I have my own ideas about this , but I will wait a bit before I will post them here in the thread.
http://petapixel.com/2015/01/31/will-real-landscape-photography-please-stand/#more-157150
I am really curious, after all this is a place for many landscape photographers.
Be honest - please !
Greetings from Germany
Stefan
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Ugo is not the only person who feels this way.
The vast majority of Serious photographers, people who have bought a bunch of gear, learned a bunch of technique, and style themselves Serious Photographers, are content to copy photographs they've seen.
The fact that this gets them up votes, likes, +1s, and so on creates a feedback loop which virtually compels them to start grinding out populist kitsch in bulk.
Social media is deadly to artistic vision. Frankly, a desire to be commercially successful can be as well.
None of which is bad per se. If making saturated landscapes with blurred surf makes you happy, great. I wish I was happy with my pictures.
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What an interesting article with a point of view not unlike that which is expressed here from time to time. The author, Ugo Cei, does start out by stating he's being curmudgeonly, and that he is. But it's a good summary of the popular landscape photography we see.
At the same time, if you are a commercial photographer, you must shoot what sells. It doesn't mean you can't also pursue others types of photography, but ultimately, the market decides.
As Cei says: "Maybe I should go looking for great landscape photography somewhere else". Yes he should, he must! We all must! The landscape photography on LensWork is often atypical of what you see on 500px. Maybe he should star there. Also, look at the work Burtynski is doing. Definitely not typical. It sounds like Cei needs to "get out" more often beyond the popular.
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Well, if he had come up with some other approaches himself I would be interested, but looking at his pictures, I just see someone who is envious of those who can make great pictures.
Certainly there can be a fatigue of seeing the same locations over and over, but there are so many other places to shoot and so many different ways to do it, so just go out and do it. I see a lot of pictures on the top landscape page on 500px that are really good and not just copies of others.
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My perception of 500px is quite different. I see the vast majority of landscapes as basically copies of the same dozen pictures. Sure it's a different waterfall, a different spit of land with a different lighthouse, a different verdant valley, but if you saw the two pictures 24 hours apart you'd be hard pressed to tell one from the other. The same basic subject matter is always treated the same way. Albeit often with great skill.
Give me a PH Emerson any day. They might be soft but he's trying to show you something, not merely dazzle with a sort of xeroxed sense of the sublime.
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My answer number one - also according to your replies:
Yes of course a commercial photographer needs to make a living.
The recipients are consuming what they are used to see. There is a kind of contemporary "Taste" that demands certain approaches.
Is our own reception as photographers really dependent on this mainstream - or - wouldn´t it be part of the process to drift into the direction of interest and experiment ?
Isn´t the way more important than the result and as I see it: doesn´t our society totally neglect this nowadays ?
Of course there are NEW Ways new sights and people willing to try out their emotions and ideas.
But doesn´t this mean real landscape Photographers today are amateurs, who are not bound to make a living out of it ?
Greetings from Germany
Stefan
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Of course there are NEW Ways new sights and people willing to try out their emotions and ideas.
So, in your opinion, what are these new ways?
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The author makes a good point and so does everyone who posted a comment. I can’t ever be sure of someone else’s motive, but I do understand why people do things different from me. We’re all individuals on different paths, with different psyches, presented with different life challenges, and in different environments. Most of us struggle with the artist's dilemma, how to fulfill something inside us and what to compromise so that we can accommodate our living situation in a world that puts a relatively low value on art. Some of us (speaking for myself) occasionally feel a pang of jealousy or resentment or perhaps a surge of self-righteousness or [insert insecure emotion here] when we see someone else do or experience something different from us. Getting into a discussion about what is art and how we should behave pursuing it is sometimes interesting, usually frustrating, and never conclusive. One thing I'm sure of is that I’m grateful every day that I and others in the free world have the luxury and freedom to create art without fear for our well-being. My best to everyone who is struggling to pursue their vision of art and viva la difference between us all.
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Stefan no doubt has his own answer but I will give mine as well.
My answer is an old one. I react to the landscape, I feel something. This reaction, this feeling, I take and try to turn in to a photograph.
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Stefan no doubt has his own answer but I will give mine as well.
My answer is an old one. I react to the landscape, I feel something. This reaction, this feeling, I take and try to turn in to a photograph.
Sounds good to me. Can you show some examples as there are no galleries linked from your signature?
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I don't shoot landscapes, alas. Mainly because it's hard. I also don't share much online.
Finally, and maddeningly, I can't paste links here using my phone, either. I'll share a couple little portfolios later today, perhaps tomorrow, though, because we're among friends!
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As someone who shoots and sells landscape and cityscape photography, I am indeed interested in what sells. But not what others sell, so that I can replicate it, but what sells of MY photography. I shoot what I like, process the way I like, and only then I pay attention to what sells of THOSE. If something doesn't go, I'll keep shooting it for my own pleasure, or find a venue where it might go. There is a difference what people might want to put on their wall, what an ad agency might consider suitable, or what magazine editor might like. So, yes, I alter my sets of images based on target audiences, but that does not mean I need to alter my photography. I still raise my camera only if something speaks to me.
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As we are visual people I want to let images speak.
Here is one of my favourite Photographers I found on Flickr, as I think a very big talent. scroll down through his stuff,
he changed his style several times radically but you can directly see his very special handwriting.
And dont let yourself be "fooled" by his newer experimental stuff, he is a master of conventional photography as well a sample below.
https://www.flickr.com/photos/cfriel/
https://www.flickr.com/photos/cfriel/3120497057/
Here I see a fight for the images and a search and man, this guy shoots PLENTY......
I have some more samples, but this is my favourite still photographer (maybe some who know me may suspect what comes next...:-) !
Greetings from Germany
Stefan
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Here are some things you can look at:
https://www.flickr.com/photos/amolitor/sets/72157634495379240/
and this one is a temporary guest pass. These photos are in a private album, a virtual "studio wall" so I can look at them. They will be coming down in a bit, so please don't copy this link if you quote me, so avoid dead links (I will edit this post when I zap the guest pass):
{ photos and guest pass have been pulled down now, sorry }
Do these have a distinctive voice, or do they simply look like copies of someone else? (that is a rhetorical question) I don't know. Perhaps in the sheer multitude of voices, mine is indistinguishable from many others. Perhaps each photographer on 500px is indeed speaking in an individual voice, but I cannot distinguish it as distinct. The facts remain: these things ARE shot in my voice, and I CANNOT distinguish distinct voices on 500px very often.
Of course you're welcome to discuss, but I'm not looking for critique.
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Do these have a distinctive voice, or do they simply look like copies of someone else? (that is a rhetorical question) I don't know. Perhaps in the sheer multitude of voices, mine is indistinguishable from many others. Perhaps each photographer on 500px is indeed speaking in an individual voice, but I cannot distinguish it as distinct. The facts remain: these things ARE shot in my voice, and I CANNOT distinguish distinct voices on 500px very often.
Of course you're welcome to discuss, but I'm not looking for critique.
Thanks very much for posting. These photos are clearly very different from landscapes, but I don't see any reason why you could not apply a similar view on landscapes, if that would speak to you. I have seen "similar" photos but yours are not copies and just because somebody else has made photos in a similar style I don't consider them copies.
I shoot landscapes and I shoot what I like. I have seen other photos from the same locations but I never saw one that looked like mine. You can see my 500px pictures from the link in my signature.
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Not real.
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Stamper,
Not real.
No. Real, just not landscape...according to what most would qualify as landscape.
Keith,
Ship's hull?
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I've never sold a photo in my life and don't intend to ever try.
That said, I do pay attention.
Some people sell pictures. A lot of commercial photography is selling pictures. Pictures of the client, pictures of the client's products, pictures of the Grand Canyon, pictures of the wedding.
At the other end of the spectrum you're selling yourself, and a vision. Ansel Adams wasn't selling pictures of Half Dome, he was selling Adams' Idea of Half Dome.
High end wedding photographers are not selling a better version of the same old photos, they're selling their own vision of your wedding. Their market is much smaller than the commodity wedding photo market, but they can make a heck of a lot more money. And so on.
So even if you're purely out for the money, consider going up market and selling a vision.
This is not to denigrate commodity photography. Those folks are like rice farmers: hard workers, skilled, serving a recognized need. I eat a lot of rice. I love rice. I don't want to be a rice farmer, though. That's hard work!
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Real or not, my take on landscape photography.
(http://www.keithlaban.co.uk/227_12_Small.jpg)
Nice...I like!!
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Stefan,
From the article:
"...almost everything has already been photographed in the best light."
False.
"...yet, after having seen the slideshow roll around three or four times, I was disgusted and wanted to throw my jug of beer at the screen"
The eye quickly becomes fatigued with the kind of images the author describes.
When the author asks "Will the Real Landscape Photography Please Stand Up?", what he means is: Please will landscape photographers start making their photos look realistic?
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I've never sold a photo in my life and don't intend to ever try.
That said, I do pay attention.
Some people sell pictures. A lot of commercial photography is selling pictures. Pictures of the client, pictures of the client's products, pictures of the Grand Canyon, pictures of the wedding.
At the other end of the spectrum you're selling yourself, and a vision. Ansel Adams wasn't selling pictures of Half Dome, he was selling Adams' Idea of Half Dome.
High end wedding photographers are not selling a better version of the same old photos, they're selling their own vision of your wedding. Their market is much smaller than the commodity wedding photo market, but they can make a heck of a lot more money. And so on.
So even if you're purely out for the money, consider going up market and selling a vision.
This is not to denigrate commodity photography. Those folks are like rice farmers: hard workers, skilled, serving a recognized need. I eat a lot of rice. I love rice. I don't want to be a rice farmer, though. That's hard work!
I had 250+ photos in Wiki Commons I donated to them for 'educational and editorial use only' - no commercial use. Many of the photos were rare, unique and hi res.
Compare my red light work to what they have on file to see what I am talking about.
http://dewallenrld.tumblr.com/
They deleted them all as I would not release commercial rights.
Sometimes photography can be hard to give away even for free.
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Stefan,
From the article:
"...almost everything has already been photographed in the best light."
False.
"...yet, after having seen the slideshow roll around three or four times, I was disgusted and wanted to throw my jug of beer at the screen"
The eye quickly becomes fatigued with the kind of images the author describes.
When the author asks "Will the Real Landscape Photography Please Stand Up?", what he means is: Please will landscape photographers start making their photos look realistic?
My specialty is photographing in the worst light...and still making something of it.
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iluvmycam,
My specialty is photographing in the worst light...and still making something of it.
A photo with a strong composition and poor light will be a compelling photo...it just wont be the best it can be. Conversely, great light and a weak composition will only ever return a poor photo with nice light.
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... Please will landscape photographers start making their photos look realistic?
Why? Reality is overrated. Anybody can see reality, few can see "what else is there." Reality is, more often than not, chaotic, banal, mediocre, or outright butt-ugly. It is the beauty that we seek to find or, if necessary, to extract from that. Been doing it from the dawn of the mankind (searching for beauty, that is).
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The responses in the comments to the original blog post (http://blog.ucphoto.me/will-the-real-landscape-photography-please-stand-up/) seem more interesting.
Ugo Cei: My dislike actually stems from the fact that the processing is done to appeal to the most obvious and common taste, maybe.
Images that are liked by many people, are liked by many people because they show what is liked by many people.
The author isn't being curmudgeonly, he's just insisting that he's different and special.
Ugo Cei: What this is is a call for help: Now that I’ve decided to move away from what I don’t like anymore, what do I do?
The author's insisting that he's different and special, but he doesn't know how he's different and special.
'You see, the extraordinary thing about photography is that it's a truly popular medium... But this has nothing to do with the art of photography even though the same materials and the same mechanical devices are used. Thoreau said years ago, "You can't say more than you see." No matter what lens you use, no matter what the speed of the film is, no matter how you develop it, no matter how you print it, you cannot say more than you see. That's what that means, and that's the truth.' Paul Strand, Aperture 19(1), 1974.
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iluvmycam,
A photo with a strong composition and poor light will be a compelling photo...it just wont be the best it can be. Conversely, great light and a weak composition will only ever return a poor photo with nice light.
I agree and therefore what to strive for is a strong composition, great light, great, unique and interesting scene captured perfectly at the right moment in time and then post processed in a way to transmit that to the viewer in the best way.
Such pictures will typically make their way to the top of the 500px landscape page. There are also others that do not have that quality. The list is only as good as what is produced at the time, the taste of those who vote and how serious they are about it.
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Slobodan,
Why? Reality is overrated. Anybody can see reality, few can see "what else is there." Reality is, more often than not, chaotic, banal, mediocre, or outright butt-ugly. It is the beauty that we seek to find or, if necessary, to extract from that. Been doing it from the dawn of the mankind (searching for beauty, that is).
I'm sorry to learn that your reality is overrated.
I wrote "realistic", not "reality".
Isaac,
Images that are liked by many people, are liked by many people because they show what is liked by many people.
This tells us nothing about the longevity of such photos, in terms of how long their owners will hang them.
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When talking about photos looking real, we usually conflate a literal notion of looking real, and the idea that a photo can read as real.
Adams, as usual, is canonical here. His photos read as real, but are wildly not. Even discounting the lack of color, the tonal relationships are often not even close to reality.
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... I wrote "realistic", not "reality"...
Would it be totally unrealistic to expect that "looking realistic" would have anything to do with reality?
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Slobodan,
Would it be totally unrealistic to expect that "looking realistic" would have anything to do with reality?
Not at all.
Perhaps "believable" better describes what I meant.
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Perhaps "believable" better describes what I meant.
Suspension of disbelief.
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Images that are liked by many people, are liked by many people because they show what is liked by many people.
This tells us nothing about the longevity of such photos, in terms of how long their owners will hang them.
Indeed, it doesn't tell us that they won't continue to like those images year-after-year.
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Isaac,
Suspension of disbelief.
No. Non-photographers tend to expect what is portrayed in a landscape photo to be a representation of what they would have seen with their own eyes had they taken the place of the camera, hence the furore over 'photoshopped' images.
Indeed, it doesn't tell us that they won't continue to like those images year-after-year.
I don't deny it.
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Isaac,
Would those be the non-photographers who've grown-up with Instagram?
I don't discriminate one from the other.
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... No. Non-photographers tend to expect what is portrayed in a landscape photo to be a representation of what they would have seen with their own eyes had they taken the place of the camera, hence the furore over 'photoshopped' images.
No. Once again, what general public expects from a landscape photography (or photography in general, bar documentary) is escape from that dreaded reality in front of "their own eyes." They want ART (hence the success of Instagram). "Furor" over photoshopped images!? Among non-photographers!? The only furor comes from "purist" photographers. General public considers it art and loves it. Has it occurred to anyone that ART is a crucial ingredient in ARTIFICIAL? Art is the opposite of reality.
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No. Once again, what general public expects from a landscape photography (or photography in general, bar documentary) is escape from that dreaded reality in front of "their own eyes." They want ART (hence the success of Instagram). "Furor" over photoshopped images!? Among non-photographers!? The only furor comes from "purist" photographers. General public considers it art and loves it. Has it occurred to anyone that ART is a crucial ingredient in ARTIFICIAL? Art is the opposite of reality.
+1!
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Slobodan,
No. Once again, what general public expects from a landscape photography (or photography in general, bar documentary) is escape from that dreaded reality in front of "their own eyes." They want ART (hence the success of Instagram). "Furor" over photoshopped images!? Among non-photographers!? The only furor comes from "purist" photographers. General public considers it art and loves it. Has it occurred to anyone that ART is a crucial ingredient in ARTIFICIAL? Art is the opposite of reality.
Apparently we will have to agree to disagree. :)
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But surely part of the appeal of a beautiful landscape is the idea that there is a real place that is like that?
The more thoughtful viewer might distinguish between is like that and looks like that.
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Re: Adams for instance.
Yosemite is like that. But it doesn't look like that.
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Apparently we will have to agree to disagree.
Given the topic is landscape photography; what furore over 'photoshopped' images (http://www.luminous-landscape.com/forum/index.php?topic=97433.msg796584#msg796584), by non-photographers, do you have in mind?
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"Today we are witnessing the triumph of rationalist know how and yet, at the same time, we find ourselves confronted with emptiness. An esthetic void, desert of uniformity, criminal sterility, loss of creative power. Even creativity is prefabricated. We have become impotent. We are no longer able to create. That is our real illiteracy.”
— Friedensreich Hundertwasser
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"Today we are witnessing the triumph of rationalist know how and yet, at the same time, we find ourselves confronted with emptiness. An esthetic void, desert of uniformity, criminal sterility, loss of creative power. Even creativity is prefabricated. We have become impotent. We are no longer able to create. That is our real illiteracy.”
— Friedensreich Hundertwasser
Quite, there is nothing strange to us anymore.
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Isaac,
Given the topic is landscape photography; what furore over 'photoshopped' images (http://www.luminous-landscape.com/forum/index.php?topic=97433.msg796584#msg796584), by non-photographers, do you have in mind?
Having discussed the topic with several friends and work colleagues yesterday and today the consensus of opinion has shown me to have been mistaken when I wrote "Non-photographers tend to expect what is portrayed in a landscape photo to be a representation of what they would have seen with their own eyes had they taken the place of the camera", which was my understanding from past discussions held with others.
Mea culpa.
Andrew,
But surely part of the appeal of a beautiful landscape is the idea that there is a real place that is like that?
Speaking for myself, yes.
Justinr,
Quite, there is nothing strange to us anymore.
Why is that important? Must a photo depict something unfamiliar to be of interest to us?
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If you have seen a lot of photos, time and again, of the same subject then showing something unfamiliar usually attracts someone's interest especially if they say "what is that"? The best way imo to improve is to photograph something unfamiliar or something well known taken from an unusual angle or substantially different light.
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Stamper,
If you have seen a lot of photos, time and again, of the same subject then showing something unfamiliar usually attracts someone's interest...
Showing something familiar in a strong composition has the same effect.
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One problem landscape photography has is that it can't even begin to compete with competent landscape painting. Among other examples, I'm thinking about Bierstadt's "Among the Sierra Nevada." He used severe linear perspective distortion to make a contrast between high and forbidding mountains in the background and a gentle, idyllic scene centered on a lake in the foreground. The height of the mountains is very much exaggerated, but they give the viewer the feel of the mountains in certain atmospheric conditions. You simply can't distort linear perspective this way with a camera. If you use a long lens to raise the height of the mountains, the lake in the foreground becomes a creek and you lose the whole point of the scene.
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Russ,
One problem landscape photography has is that it can't even begin to compete with competent landscape painting.
Why would they compete with each other? They are not the same.
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You're right, Rob. And when you look at two different photographs, they're "not the same" either. Same problem with paintings. On the other hand, an awful lot of landscape photographs are awfully close to the same, and mass-market paintings suffer from the same problem.
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One problem landscape photography has is that it can't even begin to compete with competent landscape painting. Among other examples, I'm thinking about Bierstadt's "Among the Sierra Nevada." He used severe linear perspective distortion to make a contrast between high and forbidding mountains in the background and a gentle, idyllic scene centered on a lake in the foreground. The height of the mountains is very much exaggerated, but they give the viewer the feel of the mountains in certain atmospheric conditions. You simply can't distort linear perspective this way with a camera. If you use a long lens to raise the height of the mountains, the lake in the foreground becomes a creek and you lose the whole point of the scene.
On the other hand, Russ, there is Paul Cézanne, whose paintings are practically identical with photographs taken of the same place (in terms of perspective).
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Absolutely, Slobodan. Cézanne should have been a photographer. Could have saved himself a lot of work.
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Russ,
...when you look at two different photographs, they're "not the same" either. Same problem with paintings.
In your previous post you compared photography to painting, whereas in the above quote, each of pairs belong to the same class - photo with photo and painting with painting respectively.
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Right, Rob. And they're still not the same.
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Russ,
And they're still not the same.
Sorry for my continued confusion. If they are not the same why would they compete?
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I'm really going to have to explain this? You pointed out that a photograph and a painting are "not the same." I pointed out that two different photographs are "not the same," and that two different paintings are "not the same." Sameness has nothing to do with it. My point was that a landscape photograph can't really come up to the standard set by a well-done painting.
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Russ,
Sameness has nothing to do with it. My point was that a landscape photograph can't really come up to the standard set by a well-done painting.
I understand now, thanks.
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Russ, I think you're taking a somewhat limited and old fashioned view of landscape. One of the things landscape seeks to do is to capture a sense on the sublime, and paintings arguably have a leg up there.
But there is more to it. Gursky's Rhine is landscape and gains a great deal of its effect from the fact that it begins with a real thing. As a painting it would be nothing. As digital art based on a photograph, it has something.
In general, photography has that core strength, that there was a real thing in front of the lens. Whenever the power of a piece relies on that, photography wins.
And that can include landscape.
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My point was that a landscape photograph can't really come up to the standard set by a well-done painting.
A painting is a better painting than a photograph can be; and a photograph is a better photograph than a painting can be.
You simply can't distort linear perspective this way with a camera.
Why can't you choose the kind-of projection and parameters (http://wiki.panotools.org/Projection) used to map the digital image acquired by your camera to a 2d surface?
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Quite, there is nothing strange to us anymore.
Au contraire!
"The possession of knowledge does not kill the sense of wonder and mystery. There is always more mystery." Anaïs Nin
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Of the prints I've sold lately, all the images were heavily manipulated. And the people who purchased them all knew that. In some cases, the manipulation was done to make them look more believable and realistic. In other cases, to look purposely surreal.
The last print I sold was shot and processed on commission, and I was ordered to specifically put my kind of "look" on it. I guess, in a way then, digital has become something like painting.
I know I can't compete with the great photographers, either in skill or vision. So I just concentrate on shooting things that look interesting or unusual to me, and then manipulating the image in a way that expresses how I feel about the subject, or what it was like to have been there at that moment.
I won't be quitting my day job of course, but I do have fun.
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…mistaken when I wrote "Non-photographers tend to expect what is portrayed in a landscape photo to be a representation of what they would have seen with their own eyes had they taken the place of the camera"…
Thanks, was there any kind-of agreement in your small sample of expectations?
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Justinr,
Why is that important? Must a photo depict something unfamiliar to be of interest to us?
Personally speaking the answer is yes. It's often a comfort to confine oneself to the limits of familiarity and be happy there, which is fair enough, but at other times we need some motivation to engage in viewing a photo rather than just looking at it. For me that motivation will come from the anticipation of a new experience and with the avalanche of images that has been let loose by digital recording and transmission those moments are becoming increasingly rare.
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Isaac,
...was there any kind-of agreement in your small sample of expectations?
Yes. The principal factor that would determine if a person purchased a landscape photo is simply if they sufficiently liked it.
For the majority, prior knowledge that a landscape photo had been 'enhanced' would make no difference. For the minority, it would...but not enough to not purchase the print if they liked it.
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Isaac,
Sorry for these lazy questions, but: Any preference expressed for scenes they had heard-of (basic name recognition), and scenes they were personally familiar with? Or really just a matter of visual appeal?
It's no problem Isaac. My questions were framed in terms of visual appeal, as follows:
You are in a shop and see a landscape photo for sale that you really like and are considering purchasing.
Q1 - Do you expect the landscape photo to represent reality, as you would have witnessed it first-hand had you been there at the time the photo was taken? In other words, do you expect the photo to not have been 'enhanced'?
A1 - Only one person expected the view to look like what they would have witnessed first-hand. For everyone else, the consensus was that increasing contrast, saturating colour etc. were acceptable 'enhancements' but removing or adding trees, rocks and the like was unacceptable. I never thought to ask if the latter would have been the straw that broke the camel's back and caused them to not purchase the print.
Q2 - If you knew that the photo had been 'enhanced' would you value it less? Would you think less of the photographer?
A2 - The same person indicated that they would be disappointed that they would not have witnessed such a view first-hand, but if they sufficiently liked the print then they would still purchase it. For everyone else, they would not have valued the photo or photographer any less.
Q3 - If you knew the photo had been 'enhanced' would you still purchase it?
A3 - As stated in my previous post the answer was consistently "yes", albeit was ultimately dependent on the degree of 'enhancement', as described above.
Hope this helps.
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A painting is a better painting than a photograph can be; and a photograph is a better photograph than a painting can be.
Brilliant, Isaac! Just brilliant.
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There are over-photographed scenes and over-processed photos that may have caught our interest at first, but now are banal.
I think that one important question is, does the viewer have any emotional response other than "pretty - and let's see the next photo". Naturally the emotional response varies from viewer to viewer. If the photographerdid not have an emotional response when taking the picture, the odds are good that the viewer isn't going to respond. One of the things about much amateur landscape photography done on "tours" is that the photographers don't really have a detailed knowledge of the sites over seasons and different weather patterns. I am trying to do what I can with familiar-to-me terrain, where I have "favorite" sites.
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My questions were framed in terms of visual appeal, as follows…
Thanks, it's difficult to find a quarrel with people buying pictures because they like them.
I think that one important question is, does the viewer have any emotional response other than "pretty - and let's see the next photo".
What about the response "Pretty! I want to see that photo every day!" ?
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Russ, I think you're taking a somewhat limited and old fashioned view of landscape. One of the things landscape seeks to do is to capture a sense on the sublime, and paintings arguably have a leg up there.
But there is more to it. Gursky's Rhine is landscape and gains a great deal of its effect from the fact that it begins with a real thing. As a painting it would be nothing. As digital art based on a photograph, it has something.
In general, photography has that core strength, that there was a real thing in front of the lens. Whenever the power of a piece relies on that, photography wins.
And that can include landscape.
Hi Andrew, Well, I'm taking an old-fashioned view of landscape because at nearly 85 I'm just plain old-fasshioned. But. . .
As far as a sense of the sublime is concerned, I keep coming back to Bierstadt's picture because to me it illustrates the shortcomings of photography as a landscape tool. I've spent the past fifty years in the Rocky Mountains, and I've shot – I don't know – probably thousands of pictures that include mountains. I know from experience that it's possible to shoot a picture of the mountains that'll convince people you were there, since, as you point out, the camera has to be there in order for it to make an image of the mountains, but though people looking at that picture understand that the mountains are real, in the end you can't convey the sense of the sublime that's there in the mountains.
The thing I've never been able to do is convey the way the mountains feel as they relate to the foreground. . . the way the combination of the two can impact your soul. I've attached a picture of Pikes Peak that the Manitou Springs Chamber uses on the cover of their brochure. The mountain rises up properly, but what looks like a sharp ridge in the foreground is actually a fairly gentle feature behind my neighbor's house. I used a long lens to get the kind of reach-for-the-heavens mountain effect that Bierstadt got in his Sierra, and in this picture the foreground distortion doesn't matter because people who look at it haven't a clue about the real thing. It doesn't matter anyway since the mountain, alone, is the subject of the picture. But Bierstadt was able to combine a wonderful pastoral scene with a soul-touching rendition of the mountains. There's no way you could do that with a camera, and yet, in the mountains, I've often seen and felt exactly what comes across from Bierstadt's painting. That's a strength that always escapes the camera's “real thing” rendition.
What do you think of Constable's “Hay Wain?” I'm sure the house was the real thing, and I'm sure the wagon was the real thing, and I'm sure the farmer and the dog and the fields and the trees and the clouds all were real things. But I'm also sure that they didn't come together the way the picture has them, and I'm sure they didn't hold their positions while Constable painted the scene. Yet, I suspect that if you lived in that place that painting might represent reality better than any photograph.
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There's absolutely no doubt in my mind, Russ, that paintings can do things that photographs cannot. I am also fine with treating landscape as largely about the sublime, especially with mountains! Ansel Adams spent his life working on how to do that thing that painters do, with local contrast adjustments (as painters do) but without the malleability of perspective that painters enjoy.
Paintings (and photos) can and often do "read" as reality, when in fact they look nothing like it. I think this is at least closely allied to the notion that a picture (or either sort) can evoke a very strong sense of what the scene is Actually Like, without being literal. In fact, I think being literal is a mistake, and has a much harder time of it. This is kind of your point, right?
A loosely related example:
If an actor wants to produce a naturalistic performance, they emphatically cannot stomp out onto the stage and "act natural". Indeed, it is apparently very very very hard to produce a really good naturalistic performance on stage, and it requires a tremendous amount of very subtle artifice. I am not an actor, but I've asked acting teachers!
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Andrew,
Ansel Adams spent his life working on how to do that thing that painters do, with local contrast adjustments (as painters do) but without the malleability of perspective that painters enjoy.
It goes far farther than that.
Painters have complete freedom to create an image - they start with a blank canvas and add to it. Landscape photographers are relatively constrained by comparison - they start with what exists in front of them and subtract from it.
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I guess the point of the article is that we are now saturated with iconic landscape images that say 20 years ago were more mysterious. But landscape photography was quite different in the 60’s and 70’s when photographers were also preservationists and landscape photography was more of a life style. Today’s depiction of landscape photographs on the web also shows how detached we are from the natural world. We all have trouble seeing anything else other than the same sunset. Still, I like to photograph icons because they typically get amazing light and they are what I most typically give away or sell. On a more personal level landscape photography forces me to go outside and explore for hours or even days. In some ways we have just scratched the surface and are ready to see the forest through the trees. Now that digital photography has exploded, there is a herd mentality when it comes to landscapes. I think this stems from wanting to replicate others but also not knowing how to explore or look at light. Maybe landscape photography is best viewed as groups of photos that express a sense of place. These might include icons but also should include the less obvious.
Also there was an earlier comment that Yosemite doesn’t really look the way it does in photographs. Well if you spend enough time eg. Days /Years, one will eventually see the colorful scene. I have seen colors in the Sierra Nevada that were so saturated that I was frustrated that it didn’t look real – but it was. You will not see this by driving to Inspiration Point at noon with the family.
I must admit that I sometimes question why I am so focused on making landscape photographs when there are already millions of images out there. I now do it for myself and my friends. For me it is a meditative process that takes some planning and time outside and people who live close to me like identifying less obvious compositions that they may see every day.
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I am also fine with treating landscape as largely about the sublime, especially with mountains!
Brief History of the Landscape Genre (http://www.getty.edu/education/teachers/classroom_resources/curricula/landscapes/background1.html)
Ansel Adams spent his life working on how to do that thing that painters do, with local contrast adjustments (as painters do) …
What specifically shows Ansel Adams "working on how to do that thing that painters do" rather than working on photography as one of the visual arts?
Paintings (and photos) can and often do "read" as reality, when in fact they look nothing like it.
12 lines on a flat surface are "read" as a 3 dimensional cube (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Necker_cube), when in fact…
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My nature (landscape, large-field astro, macro, critter) photography is generally an excuse to go outside, get some exercise, get some peace of mind, try to document something memorable or at least document organisms unfamiliar to me and read about them. When I am in photography mode, I look more intensely at the scenery, organisms, etc. It's like MSG for hiking. I like to assemble a set of photos for a particular site, I think that having 5 related photos is enough to give others a flavor of the site. The number "5" is because our nature photo club has member's photo session every month, and 5 is the number each person can contribute.
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HSakols,
Today’s depiction of landscape photographs on the web also shows how detached we are from the natural world.
How so?
We all have trouble seeing anything else other than the same sunset.
I have yet to see the same sunset twice.
...I like to photograph icons because they typically get amazing light...
More so than non-icons? How so?
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Russ,
I know from experience that it's possible to shoot a picture of the mountains that'll convince people you were there, since, as you point out, the camera has to be there in order for it to make an image of the mountains, but though people looking at that picture understand that the mountains are real, in the end you can't convey the sense of the sublime that's there in the mountains.
What say you about the attached image, of the Trango Towers in the Karakoram, Pakistan? Credit: Colin Prior.
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Coin Prior's abilities are probably way beyond any of the members here and none of us can possibly hope to emulate him. No point in trying imo. :)
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What do you think of Constable's “Hay Wain?” I'm sure the house was the real thing, and I'm sure the wagon was the real thing, and I'm sure the farmer and the dog and the fields and the trees and the clouds all were real things. But I'm also sure that they didn't come together the way the picture has them, and I'm sure they didn't hold their positions while Constable painted the scene. Yet, I suspect that if you lived in that place that painting might represent reality better than any photograph.
I do appreciate your point, but this might not actually be the best example - Willy Lott's cottage is still there, and remarkably similar to Constable's painting. It's actually one of the most irritatingly over-photographed places in England... ;D
This makes the point well: https://parodiesandvariations.wordpress.com/2012/06/11/constable-the-hay-wain-willy-lotts-cottage/ (https://parodiesandvariations.wordpress.com/2012/06/11/constable-the-hay-wain-willy-lotts-cottage/)
Maybe that's another aspect to this discussion, though.
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Russ,
What say you about the attached image, of the Trango Towers in the Karakoram, Pakistan? Credit: Colin Prior.
Hi, Rob, It's a fine shot of the rocks, but that's not my point. As I showed, I can make Pikes Peak reach for the sky with a long lens, but anything in the foreground, like Bierstadt's lake with deer, would be squashed into a dribble. With painting you can exaggerate linear perspective to change the feel of the scene. With a camera, you're screwed. You can use a short lens and emphasize the lake and the deer, leaving the mountains reduced to humps, or you can use a long lens and get the reverse effect. You can't have it both ways. In painting you can have your cake and eat it too.
My point is that reality often feels less real than artistic interpretation. To me the mountains are a classic example, but there are plenty of other examples.
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I imagine that Ugo Cei's complaints would also apply to Bierstadt's pictures, and some would urge that we not push the shiny-new cadmium yellow slider all the way.
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To use that universal Canadian expression, Isaac; Eh?
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Today’s depiction of landscape photographs on the web also shows how detached we are from the natural world. We all have trouble seeing anything else other than the same sunset.
How so?
Too busy looking for the formulaic scene to see what's before us?
...I like to photograph icons because they typically get amazing light...
More so than non-icons? How so?
An open aspect, orientation and climate (how the scenes were noticed and selected in the first place).
I have seen colors in the Sierra Nevada that were so saturated that I was frustrated that it didn’t look real – but it was.
Yes, the colors can be unbelievably lurid ;-)
In an Art Issues editorial, Rebecca Solnit wrote, 'Yosemite Valley, in its most usual condition, is a green or brown landscape with indifferent air quality." She went on to describe Galen Rowell as one of those wretched photographers "who use colored lenses to depict a souped-up, hot rod-bright world." Poor Rebecca must never have gotten up early enough to see alpenglow at dawn or to see the natural features crystallize during the clearing of a storm when the atmospheric perspective taught in art school vanishes in the absence of haze.
p189 Galen Rowell's Inner Game of Outdoor Photography (http://books.google.com/books/about/Galen_Rowell_s_Inner_Game_of_Outdoor_Pho.html?id=d5qPQAAACAAJ)
Sometimes I see ... effects that I know will not appear believable on film because they will be much more spectacular in a photograph than what I am seeing with my eyes. In those cases I take great care to maintain visual sea level by introducing some sort of normal subject matter as a point of reference. Take, for example, a telephoto of a person silhouetted against an underexposed mountain face at dawn. The intense red colors may appear as if they have been heavily filtered, and the black silhouette may look like a montage of two images or a cutout introduced in a copy camera. By including other neutral ... effects in the image, it becomes more believable. Blue sky above the peak or blue shadows in the foreground show that the scene is not filtered. Shadows that connect with the silhouette make it appear more real.
Mountain Light (http://books.google.com/books?id=sEObuAAACAAJ) p202
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Isaac,
Too busy looking for the formulaic scene to see what's before us?
You've accidentally misquoted me. "How so?" applied only to the first of the two sentences in your quote. In addition, I'm unsure if your own question applies to the first, second or both sentences, though that is academic since I am unable to answer your question - if I knew the answer I would not originally have asked.
An open aspect, orientation and climate (how the scenes were noticed and selected in the first place).
Do you know that to be fact or are you speculating?
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I am trying to do what I can with familiar-to-me terrain, where I have "favorite" sites.
"Photography can easily degenerate into a pseudo-art, with millions of people all taking pictures of the same things and all thinking we are special. … it is only by seeking the extraordinary – which can be found in the ordinary – that photography becomes art. (http://www.theguardian.com/artanddesign/jonathanjonesblog/2015/feb/03/instagram-generation-amateur-photographers-art-plagiarism)"
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Isaac,
Perhaps two sentences were used to express a single thought.
I look forward to HSakols clarifying what was meant.
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I shouldn't even be looking at this site :D Instead i should be getting my lessons together for the classroom. On Monday I'm taking 31 kids to the ocean for a two night field trip. But, I always have time to chat photography.
Today’s depiction of landscape photographs on the web also shows how detached we are from the natural world. We all have trouble seeing anything else other than the same sunset.[/quote
Geez your like a writing teacher. This is exactly what I'm doing to my students to get them to write, but they are 11 years old. What I mean (at least I think) is that with our busy lives we spend less time out of doors which influences how we see the world. I know when I first arrive at a new national park I'm overwhelmed by the beauty that it takes some time before I can come up with original compositions. Like I said earlier it takes a while to see the forest through the trees. Much of our vision of the world today comes from the internet, because most of us spend most of our time inside. Thus, when we first arrive in Yosemite with our sparkling new DSLRs we immediately take in the grand scene that we expect with possibly a hundred other photographers. When I used to commute daily into Yosemite Valley, I did some of my best work. I remember one afternoon stopping just to photograph a black oak tree against a granite boulder because the light was sublime. Today I still love this composition- its texture- almost metalic. Still that photograph represents a different understanding of my back yard. No one wants it as art which is fine. Some prints have to be for yourself. Starting next week, we will have hordes of visitors come to see Horsetail Falls even though we have had no rain. It is an interesting phenomena and I admit that I too have tried to photograph the event, but it so strange to be around so many other people all looking at the same thing. Now if all these people were to camp out in Yosemite Valley for say 10 days, I bet we all would start looking at the natural world differently. I know given days of taking photos that I become much more focused when I compose.
...I like to photograph icons because they typically get amazing light...
More so than non-icons? How so?
I'm always photographing Half Dome and El Capitan because they are hard to ignore. My most memorable time photographing Half Dome was hiking to the diving board to get the famous Ansel Composition Monolith. I've made many copies of this print because it is beautiful. The print makes me reflect on what a hard man Ansel was just to get to that location with an 8x10 camera. The print illustrates why I love scrambling through the mountains, that there is a physical element to photography as well. We spent the night after watching the sun set and having some hot drinks. I admit I still don't have a photograph of Inspiration Point that I'm super happy with. If there are amazing clouds, I will make a sort trip up there and mingle with other photographers trying to get that shot. At least I'm not shooting buffalo.
I'll show you those photos but they are on my other computer.
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Here are my examples. All of these were shot using Velvia. Half Dome Monolith was with a Bronica Sqa. The black oak was taken with a Horseman VHR, and the Half Dome Storm was taken with a Nikon F100.
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I do appreciate your point, but this might not actually be the best example - Willy Lott's cottage is still there, and remarkably similar to Constable's painting. It's actually one of the most irritatingly over-photographed places in England... ;D
This makes the point well: https://parodiesandvariations.wordpress.com/2012/06/11/constable-the-hay-wain-willy-lotts-cottage/ (https://parodiesandvariations.wordpress.com/2012/06/11/constable-the-hay-wain-willy-lotts-cottage/)
Maybe that's another aspect to this discussion, though.
Hi Ian, I hit the link and saw the "modern" version of Willy Lott's cottage. Interesting, but there doesn't seem to be any discussion associated with the two pictures. What the photograph of the cottage tells me is that it's been a long time between 1821 and 2015. I suspect things have changed a bit during that period.
But regarding over-photographed places, I'd vote for Half Dome over Willy's cottage any day. Whole generations of camera-equipped copycats have rushed to the place.
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Here are my examples. All of these were shot using Velvia. Half Dome Monolith was with a Bronica Sqa. The black oak was taken with a Horseman VHR, and the Half Dome Storm was taken with a Nikon F100.
Love the storm - thanks!
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And here is the morning after on the diving board. My father once gave me about 20 white tyvak clean room suits.
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What I mean (at least I think) is that with our busy lives we spend less time out of doors which influences how we see the world.
"Half of Britons admit to taking the country’s surroundings for granted… The majority (62%) blame this on a lack of time in their busy lives…
The study (http://www.sourcewire.com/news/66108/brits-too-busy-to-enjoy-beauty-of-britain#.VNT4LTUrr7A) of 2,000 adults in the UK …a fifth blame living too far from a place of natural beauty (19%) for their failure to admire their own habitat.
…a third admitting to watching a sunset just once a year or less. Two-thirds blame this on not knowing where to watch the sunset in the UK…"
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There ARE no sunsets in the British Empire.
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... Two-thirds blame this on not knowing where to watch the sunset in the UK…"[/i]
Uhmm... in the east? You know, given that they drive on the opposite side of the road ;)
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That famous social research firm, Grand Marnier..
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That famous social research firm, Grand Marnier..
If Michelin can be that famous cuisine expert... ;)
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One problem landscape photography has is that it can't even begin to compete with competent landscape painting. Among other examples, I'm thinking about Bierstadt's "Among the Sierra Nevada." He used severe linear perspective distortion to make a contrast between high and forbidding mountains in the background and a gentle, idyllic scene centered on a lake in the foreground. The height of the mountains is very much exaggerated, but they give the viewer the feel of the mountains in certain atmospheric conditions. You simply can't distort linear perspective this way with a camera. If you use a long lens to raise the height of the mountains, the lake in the foreground becomes a creek and you lose the whole point of the scene.
*cough* Photoshop *cough* ;)
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A painting is a better painting than a photograph can be; and a photograph is a better photograph than a painting can be.
Indeed.
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Don't strangle on that cough, Jeremy. Show me an example.
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It's colorful, but it looks like 2 separate images to me, divided by a horizontal line. There's not enough connection between those two segments. :)
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Don't strangle on that cough, Jeremy. Show me an example.
You need an example of reality altered by photoshop? Plenty of examples online Russ. Numbering in the many, many millions I'd guess.
I don't have a landscape on my doorstep that matches your exact description, so I can hardly go out and shoot it and then spends hours in PS altering it so you can then say, "That's not quite what I meant and it proves nothing anyway". But here's a cityscape with perspective and other stuff all messed up.
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That's interesting, Jeremy, and I'm quite familiar with Photoshop, though I, like all other users, have never used everything that's in it. But what you need to show me is the equivalent of Bierstadt's "Among the Sierra Nevada." If you can get that kind of placid and extensive foreground in front of towering mountains, you'll have made your point, though I'll still probably suggest that what you've done is not, strictly, photography. Don't misunderstand what I'm saying. I think it can be done in Photoshop. But I have to wonder why it would be worthwhile.
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That's interesting, Jeremy, and I'm quite familiar with Photoshop, though I, like all other users, have never used everything that's in it. But what you need to show me is the equivalent of Bierstadt's "Among the Sierra Nevada." If you can get that kind of placid and extensive foreground in front of towering mountains, you'll have made your point, though I'll still probably suggest that what you've done is not, strictly, photography. Don't misunderstand what I'm saying. I think it can be done in Photoshop. But I have to wonder why it would be worthwhile.
Why do anything if that's your attitude Russ?
People can do whatever they want and for whatever reason suits them and if they enjoy it, so what? Not talking about breaking laws etc here.
As for the painting you mention, why would I want to recreate that as it already exists and just because you never photographed anything like that proves nothing. But it reminds me of work by Hag who created fantastical photographic images via composites long before PS existed. Or you simply find a location that looks like that and wait for some crazy clouds, failing that create using photoshop instead of with oils. That's basically what Biestadt did anyway.
Bierstadt painted Among the Sierra Nevada, California in his Rome studio, then showed the canvas in Berlin and London before shipping it to the United States. Works such as this fueled the image of America as a promised land just when Europeans were immigrating to this country in great numbers. When the painting was shown in Boston, one critic recognized that the landscape was a fiction invented from Bierstadt’s sketches of the West. Nevertheless, the writer felt that it represented “what our scenery ought to be, if it is not so in reality.”
Yup sounds like he did photoshop style compositing using oils.
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Ah, now we're into philosophy. Why do anything? That's always up to you, Jeremy. Many people don't do much other than, eat, sleep, go to the bathroom, and watch TV.
But this kind of thing isn't about whether or not you enjoy it or whether or not doing it "suits you." It's about what a work of visual art conveys to its viewer.
The point I hoped I'd made abundantly clear is that in visual art it's the experience that matters, not correspondence to "reality." In high mountains, like the Rockies, the experience that comes across often has little to do with true linear perspective. A camera -- unless you have a very weird lens on it -- gives you something very close to true linear perspective. You can dork around with the result in Photoshop all you want, but with a scene like "Among the Sierra Nevada", the relationship between the foreground and background simply isn't there -- unless you cut and paste; a corruption that's always obvious to anyone with eyes to see.
Bierstadt could have painted "Among the Sierra Nevada" on Mars and the effect still would be the same. No, you'll never actually see the scene Bierstadt painted. It isn't an accurate portrayal of "reality." But if you've spent enough time in the mountains to have seen changes of season, visual distortions caused by fog and changing light, and the other tricks weather can bring on, Bierstadt's "unreal" depiction will be more likely to strike you as true than any photograph you've ever seen.
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Gursky.
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Russ's point is perfectly clear, geez.
As soon as you start altering perspective and whatnot in photoshop you're clearly in the land of "painting", or near enough.
If I say "car crashes are bad for you, but massages are good for you" pointing out that certain VERY SLOW car crashes actually have a massaging effect is ridiculous and misses the point.
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Russ's point is perfectly clear, geez.
Russ insists and insists that no photograph will ever convey to him the feeling conveyed by Bierstadt's painting "Among the Sierra Nevada."
That is hardly something others are in a position to question.
Meanwhile: Is the narrow range of photography that accompanies bratwurst and beer on a huge TV monitor somehow "real landscape photography" to the exclusion of the wide range of photography shown in exhibitions (http://www.somersethouse.org.uk/about/press/press-releases/landmark-the-fields-of-photography) ?
As soon as you start altering perspective and whatnot in photoshop you're clearly in the land of "painting", or near enough.
"Composite portraits are absolute quackery! What's next, composite landscapes?" The Photographic News, January 1888
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Wow - being a bit busy and returning here I found six pages of discussion ! A joy to see : Photography lives as long as we all feel it ::)
I have another thesis that I would like to induce to this:
Universal Reality is not existing, even pointing the camera in one direction at a certain time with a lens will alter the image according to the moment you press the button.
Photography is now reaching a point that a "photoshop" painting can look like an unaltered Photo and paintings may look like altered photos.
A row of Photos is called timelapse and even transfers into film, film on the other hand can be shot pretty static with very few movements, so it looks like a photo,
we have reached a point where immersive media are transitioning into each other. Why not use this ?
The viewing media of the future will be huge 8k screens. This will also alter the way people will look at "images" - static or moving.
A slight change of light, a cloud moving over the subject, a leaf falling from a tree..... all this could be part of it.
And of course a lot more.
Will the real landscape "photographers" of the near future be using immersive media imaging to express themselves ?
Is "pure" photography exhausted and tried to the limits of endless repetiton ?
What do you think ?
Greetings from Germany
Stefan
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What do you think ?
That seems to be a list of techniques. If those techniques are just used to make pretty pictures …
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Landscape photo-essay has more uniqueness than individual image, and expresses the individual photographer's subjective experience of being in that location. Time-lapse could be involved for some image components.
Someday if I am at a "popular" location, I plan to photograph left-over tripod holes. ::)
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Bierstadt could have painted "Among the Sierra Nevada" on Mars and the effect still would be the same. No, you'll never actually see the scene Bierstadt painted. It isn't an accurate portrayal of "reality." But if you've spent enough time in the mountains to have seen changes of season, visual distortions caused by fog and changing light, and the other tricks weather can bring on, Bierstadt's "unreal" depiction will be more likely to strike you as true than any photograph you've ever seen.
I wonder if there are perceptual phenomena or illusions that influence the way we perceive landscapes when we are there, which cannot be recorded by the camera (e.g. the moon illusion).
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Images that are liked by many people, are liked by many people because they show what is liked by many people.
I think this is the point the author of the article misses completly.
He seems to think that it's possible to produce "uncommon landscape photography" and still get them liked by many, while my opinion is that a landscape photo (or a photo in general) is either for fews or for many.
Just as examples of "landscape for few": http://www.luminous-landscape.com/forum/index.php?topic=84069.0 or Karl Hurst's Booths series (https://www.flickr.com/photos/karl_hurst/)
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Diego Pigozzo,
...my opinion is that a landscape photo (or a photo in general) is either for fews or for many.
What is it about images that are liked by few people that makes few people like them?
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Diego Pigozzo,
What is it about images that are liked by few people that makes few people like them?
Good question, which probably has many answers as many viewers.
One answer could be "I like it because it shows a certain beauty where others sees just uglyness".
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Ah, now we're into philosophy. Why do anything? That's always up to you, Jeremy. Many people don't do much other than, eat, sleep, go to the bathroom, and watch TV.
You brought up "why bother to do anything?", not me.
But this kind of thing isn't about whether or not you enjoy it or whether or not doing it "suits you." It's about what a work of visual art conveys to its viewer.
Actually it can be about what suits you or enjoyment and you could even be the viewer.
The point I hoped I'd made abundantly clear is that in visual art it's the experience that matters, not correspondence to "reality." In high mountains, like the Rockies, the experience that comes across often has little to do with true linear perspective. A camera -- unless you have a very weird lens on it -- gives you something very close to true linear perspective.
Lenses despite all the wittering you get by some people [ahem Ray :) ] have no influence on perspective. Perspective is a result of one's position relative to something else. Lenses changing perspective is one of the biggest myths in photography.
You can dork around with the result in Photoshop all you want, but with a scene like "Among the Sierra Nevada", the relationship between the foreground and background simply isn't there -- unless you cut and paste; a corruption that's always obvious to anyone with eyes to see.
The picture you rave about is a cut and paste in itself and a good PS artist can do exactly the same thing with pixels rather than oils and with the right base imagery could recreate that painting.
Bierstadt could have painted "Among the Sierra Nevada" on Mars and the effect still would be the same. No, you'll never actually see the scene Bierstadt painted. It isn't an accurate portrayal of "reality." But if you've spent enough time in the mountains to have seen changes of season, visual distortions caused by fog and changing light, and the other tricks weather can bring on, Bierstadt's "unreal" depiction will be more likely to strike you as true than any photograph you've ever seen.
You can still do the same thing via photography and PS. Just because you personally have not seen an image like this painting does not mean there are none or it can't be done.
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Interesting, Jeremy. The burden of your extended arguments is: "You can do the same thing with a photograph." Yet, you can't come up with a demonstration that this is true.
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The burden of your extended arguments is: "You can do the same thing with a photograph." Yet, you can't come up with a demonstration that this is true.
He can't be bothered coming up with a demonstration that this is true for you, because it would just be so you can then say, "That's not quite what I meant and it proves nothing anyway" (http://www.luminous-landscape.com/forum/index.php?topic=97433.msg798481#msg798481).
Insist and insist that no photograph will ever convey to you the feeling conveyed by Bierstadt's painting "Among the Sierra Nevada". It's a matter of your subjectivity, only accessible to you - not a question of fact or general opinion. You are witness, advocate, judge, jury, and sole interested party.
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You are witness, advocate, judge, jury, and sole interested party.
For once you're right, Isaac. And the same thing applies to anybody looking at a work of art. The rest of what you said comes across as background noise.
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To put this discussion in perspective one really should read this: http://landscapephotographyblogger.com/did-velvia-film-change-landscape-photography/
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Interesting, Jeremy. The burden of your extended arguments is: "You can do the same thing with a photograph." Yet, you can't come up with a demonstration that this is true.
Russ that are an awful lot of images out there with exactly the same techniques as used in the painting you like is done via Photoshop. If you managed to survive this long and still be unaware of such work, that's a remarkable achievement on your part. Heck I even pointed you towards Hag, who did the same thing in the darkroom decades back and posted a cityscape of mine where perspective had been rejigged in PS. But I guess unless someone recreates that very specific painting you like via PS, you will continue to deny the possibility.
There's also this new fangled invention called google which allows to find Photoshop composited landscapes. (https://www.google.co.uk/search?q=composite+landscape+photoshop&num=100&safe=off&espv=2&tbm=isch&tbo=u&source=univ&sa=X&ei=46DkVNavL5CR7AaS5IGgAg&ved=0CCIQsAQ&biw=1916&bih=1079) Whether you like them is another matter.
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Thanks, Jeremy. It was interesting to look at that display of Photoshop composited landscapes. I get the same feeling from them that I get from HDR driven to its most absurd by those who've just discovered HDR and find it's such a happy toy. It's pretty clear you haven't spent much time in the mountains. I'm still looking for a photograph that has the same real feel of the mountains you get from great mountain paintings. There certainly aren't any in that collection.
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Thanks, Jeremy. It was interesting to look at that display of Photoshop composited landscapes. I get the same feeling from them that I get from HDR driven to its most absurd by those who've just discovered HDR and find it's such a happy toy. It's pretty clear you haven't spent much time in the mountains.
Why would that google chosen election of images have any bearing of how much time I've spent anywhere? I'm a keen mountain biker by the way and I do in fact like being in elevated places. I only live a short cycle ride from the Peak District, which can be seen from back of our house. Sheffield is also the centre for climbing in the UK.
I'm still looking for a photograph that has the same real feel of the mountains you get from great mountain paintings. There certainly aren't any in that collection.
That's not a curated selection, if you google landscape paintings (https://www.google.co.uk/search?safe=off&espv=2&biw=1916&bih=1035&tbm=isch&sa=1&q=landscape+paintings&oq=landscape+paintings&gs_l=img.3..0l10.3450.3450.0.3799.1.1.0.0.0.0.48.48.1.1.0.msedr...0...1c.1.61.img..0.1.47.Fv8xkwTk1GE#imgdii=_) you get a similar lurid selection. I wouldn't then condemn all landscape painting as a result of looking at that quick search.
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Well, Jeremy, I'll have to concede that if it was possible to remove Leon Trotsky from early Bolshevik party photographs it may, well, be possible to do what you're suggesting. Now show me an example and I'll have to concede the argument.
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You've been shown loads of examples of how it can be done. Anything you can imagine can be created, the fact you didn't like some random uncurated examples doesn't mean someone can't replicate the painting you like in a way you approve of. Chances are you've seen loads of composites and HDR and liked them without realising that's is what they were, because they were actually well done.
Large chunks of what you see in film and TV is not actually filmed for real and I'm not talking space stations and transformers here, but the mundane 'real' world. Watch this video and see how little of reality is real. (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=clnozSXyF4k)
This is a very amusing mickey take of using green screen for ordinary things. (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UjhBf4vlTw0)
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Anything you can imagine can be created, the fact you didn't like some random uncurated examples doesn't mean someone can't replicate the painting you like in a way you approve of. Chances are you've seen loads of composites and HDR and liked them without realising that's is what they were, because they were actually well done.
Large chunks of what you see in film and TV is not actually filmed for real and I'm not talking space stations and transformers here, but the mundane 'real' world. Watch this video and see how little of reality is real. (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=clnozSXyF4k)
This is a very amusing mickey take of using green screen for ordinary things. (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UjhBf4vlTw0)
I can't argue with what you're saying, Jeremy -- except for the idea that somebody can recreate Bierstadt's painting with Photoshopped photographs of actual mountain scenes. I'll believe that when I see it. Yes, there's an unlimited amount of crap on TV. I'd never argue with that statement. It's why I stopped watching TV altogether about twenty years ago.
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Honestly, Russ, I think Gursky and Rhine II is about as close as you're likely to get.
It's almost the exact opposite of Mountains but I think it illustrates the point. But it doesn't matter, because Gursky is as much a "painter" as he is a "photographer" for our discussion.
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I can't argue with what you're saying, Jeremy -- except for the idea that somebody can recreate Bierstadt's painting with Photoshopped photographs of actual mountain scenes. I'll believe that when I see it.
Of course they can. Whether anyone would want to bother is more to the point.
Yes, there's an unlimited amount of crap on TV. I'd never argue with that statement.
Not what I said at all.
It's why I stopped watching TV altogether about twenty years ago.
There's also an awful lot of good stuff on TV. TV now is now probably the best it has ever been and why movie stars are not seen as slumming it anymore by doing TV.
I've said for many years that long form drama on TV is by far the best way of dramatising novels, which usually suffer when shoehorned into 120mins for the cinema. And now that is becoming the done way to do books justice on screen.
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... Gursky is as much a "painter" as he is a "photographer" ...
Indeed. If I am allowed to cite myself: "There is a profound difference between artists using photography as a medium, and photographers striving to create art." Gursky is the former.
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Of course they can. Whether anyone would want to bother is more to the point.
I'll believe it when I see somebody bother.
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Indeed. If I am allowed to cite myself: "There is a profound difference between artists using photography as a medium, and photographers striving to create art." Gursky is the former.
How can you tell which is which?
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How can you tell which is which?
Easy... if photographers hate you, you are the former, if they like you, you are the latter. ;D
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But EVERYBODY hates me!
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Slobodan,
There is a profound difference between artists using photography as a medium, and photographers striving to create art.
What is the profound difference?
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Easy... if photographers hate you, you are the former, if they like you, you are the latter. ;D
But how do you know if they are photographers or artists if both are holding cameras? :)
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But EVERYBODY hates me!
For once, you may actually be right. :P
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Slobodan,
What is the profound difference?
Could it be "the photographer limits himself to the photographic medium"?
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Diego,
Could it be "the photographer limits himself to the photographic medium"?
Isn't that self-evident? Hopefully Slobodan will elucidate.
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Russ that are an awful lot of images out there with exactly the same techniques as used in the painting you like is done via Photoshop. If you managed to survive this long and still be unaware of such work, that's a remarkable achievement on your part. Heck I even pointed you towards Hag, who did the same thing in the darkroom decades back and posted a cityscape of mine where perspective had been rejigged in PS. But I guess unless someone recreates that very specific painting you like via PS, you will continue to deny the possibility.
There's also this new fangled invention called google which allows to find Photoshop composited landscapes. (https://www.google.co.uk/search?q=composite+landscape+photoshop&num=100&safe=off&espv=2&tbm=isch&tbo=u&source=univ&sa=X&ei=46DkVNavL5CR7AaS5IGgAg&ved=0CCIQsAQ&biw=1916&bih=1079) Whether you like them is another matter.
Yes, there are some interesting shopped pix. But to me they are pretty much bullshit photos. Of course, I'm a doc photog so they rub me the wrong way.
http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/9/97/Photomontage_(Forggensee_Panorama)_-2.jpg
I seldom do landscape or studio work. They just don't interest me. Although I had to put a few landscape pix in my latest artists' book De Wallen: Amsterdam's Red Light District to give it some balance.
If I was going to shoot landscapes I'd stick with somewhat faithful renditions.
http://rangefindercamera3.tumblr.com/image/111558641112
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Slobodan,
What is the profound difference?
Profound = demanding deep study or thought
Difference = the state or condition of being dissimilar or unlike
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Yes, there are some interesting shopped pix. But to me they are pretty much bullshit photos. Of course, I'm a doc photog so they rub me the wrong way.
Plenty of terrible photos that are not photoshopped. It's people that make bad [or good] photos, not the tools they use. There's probably plenty of good PS work you have no problem with, mainly because it is well done and you are not even aware of it.
http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/9/97/Photomontage_(Forggensee_Panorama)_-2.jpg
Awful image to my mind, but it does illustrate the article point very well because of it's obviousness.
I seldom do landscape or studio work. They just don't interest me. Although I had to put a few landscape pix in my latest artists' book De Wallen: Amsterdam's Red Light District to give it some balance.
If I was going to shoot landscapes I'd stick with somewhat faithful renditions.
http://rangefindercamera3.tumblr.com/image/111558641112
That's about as faithfull as the PS photos you don't like. :-\
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It's people that make bad [or good] photos, not the tools they use. There's probably plenty of good PS work you have no problem with, mainly because it is well done and you are not even aware of it.
Very good, Jeremy. You actually said something sensible. The fact that there was any kind of post-processing should never be evident.
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Very good, Jeremy. You actually said something sensible.
Well at least one of us should make the effort. ;D
The fact that there was any kind of post-processing should never be evident.
Unless you want it to be.
But also of note - all images shot raw are obviously post processed and if an image is B+W it's been very obviously post processed whether from colour raw file or a B+W negative. Objecting to post processing is like objecting to developing a film, meaningless.
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But also of note - all images shot raw are obviously post processed and if an image is B+W it's been very obviously post processed whether from colour raw file or a B+W negative. Objecting to post processing is like objecting to developing a film, meaningless.
Who said anything about objecting to post-processing? I said post-processing needs to be undetectable. You need to learn to read more carefully, Jeremy. Oh, and it's not just "images shot raw" that need post-processing. Jpeg images also need post-processing, but it's the software maker who decides on the post-processing.
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Profound = demanding deep study or thought
Difference = the state or condition of being dissimilar or unlike
What is the profound difference you say exists between artists using photography as a medium, and photographers striving to create art?
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Rob and Isaac,
Like a joke, if you do not get it, there is no point in explaining it. But I might help you with a visual clue: Andreas Gursky vs. Peter Lik.
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Apparently there was no point behind your profound statement.
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Apparently there was no point behind your profound statement.
Apparently, some people, like Mike Johnston (of The Online Photographer fame), do find a point in it, enough to use it as a featured comment on their site:
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Who said anything about objecting to post-processing? I said post-processing needs to be undetectable. You need to learn to read more carefully, Jeremy.
Right back atcha. Post processing is almost invariably evident and as as you object to evidence of PPing, you object to PPing. :P
Oh, and it's not just "images shot raw" that need post-processing. Jpeg images also need post-processing, but it's the software maker who decides on the post-processing.
I actually hate the term post processing. 'Post' what?. It should simply be processing. Then your statement re JPEGs would make some sense.
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Apparently, some people, like Mike Johnston (of The Online Photographer fame), do find a point in it, enough to use it as a featured comment on their site:
Though still not convinced how you separate the two.
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Mike Johnston (of The Online Photographer fame)
Please provide a link so we can understand the context, and see if he was able to elucidate the point.
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Post processing is almost invariably evident and as as you object to evidence of PPing, you object to PPing.
You're absolutely right, Jeremy. Since a file, by itself, can't be seen, you need either to turn it into a jpeg that can be viewed by digital means, or you need to make a print that can be viewed directly. That's definitely post-processing. I don't object to that at all. But if I can see that you dorked around with the thing in Photoshop or any other software to make it something it wasn't to begin with, I won't object, I'll just throw it away.
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Please provide a link so we can understand the context, and see if he was able to elucidate the point.
The first article is: http://theonlinephotographer.typepad.com/the_online_photographer/2010/11/ort-as-they-say-in-texas.html
And the second: http://theonlinephotographer.typepad.com/the_online_photographer/2012/11/the-difference.html
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Though still not convinced how you separate the two.
I sympathize with your predicament. As the dictionary definition states, it is "demanding deep study or thought" Are you capable of that? ;)
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Please provide a link so we can understand the context, and see if he was able to elucidate the point.
The first article is: http://theonlinephotographer.typepad.com/the_online_photographer/2010/11/ort-as-they-say-in-texas.html
And the second: http://theonlinephotographer.typepad.com/the_online_photographer/2012/11/the-difference.html
Thanks. Apparently Mike Johnston (of The Online Photographer fame) had nothing to say about your comment.
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Thanks. Apparently Mike Johnston (of The Online Photographer fame) had nothing to say about your comment.
You mean other than selecting it as the first featured comment, which is a statement in itself. You do understand the concept of featured comments, I hope? Or shall I find you a dictionary definition?
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Or shall I find you a dictionary definition?
Just show The Online Photographer's description of why they select certain comments to be "featured comments".
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Apparently, some people, like Mike Johnston (of The Online Photographer fame), do find a point in it, enough to use it as a featured comment on their site:
It's a different quote. Here you have omitted 'who just happen to be'. That changes the meaning.
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Just show The Online Photographer's description of why they select certain comments to be "featured comments".
Feel free to parse his site or ask Mike directly. Any other reader of average intelligence would, however, easily grasp the meaning of "featured comments."
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Gursky is both an 'artist using photography as a medium' and a 'photographer striving to create art'. Peter Lick I don't know.
It doesn't make sense to say that Gursky 'just happens to be using photography as a medium'. He's a photographer through and through, having studied under the Bechers at the Dusseldorf Kunstacademie. He's never made work in any medium other than the photography.
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It's a different quote. Here you have omitted 'who just happen to be'. That changes the meaning.
You are kidding, right!?
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A very successful trolling method is to always find another chore for the other chap to do. If you can spend ten seconds goading him into doing ten minutes of work, you... um... win. In some weird sense.
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You mean other than selecting it as the first featured comment, which is a statement in itself.
Perhaps the words look pretty even though they are empty.
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Perhaps the words look pretty even though they are empty.
The words are often used to distinguish between modernist and postmodernist/conceptualist photographic practices. The modernists (Weston, Strand, Adams etc) attempted to create art from within the photographic medium, whereas the postmodernists just use photography, either appropriating other photographers' images (Richard Prince, Sherrie Levine), or making pictures which are significant only to the extent that they operate in a semiotic network (e.g. Cindy Sherman's Untitled Film Stills).
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I sympathize with your predicament. As the dictionary definition states, it is "demanding deep study or thought" Are you capable of that? ;)
I am and if you were too, you would have understood the point I was making with being able to differentiate the two types of photographer. :P
So how do you determine which is which? You gave us two examples of photographers, one you think is an artist and the other a mere photographer. But you've not been able to explain why these photographers are which kind of practitioner.
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The words are often used to distinguish between …
Thank you, for your explanation.
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Indeed. If I am allowed to cite myself: "There is a profound difference between artists using photography as a medium, and photographers striving to create art." Gursky is the former.
The difference can be basic: for example, Hans Eijkelboom’s photographs (http://forum.luminous-landscape.com/index.php?topic=98082.0) don't ask to be admired as photographs.
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Indeed. If I am allowed to cite myself: "There is a profound difference between artists using photography as a medium, and photographers striving to create art." Gursky is the former.
I let this one slide by. I think you're confusing painting with art, Slobodan. The terms aren't synonymous. There are some photographers producing very bad art. There are at least as many painters producing very bad art.
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The difference can be basic: for example, Hans Eijkelboom’s photographs (http://forum.luminous-landscape.com/index.php?topic=98082.0) don't ask to be admired as photographs.
That's a good example. Conceptual photography. The art is in the idea, the execution is a formality.
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The difference can be basic: for example, Hans Eijkelboom’s photographs (http://forum.luminous-landscape.com/index.php?topic=98082.0) don't ask to be admired as photographs.
I am not sure this is a good example because beauty and aesthetic may be very different things, therefore this photos may very well be admired as "photograph" even without being "aesthetically pleasing".
On the other hand, if aesthetic is what tells a photographer from an artist, what is all the fuzz about " the real landscape "?
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…may very well be admired as "photograph" even without being "aesthetically pleasing".
In general, some photographs may be admired as "photograph" even without being "aesthetically pleasing".
In particular, why would those photographs be admired as "photograph" ? -- "The camera does the work. All I have to do is carry it. I never look through the camera."
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In general, some photographs may be admired as "photograph" even without being "aesthetically pleasing".
In particular, why would those photographs be admired as "photograph" ? -- "The camera does the work. All I have to do is carry it. I never look through the camera."
As I said, I admire those photo for the idea behind them (and at the same time I don't like them because of their aesthetic).
The fact that they are taken "without looking" doesn't bother me much.
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As I said, I admire those photo for the idea behind them…
You admire the idea "as [you] read it", but do not seem to admire the photos as photos.
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You admire the idea "as [you] read it", but do not seem to admire the photos as photos.
I surely don't admire them as images, but a photo is not just an image: it's an image that conveys a message.
Well, at least that's true for the photo I admire.
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Well, at least that's true for what you mean by photo - others might consider that to be unnecessary baggage.
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Diego,
...a photo is not just an image: it's an image that conveys a message.
Do all viewers of an image receive the same message?
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I surely don't admire them as images, but a photo is not just an image: it's an image that conveys a message.
Well, at least that's true for the photo I admire.
None of the individual photos convey a message (or at least not an interesting message). It is the series of photos - the photos arranged in a grid - that conveys the message (that we are types, not individuals). Thus this a good example of an artist 'using photography as a medium' as opposed to a 'photographer striving to create art'. Maybe.
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Well, at least that's true for what you mean by photo - others might consider that to be unnecessary baggage.
Of course: I'm not pretending to be the golden standard of photography and surely others have very different ideas of what a photo is.
But my point is quite different: if the difference between a photographer and an artist is the aesthetic qualities of the shots, why all the fuzz about the "real landscape photography"?
All those " amazing locations, wonderful light, colorful sunsets, starry skies, waterfalls, ocean waves, tropical beaches, brilliant colors" photos sure don't lack aesthetic, and yet they are not "real landscape photography".
Why?
The author writes "The third and final problem is that all those beautiful images didn’t speak to my soul", which I read as "they don't convey to me any message".
And another point can be made: if others have different ideas of what a photo is, does make sense to talk about "real landscape photography"?
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Diego,
Do all viewers of an image receive the same message?
I think the "most correct" answer is no, because what someone perceive and/or understand depends not only on the message but also on the personal background of the receiver.
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None of the individual photos convey a message (or at least not an interesting message). It is the series of photos - the photos arranged in a grid - that conveys the message (that we are types, not individuals). Thus this a good example of an artist 'using photography as a medium' as opposed to a 'photographer striving to create art'. Maybe.
Or maybe not ;D.
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... if the difference between a photographer and an artist is the aesthetic qualities of the shots...
I'd say aesthetic is certainly not the difference. I'd even say the opposite: the more "aesthetic" it is, the more photographic it is, and less artistic. I know, I know, another controversial generalization, but I hope you get the idea.
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I'd say aesthetic is certainly not the difference. I'd even say the opposite: the more "aesthetic" it is, the more photographic it is, and less artistic. I know, I know, another controversial generalization, but I hope you get the idea.
I get the idea but still I'm not sure I agree with what you say.
For example, I think that Salgado's photos are equally aesthetical and artistic.
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Many in the art world are suspicious of Salgado's aestheticism.
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Many in the art world are suspicious of Salgado's aestheticism.
I'm sure they do: how can they say to be "in the art world" if they like the same thing a bus driver likes?
IHMO there is an unjustified dislike for aesthetics, expecially in photography, because of the wrong assumption that if something can be done by many then it must be "of low value".
The "expecially in photography" comes from the fact that today technology allows many to do what very few could do a century ago, so having hundreds of thousands of aesthetically beautiful landscapes leads to "aesthetically beautiful landscapes are not real landscape".
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Many in the art world are suspicious of Salgado's aestheticism.
Can you elaborate?
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Can you elaborate?
http://www.nytimes.com/1995/02/24/arts/photography-review-a-unified-vision-of-the-world-s-varied-workers.html
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I don't find:
"There is a profound difference between artists using photography as a medium, and photographers striving to create art."
to be particularly hard to grasp. Simplifying and eliminating some detail, it can be read as:
"there is a difference between artists (of a kind) and photographers (of another kind)"
What could be simpler? The fact that "artists" are not the same as "photographers" is surely not terribly hard to grasp. The details, once filled back in, and elucidate Slobodan's point some more, of course. But the meat of the thing is pretty simple.
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http://www.nytimes.com/1995/02/24/arts/photography-review-a-unified-vision-of-the-world-s-varied-workers.html
Ok, Mr. Karmel doesn't liked Salgado back in 1995 (as many others probably did and still do).
Therefore...?
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Ok, Mr. Karmel doesn't liked Salgado back in 1995 (as many others probably did and still do).
Therefore...?
In his first paragraph he refers to the fact that opinion is divided on Salgado. Some find his work kitsch. That is all.
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In his first paragraph he refers to the fact that opinion is divided on Salgado. Some find his work kitsch. That is all.
Well, I would be surprised (and worried, to be honest) if there was unanimity of judgment on a photographer's work.
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I don't find:
"There is a profound difference between artists using photography as a medium, and photographers striving to create art."
to be particularly hard to grasp. Simplifying and eliminating some detail, it can be read as:
"there is a difference between artists (of a kind) and photographers (of another kind)"
What could be simpler?
Well it's simple if the 'kind' of artist is a sculptor, and the 'kind' of photographer is a press photographer. But Slobodan is comparing an artist whose medium is photography, and a photographer whose practice is art. Surely the difference is then less obvious.
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I like Salgado, but I would not consider him an artist (who uses photography as a medium), but rather a photographer who strives to use aesthetic elements borrowed from classic arts. In his case, mostly Rembrandt-esque lighting, chiaroscuro.
If I dare continue along this path, I'd venture to say that most of us (myself certainly included) posting on this and similar forums belong to the same group of photographers (with various degrees of success, of course), trying to infuse elements of classical composition, balance, color contrast and harmony, etc. into our photographs.
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...But Slobodan is comparing an artist whose medium is photography, and a photographer whose practice is art. Surely the difference then is less obvious.
And that is, I think, my point. You'd expect that the two would actually meet at some point, being so close to each other in such a premise, and the difference should all but disappear. And yet, I continue to argue, there still is a profound difference between them.
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Then there are artists who use photography as a medium, but who prefer to call themselves photographers (e.g. James Welling).
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And that is, I think, my point. You'd expect that the two would actually meet at some point, being so close to each other in such a premise, and the difference should all but disappear. And yet, I continue to argue, there still is a profound difference between them.
I agree there's a difference, but it's complicated. I can see a sliding scale. Richard Prince on one end... but who on the other? Edward Weston or Peter Lik? Where does Ansel Adams fit in? Or Robert Adams?
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I like Salgado, but I would not consider him an artist (who uses photography as a medium), but rather a photographer who strives to use aesthetic elements borrowed from classic arts. In his case, mostly Rembrandt-esque lighting, chiaroscuro.
May I ask why?
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I hear Mozart used to make songs to pay his bills, even listening to his customers requirements.
I guess one has got do to what one has got to do. Pay your bills, enjoy life, do what you do best.
-h
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Diego,
I think the "most correct" answer is no, because what someone perceive and/or understand depends not only on the message but also on the personal background of the receiver.
On what should the photographer base a photograph's message if the message received will differ from viewer to viewer?
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Only one message....the one concocted in the photographer's mind.
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Diego,
On what should the photographer base a photograph's message if the message received will differ from viewer to viewer?
On the little common cultural and biological background and yet there is no guarantee that the message will be perceived equally by all viewers.
In fact it is guarantee that the message will not be perceived equally by all viewers.
Just to give you an extreme example of different cultural background: a food shot.
Show the shot to some Mr. Doe and he could perceive a message of something tasteful, maybe and idea of a dinner with a friend.
Show the same shot to someone who was in a concentration camp during WWII and he'll get a completly different message (1).
On the other hand, an example of common biological background is the psycology of color.
I think one of the ability a photographer should have is exploit the things that commons us to get the attention of the viewer and get some of them to dig into the shot to try to explore the intended message.
(1) I once read an interview with a man who was in a concentration camp, and He told the interviewer that he never leave anything uneaten on the plate.
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stamper,
Only one message....the one concocted in the photographer's mind.
What if a message was not concocted?
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http://dictionary.reference.com/browse/concocted
To devise, using skill and intelligence; contrive:
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But Slobodan is comparing an artist whose medium is photography, and a photographer whose practice is art. Surely the difference is then less obvious.
And that is, I think, my point. You'd expect that the two would actually meet at some point, being so close to each other in such a premise, and the difference should all but disappear. And yet, I continue to argue, there still is a profound difference between them.
Maybe compare the photographs of Andreas Gursky with the photographs of Thomas Struth.
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"Artists who work in the photographic medium" is certainly a category that overlaps with "photographers who strive to creat art" but I don't see why that's a problem.
"brown dogs" and "large dogs" are two categories which overlap, and yet we can sort out the meanings pretty well, right? Arguably there is no profound difference in this case, so I suppose one could argue that there can be no profound differences between categories which overlap. I think that is wrong. I think there can be.
The differences are not in the individuals, but in the categories and the way we define them. A specific Large Brown Dog belongs in both categories, and isn't at all different from itself. So you cannot say that every individual brown dog is different from every individual large dog. Still, the category of large dogs IS quite different from the brown ones.
In the same way, I think that "Artists who use photography" is a category that is different -- even profoundly so -- from "photographers who strive to create art".
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Surely the question then becomes whether there's a profound difference (or indeed any difference) between large dogs which are brown, and brown dogs which are large?
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Surely the question then becomes whether there's a profound difference (or indeed any difference) between large dogs which are brown, and brown dogs which are large?
Um, wha? My post, the one you're replying to, is actually specifically about why this isn't the question, and I can't think how on earth I could be more clear.
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… I can't think how on earth I could be more clear.
By talking about artists and photographers.
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...
The differences are not in the individuals, but in the categories and the way we define them.
...
I think this is exactly the point: the difference is the way we define categories, nothing else.
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Richard Prince on one end... but who on the other? Edward Weston or Peter Lik? Where does Ansel Adams fit in?
On his seventieth birthday, speaking at the Metropolitan Museum of Art, [Ansel Adams] re-asserted the Stieglitz position as if forty years of artistic nihilism, experimentation, iconoclasm, cynicism, spiritual muckraking, and the arrogance of fashionable despairs had never intervened. "I believe the artist can accomplish most on the agenda for survival by creating beauty, by setting examples of beauty in order, by emphasizing the concept of the essential dignity of the human mind and spirit… I believe, with Alfred Stieglitz, that art is the affirmation of life."
"Ansel Adams, Photographer", Wallace Stegner in "Ansel Adams in the National Parks" pp20-21
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By talking about artists and photographers.
Yes, the dog analogy isn't particularly helpful here. Much better to give some examples of practitioners who fall into Slobodan's categories. (Unless this is just a logic problem.)
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I knew we are going to step into some dog poop along the way.
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Much better to give some examples of practitioners who fall into Slobodan's categories.
I'm not sure giving examples would be fruitful: we already disagree on which category Salgado belongs, I don't think more example to disagree on would help.
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I'm not sure giving examples would be fruitful: we already disagree on which category Salgado belongs, I don't think more example to disagree on would help.
Then perhaps you could elaborate why you consider him an Artist?
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Then perhaps you could elaborate why you consider him an Artist?
Because, like Ansel Adams, it is able to show the mighty power of the nature.
At least to me, of course.
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Because, like Ansel Adams, it is able to show the mighty power of the nature.
At least to me, of course.
You are talking about Salgado the landscape photographer, not Salgado the documentary photographer?
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You are talking about Salgado the landscape photographer, not Salgado the documentary photographer?
Yeaph!
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Well... when you paint like the original Impressionists did, you are an Artist. When you paint like Impressionists today, you are... an impersonator.
By the same token, when you photograph like Ansel Adams today, you are a copycat.
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Well... when you paint like the original Impressionists did, you are an Artist. When you paint like Impressionists today, you are... an impersonator.
By the same token, when you photograph like Ansel Adams today, you are a copycat.
This makes all photographer copycats, doesn't it?
I mean, everything has been photographed in every possible ways, isn't it?
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This makes all photographer copycats, doesn't it?
I mean, everything has been photographed in every possible ways, isn't it?
This is me, being a Salgado copycat:
http://forum.luminous-landscape.com/index.php?topic=63891.msg514611#msg514611
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This is me, being a Salgado copycat:
http://forum.luminous-landscape.com/index.php?topic=63891.msg514611#msg514611
So, if the answer is "yes, all photographers today are copycats", does still make sense asking for "real landscape photography"?
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This makes all photographer copycats, doesn't it? I mean, everything has been photographed in every possible ways, isn't it?
No and no.
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No and no.
Can you show me some photographer today that shot something in a way that was never shot before?
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So, if the answer is "yes, all photographers today are copycats"...
No, the answer is not "yes." Most are, though, with few separating from the pack by breaking new grounds, exploring new angles, concepts, ideas. You know, things that make artists Artists. Simply using a few aesthetic tricks, borrowed from classical arts, like I do (and Salgado) does not make a photographer an Artist.
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As that would require an exhaustive comparison with every photograph every made, I leave you to believe whatever you wish to believe.
Well, if you're saying that there certanly are some photographers that are not copycats I think you can name some of them, otherwise I could wish to believe that you're just believing there are non-copycats photographers out there.
Looking on the site I found this article by Michael Reichmann (http://luminous-landscape.com/its-all-a-blur/), which shows some (beautiful) shots closely resembling those of Ernst Haas.
(I have no idea who Ernst Haas is, I read his name here (http://forum.luminous-landscape.com/index.php?topic=88703.0)).
Is Mr. Reichmann a copycat photographer?
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Exciting new photography? There's so much of it. Where to start? (Landscape isn't really my field.)
Fashion. Viviane Sassen: http://www.vivianesassen.com
Still Life. Lucas Blalock: http://www.frieze.com/issue/article/focus-interview-lucas-blalock/
Documentary. Roger Ballen: http://www.rogerballen.com
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While it is perhaps not true that everything has been photographed in every possible way, it IS true that we're sufficiently immersed in photographs that we understand and judge photographs largely in terms of other photographs.
That is, when we think about the photograph at all, it is largely in terms like 'That's a bit like that other photograph..'.
I am convinced that the single iconic image is pointless, and that anything fundamentally new has to be shown as a collection of work. While a single picture might BE new, we can't see it as such, since we'll just see it as a collection of tropes and ideas from other pictures, possibly with a few mistakes or infelicities thrown in by photographic necessity. It is only in a series of photographs that any new ideas can be made clear.
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Landscape. Mishka Henner:
'Feedlots' - http://mishkahenner.com/filter/works/Feedlots
'No man's Land' - http://mishkahenner.com/filter/works/No-Man-s-Land
Edit to add:
'Dutch Landscapes' - http://mishkahenner.com/filter/works/Dutch-Landscapes
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...I have no idea who Ernst Haas is...
I hate to sound elitist, but you better run, don't walk, to find out.
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Exciting new photography? There's so much of it. Where to start? (Landscape isn't really my field.)
Fashion. Viviane Sassen: http://www.vivianesassen.com
Still Life. Lucas Blalock: http://www.frieze.com/issue/article/focus-interview-lucas-blalock/
Documentary. Roger Ballen: http://www.rogerballen.com
Well, they don't looks very "new" to me: abstract, collage and mundane, that's something already seen.
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I hate to sound elitist, but you better run, don't walk, to find out.
I will, I will.
Yet I still don't know if Mr. Reichmann is a copycat.
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Well, they don't looks very "new" to me: abstract, collage and mundane, that's something already seen.
The fact that everything looks the same to you, might mean that you haven't developed the eyes to see.
Sure, the artists I've linked to are referencing previous photographic practices, but they have twisted things to the extent that they have created a singular style. The work is recognisably their own. (Or google's!)
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The fact that everything looks the same to you, might mean that you haven't developed the eyes to see.
May very well be as you say.
Or it be there so much photos out there that you just happen to not have seen similar photos.
Who knows?
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While it is perhaps not true that everything has been photographed in every possible way,...
I couldn't agree more.
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The work is recognisably their own. (Or google's!)
I just tried google image search on this image of mine (https://www.flickr.com/photos/diegopig/15551985554) and the search didn't returned anything similar.
Does this means that image is truly original?
(same thing with this (https://www.flickr.com/photos/diegopig/15557592908/) and this (https://www.flickr.com/photos/diegopig/14631591713/): jee, I must be really good!)
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You're amazing!
(Actually, I quite like the coat hanger picture).
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Well, if you're saying that there certanly are some photographers that are not copycats I think you can name some of them, otherwise I could wish to believe that you're just believing there are non-copycats photographers out there.
I'm saying your interested in quarreling and I'm not -- ask yourself if the world changes and new things come into being and what that implies.
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I'm saying your interested in quarreling and I'm not -- ask yourself if the world changes and new things come into being and what that implies.
As you said, believe what you wish to believe.
But the all purpose of my posts wasn't quarelling but suggesting that discussing about "real landscape photography" is quite pointless: nobody will become a better photographer by complaining about "fake landscape photography", "real landscape photography", "copycat photography", "artist vs photographer" and so on.
Like amolitor said, we are overwhelmed by so much photographs that almost everything you can think of has already been photographed.
Even Mr. Reichmann made some photos very similar to Ernst Haas's, and yet nobody is dismissing Reichmann's photos as copycats.
So, if I can repeat myself: does it really make sense to talk about "real landscape photography" when nobody can't tell "real landscape photography" from "non-real landscape photography" on criteria like aesthetic, originality, message, intention, technical qualities or any other criteria?
By the way, I can name some photographers that make photographs like no one did before.
But I'm not sure that "Voyager", "Curiosity", "Hubble" or "Rosetta" would qualify as photographer, didn't they?
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... nobody will become a better photographer by complaining about "fake landscape photography", "real landscape photography", "copycat photography", "artist vs photographer" and so on.
Well, by merely armchair complaining, no, of course. But by realizing what it is that bothers you by "fake/copycat/etc. landscape photography," you are more likely to continue in a different direction, finding your own way (style) as you go, thus becoming a better photographer.
...almost everything you can think of has already been photographed...
It isn't' about what was photographed, but how. It isn't painting haystacks (i.e., what) that made Monet famous, but how he painted it.
...Even Mr. Reichmann made some photos very similar to Ernst Haas's, and yet nobody is dismissing Reichmann's photos as copycats...
And nobody is considering it Art either, just good photographs. Mr. Reichmann is a photographer who, in this particular case, was using knowingly and openly (i.e., not hiding it) a known technique, acknowledging its source. In the art world, it is known as homage.
...nobody can't tell "real landscape photography" from "non-real landscape photography" on criteria like aesthetic, originality, message, intention, technical qualities or any other criteria?
Of course we can. We can certainly tell postcard-pretty landscape photography from New Topographics.
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Mr. Reichmann is a photographer who, in this particular case, was using knowingly and openly (i.e., not hiding it) a known technique, acknowledging its source. In the art world, it is know as homage.
So is openly copy-catting?
Of course we can. We can certainly tell postcard-pretty landscape photography from New Topographics.
Well, if "we can" then asking the "real landscape photography" to stand up doesn't make sense: it already has stood up in new Topographics, didn't it?
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The world doesn't stand still ... That was just a historic example.
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The world doesn't stand still ... That was just a historic example.
What about a non-historic example of "real landscape photography"?
Unless it's like pornography, we should be able to say "look, this is real landscape photography" while showing a photo.
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I confess myself surprised, Slobodan, to see you of all people parsing distinctions between this Art and that Art! Have we finally persuaded you to join the naval staring, nitpicking, team?
I welcome you, of course ;)
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Slobodan,
...when you photograph like Ansel Adams today, you are a copycat.
How does one "photograph like Ansel Adams"?
...breaking new grounds, exploring new angles, concepts, ideas. You know, things that make artists Artists. Simply using a few aesthetic tricks, borrowed from classical arts, like I do (and Salgado) does not make a photographer an Artist.
Is this the "fundamental difference" you previously referred to?
I hate to sound elitist, but you better run, don't walk, to find out.
What's the rush?
In the art world, it is know as homage.
Is that the same as "copying", only spelled differently?
Andrew,
...when we think about the photograph at all, it is largely in terms like 'That's a bit like that other photograph..'.
How do you know this to be true?
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I confess myself surprised, Slobodan, to see you of all people parsing distinctions between this Art and that Art! ...
Andrew, not sure what you mean by that.
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Slobodan, the confusion arises because you keep using the term "art" to mean painting, or at least to mean everything other than photography. Photography is just as much "art" as is painting or sculpture or printmaking or any of the other arts. When you mean painting, say "painting."
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What about a non-historic example of "real landscape photography"?
Unless it's like pornography, we should be able to say "look, this is real landscape photography" while showing a photo.
If by 'non-historic' you mean recent, I've already given an example - Mishka Henner:
'Feedlots' - http://mishkahenner.com/filter/works/Feedlots
'No man's Land' - http://mishkahenner.com/filter/works/No-Man-s-Land
'Dutch Landscapes' - http://mishkahenner.com/filter/works/Dutch-Landscapes
The idea of photography that is implicit in your responses - that the history of photography has come to a halt, and that originality in photography is no longer possible - is interesting. I've heard similar arguments about pop music - specifically that the internet, by making readily available the whole of pop's back catalog (Spotify), has deprived us of any sense of progress, of the radically new. This phenomenon of 'post-internet atemporality' (to use the jargon), is something I'm sure many of us have a sense of, but I'd very surprised if, in 5 or 10 years time, art photography had made no advances. Whilst in some ways history seems to have ground to a halt, in other ways it's accelerating ever faster.
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I am gently teasing you, Slobodan, because you have more than once pointed out that the difference between Art and Decor is somewhat artificial and completely modern. This current discussion - which I find fascinating - does not seem consistent with that approach to the subject!
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Slobodan, the confusion arises because you keep using the term "art" to mean painting, or at least to mean everything other than photography. Photography is just as much "art" as is painting or sculpture or printmaking or any of the other arts. When you mean painting, say "painting."
The short answer: no
The long answer: too long to answer
Ok, Russ, now seriously: No, by "art" I do not mean painting or "everything other than photography." Photography can be "just as much "art" as is painting or sculpture or printmaking or any of the other arts," but more often than not it isn't. And even when it is, it is not "just as much." There are too many people, general public as much as art historians and critics, that do not consider it at the same level as painting (yourself included, I believe). In monetary terms, yes, photography is starting to sell for millions, but paintings are still going for hundred times more.
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So what you're saying is that the extent to which photography is art depends on its price in the auction houses?
I certainly don't consider painting to be more "art" than photography. It's a different art. I think you're confused by the fact that I pointed out that you can distort linear perspective in painting but you can't really do it in photography. That doesn't make painting better art than photography, though I think it does make it, in some cases, much better at producing the feeling of certain mountain scenes.
In general, I think painting can beat photography when it comes to landscape. I don't think painting can hold a candle to photography when it comes to the kind of thing you did with "Lonely in Chicago" and it certainly can't when it comes to showing the lives of people in their natural state.
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So what you're saying is that the extent to which photography is art depends on its price in the auction houses?...
No, that is not what I am saying, but rather a non sequitur. I specifically prefaced my statement with "in monetary terms." There are other, non-monetary, ways, some of which I mentioned as "general public... art historians and critics" I think it is fair to estimate that a majority of those do not put photography at the same level as painting. Monetary value is just one way of illustrating that tendency.
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When you say "art historians and critics" I suspect you're referring to the people surrounding auction houses and museums -- whose livelihood depends on pumping up the "value," otherwise known as the selling price, of what they call "art objects." Of course an "art object" that's one-of-a-kind potentially is more "valuable" than an art object that's infinitely reproducible. But that has absolutely nothing to do with its visual effectiveness, which is what I'd use as a basis upon which to judge its value as "art." Part of the problem is the meaning of "art," a slippery term if ever there was such a thing.
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Of course we can. We can certainly tell postcard-pretty landscape photography from New Topographics.
Well, if "we can" then asking the "real landscape photography" to stand up doesn't make sense: it already has stood up in new Topographics, didn't it?
We can, but the blogger (http://blog.ucphoto.me/will-the-real-landscape-photography-please-stand-up/) who asked that question seems to have been fixated by "a slideshow of landscape photos" while "munching on some bratwurst and drinking a beer" in Munich. You might think there are more sensible places to look for variety in photography.
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I am gently teasing you, Slobodan, because you have more than once pointed out that the difference between Art and Decor is somewhat artificial and completely modern. This current discussion - which I find fascinating - does not seem consistent with that approach to the subject!
Teasing is ok. I think I ultimately saw the value in your comment about Art vs. Decor that the distinction is much more pronounced with modern art than in the past (where I found the inspiration for my claim that most, if not all, art started as decor).
As for parsing, semantic-hair splitting, etc., no, I am not fond of that at all, though I might fall into that trap from time to time. I prefer broad generalizations (the likes of my "profound difference"), that are rather intuitive insights and open to your own interpretations, depending on the context. They are meant to provoke your own thinking about the issue, rather than tell you in no uncertain terms what the issue (and solutions to it) are. Not unlike saying "all is fair in love and war."*
Too many people, some on this thread, are measurbators and would like to know "how long is a piece of string," what the definition of "harmony," "profound," "historic," "real" etc., etc., is (and what the definition of "is" is). They want to put every photographer in their little boxes and label them as this or that, then measure the distance between boxes (e.g. how far is Ansel Adams from Peter Lik) and between a box and the ultimate goal (e.g. how far is Lik from Art).
* Parse that, measurbators!
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...We can, but the blogger (http://blog.ucphoto.me/will-the-real-landscape-photography-please-stand-up/) who asked that question seems to have been fixated by "a slideshow of landscape photos" while "munching on some bratwurst and drinking a beer" in Munich. You might think there are more sensible places to look for variety in photography.
Indeed.
By the way, the term "real landscape photography" is not mine, nor I understand what its author meant by that, so whatever I say about the issue here is not to defend the term.
As for the slideshow... most people love chocolate, yet if eating too much of it might make them sick. I heard that workers in chocolate factories wouldn't want to see it for the rest of their lives. The same with a certain type of landscape photography, exemplified by 500px.
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I prefer BS to be accompanied by beer or Barolo :-)
So far, Isaac, you have not been known to resort to banal vulgarities to make your point. Looks like you already had too much of that beer or wine.
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Too many people, some on this thread, are measurbators and would like to know "how long is a piece of string," what the definition of "harmony," "profound," "historic," "real" etc., etc., is (and what the definition of "is" is). They want to put every photographer in their little boxes and label them as this or that, then measure the distance between boxes (e.g. how far is Ansel Adams from Peter Lik) and between a box and the ultimate goal (e.g. how far is Lik from Art).
I was just trying to ground a potentially interesting philosophical discussion with some specific examples. I'm not sure what a 'measurebator' is, but it sounds offensive. Is such language necessary?
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I was just trying to ground a potentially interesting philosophical discussion with some specific examples. I'm not sure what a 'measurebator' is, but it sounds offensive. Is such language necessary?
For the record, I did not have you in mind, nor to offend. From what I've seen, you have a better theoretical background in art history/philosophy than I do, and I respect that and your contribution to the thread.
"Measurbator" is a term originated by the founder of this site, Michael Reichmann, and often used by its frequent posters, and is meant to mean, humorously, not offensively, photographers who would rather spend their time measuring megapixels, dynamic range, this or that technical aspect of photography, etc. than taking pictures or discussing esthetics of photography. I just used it in the context of this debate to indicate those who would slice and dice every statement to its atoms, and reduce every generalization, meant to be intuitively grasped, to measurable and quantifiable ingredients.
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I just used it in the context of this debate to indicate those who would slice and dice every statement to its atoms, and reduce every generalization, meant to be intuitively grasped, to measurable and quantifiable ingredients.
Do you think we should just accept generalizations without question? Do you think it's possible to be specific without being reductionist?
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Slobodan,
Too many people, some on this thread, are measurbators and would like to know "how long is a piece of string," what the definition of "harmony," "profound," "historic," "real" etc., etc., is (and what the definition of "is" is). They want to put every photographer in their little boxes and label them as this or that, then measure the distance between boxes (e.g. how far is Ansel Adams from Peter Lik) and between a box and the ultimate goal (e.g. how far is Lik from Art).
Please have the courage of your convictions and directly address the person(s) you criticise.
...measurbator...
Which box does this label fit in?
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Slobodan,
Please have the courage of your convictions and directly address the person(s) you criticise...
If you insist: you, Diego and Isaac come first to mind. I used a more generic term not out of cowardice, but simply because the three of you are not so unique and original in your way of thinking.
I've encountered a lot of jerks on the Internet (and I am sure the feeling is mutual), but you didn't strike me as one, at least not initially. At some point, however, I've begin to wonder if you are asking those simplistic questions (e.g., "define harmony," "why rush") because you genuinely do not know and want to learn, or you think that using Socratic method is always cool, or you are simply enjoying yanking somebody's chain.
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Slobodan,
...you...
Thank you.
Since I apparently upset you I will retire from the thread.
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… and Isaac come first to mind.
I am, of course, flattered that you keep me so much in mind. It's sweet.
… photographers who would rather spend their time measuring megapixels, dynamic range, this or that technical aspect of photography, etc. than taking pictures or discussing esthetics of photography.
The only time I remember doing something like that was in response to your comment (http://forum.luminous-landscape.com/index.php?topic=94724.msg779934#msg779934) on a technical aspect of photography.
I just used it in the context of this debate to indicate those who would slice and dice every statement to its atoms, and reduce every generalization, meant to be intuitively grasped, to measurable and quantifiable ingredients.
A generalization "meant to be intuitively grasped" can still be plain wrong.
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I learned a new word, today: "jerk" defined as "person telling someone that 'because I say so' isn't an argument".
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Landscapes??
Pretty pix are a dime a dozen...or even free.
http://www.amazon.com/Sunrise-around-world-Photo-Gallery-ebook/dp/B00ROCZ2JG/ref=pd_sim_sbs_kstore_9?ie=UTF8&refRID=16FNDDPK30NZ1MN5T7FJ
http://www.amazon.com/Spectacular-Mountain-Lakes-Photo-Gallery-ebook/dp/B00QU1H3NK/ref=pd_sim_sbs_kstore_4?ie=UTF8&refRID=0GHX6N388YGCDGWS8V3J
Lik just figured out how to make lots of money from his work instead of pennies. It would be nice if Lik will used some of his riches to create a foundation to give grants to struggling phoogs out there for worthwhile projects.
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Landscapes?? Pretty pix are a dime a dozen...or even free.
So are comments based on subject-line without reference to the original-post or subsequent discussion ;-)
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Guess he told YOU, Iluvmycam. Take that. . . and that!
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…when you photograph like Ansel Adams today, you are a copycat.
How does one "photograph like Ansel Adams"?
Digital Landscape Photography: In the Footsteps of Ansel Adams and the Great Masters (https://books.google.com/books?id=HmCUQQAACAAJ)
Advanced Digital Black & White Photography (https://books.google.com/books?id=_2CclDoF--wC&lpg=PA70&dq=%22If%20there%20is%20a%20typical%20Ansel%20Adams%20scene%22&pg=PA70#v=onepage&q=%22If%20there%20is%20a%20typical%20Ansel%20Adams%20scene%22&f=false)
…
…was using knowingly and openly (i.e., not hiding it) a known technique, acknowledging its source. In the art world, it is know as homage.
Is that the same as "copying", only spelled differently?
I suspect you understand the difference in meaning (http://dictionary.cambridge.org/us/dictionary/british/homage) very well.
…when we think about the photograph at all, it is largely in terms like 'That's a bit like that other photograph…'.
How do you know this to be true?
More to the point: Andrew, why do you think that is true? It isn't what I seem to do when I think about a photograph, unless it really is very like another photograph.
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Can you show me some photographer today that shot something in a way that was never shot before?
As that would require an exhaustive comparison with every photograph every made, I leave you to believe whatever you wish to believe.
So what if you create some photos unlike anything else you have seen? Are you still being original if someone [unknown to you] had already done something like it before?
After all you can't be expected to look at all photography ever done before creating your art.
Also would the people who are seen as being original now, actually be that good compared to some people who came later in both were placed in the same time? Were they genuinely original thinkers or were they simply doing photography when there was an awful lot less of it, so relatively quite easy to be different?
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Slobodan,
Is that the same as "copying", only spelled differently?
Exactly like giclee is an alternative way of spelling or should I say selling ink jet prints.
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Are you still being original if someone [unknown to you] had already done something like it before?
What we are not being is a "copycat" (http://forum.luminous-landscape.com/index.php?topic=97433.msg803026#msg803026).
Also would the people who are seen as being original now, actually be that good compared to some people who came later in both were placed in the same time? Were they genuinely original thinkers or were they simply doing photography when there was an awful lot less of it, so relatively quite easy to be different?
Evidently some were different than their contemporaries. Sorry a discussion of counter factuals doesn't seem interesting to me.
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What we are not being is a "copycat" (http://forum.luminous-landscape.com/index.php?topic=97433.msg803026#msg803026).
What if I take some shot in the style of another (famous or not, doesn't matter) photographer and lying about not knowing him?
Would you considered me a copycat?
I could surely be (along being a liar), but how do you know?
So does it really make sense all this copycat stuff?
What about judging and/or enjoying a photo for its own qualities?
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Would you considered me a copycat?
By definition (http://dictionary.cambridge.org/us/dictionary/british/copycat).
So does it really make sense all this copycat stuff?
What about judging and/or enjoying a photo for its own qualities?
What will we see when we consider the body work of that photographer?
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By definition (http://dictionary.cambridge.org/us/dictionary/british/copycat).
The problem is that you don't know if I had my own idea or copy other's: I said I didn't know the other photographer, how can you tell if its or isn't true?
So, based on the definition, you could consider me a copycat only if you know I lied.
What will we see when we consider the body work of that photographer?
Something already seen, something not yet seen.
How much "not yet seen" is needed to not be a copycat?
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… only if you know I lied.
You told me you lied.
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You told me you lied.
No, I told you I didn't knew him.
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Sorry, squabbling about what your words do or do not mean isn't interesting to me.
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So does it really make sense all this copycat stuff?
What about judging and/or enjoying a photo for its own qualities?
If no-one tried to be original, you would have nothing to copy. The impulse to find new ways of seeing is the engine of art.
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Sorry, squabbling about what your words do or do not mean isn't interesting to me.
Ok, let's make the point clear, then: how much your personal knowledge and the "perceived" photographer's knowledge goes into your judgement of a photo (of that photographer)?
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If no-one tried to be original, you would have nothing to copy. The impulse to find new ways of seeing is the engine of art.
I fully agree.
But my point is not about the value of the originality: my point is about the "stopper" status of producing a photo "in the style of".
You saw in this very thread: Salgado is a copycat, and that's all we need to judge his photo.
And my problem is not on "is a copycat", but on "that's all we need to judge his photo".
(I'm refering to Salgado only because my photographic culture is quite limited).
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... And my problem is not on "is a copycat", but on "that's all we need to judge his photo".
Who said that?
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Who said that?
I can't remember: can you help me on this?
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I can't remember: can you help me on this?
i still can't figure it out if you are trying to be funny or what? If you imply I said that, please quote me. I can't remember either.
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i still can't figure it out if you are trying to be funny or what? If you imply I said that, please quote me. I can't remember either.
As you said, believe what you wish to believe.
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As you said, believe what you wish to believe.
Again!? Seriously!?
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...Apparently Mike Johnston (of The Online Photographer fame) had nothing to say about your comment.
Still saying nothing about my comment, but coincidentally, he had another blog pos (http://theonlinephotographer.typepad.com/the_online_photographer/2015/03/the-old-question-revisited.html)t the other day about "is photography art?"
I cherry-picked the following (bold mine):
Most contemporary commentators are content to dismiss the issue either by questioning its relevance or by concluding that it can't be resolved. Yeah, photography sort of is art, they seem to be saying, but it sort of isn't, and besides it really doesn't matter.
And the one close to my comment (again, bold mine):
what I believe: that photography is not an art, but that some photographers are nevertheless artists.
Except I package it a bit differently: those are artists who happen to be photographers.
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Burt Glinn from the 1981 book World Photography by Bryn Campbell.
"Our world is so flooded with photographic images that when we preconceive we end up, probably unwittingly, taking pictures of pictures we have seen."
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Still saying nothing about my comment, but coincidentally, he had another blog post (http://theonlinephotographer.typepad.com/the_online_photographer/2015/03/the-old-question-revisited.html) the other day about "is photography art?"
I don't think that blog post says anything much of relevance to your original comment:
"There is a profound difference between artists using photography as a medium, and photographers striving to create art."
"I don't have to give myself a label. What I can do is say 'no' to certain things. For example, if I'm invited to do a photography show, I tend to say no. The medium itself, I find, is a relatively boring context. You would never see a show about acrylic painting. If it's that kind of understanding of the medium, it's completely uninteresting on an intellectual level. I make art. I don't come from a photographic background and I try to stay away from contexts where the work is diminished down to how it's made. For example, I wouldn't do a show about Fuji film.
…
I don't teach photography students, I teach art students, and if they think they can make use of a camera that's fine. But probably they've started at the wrong end because they've chosen their medium before they've chosen their content."
Thomas Demand, pp14-22 Image Makers, Image Takers (https://books.google.com/books?id=y99TAAAAMAAJ&focus=searchwithinvolume&q=%22I+don%27t+have+to+give+myself+a+label.%22)
Is there a profound difference between artists using painting as a medium, and painters striving to create art etc. ?
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"All" photographers do is select image contents and then modify to taste. There isn't the degree of individuality conferred by having to use hand and arm to create an image. Drawings and paintings show the characteristic pencil/crayon/brush/pen strokes and brush strokes of the individual artist - as individual as a person's handwriting. The more mechanical nature of photography accounts for its reputed objectivity and for the eternal question "But Is It Art?". In some ways the "new film", "alternative/historical methods" movement and the use of experimental photography as part of mixed media art are attempts to get away from the mechanical objectivity to something that feels more like traditional art. (and of course some people just like to mess around with wet plates, etc).
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Drawings and paintings show the characteristic pencil/crayon/brush/pen strokes and brush strokes of the individual artist - as individual as a person's handwriting.
Not really, "because there is never going to be a definitive Rembrandt (http://www.unctv.org/content/rembrandt/weller)."
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...Is there a profound difference between artists using painting as a medium, and painters striving to create art etc. ?
Of course... the latter you pay by the square footage of your walls, plus paint.
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Of course... the latter you pay by the square footage of your walls, plus paint.
So "photographers striving to create art" you would pay by the square footage of your walls, plus canvas.
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I still wonder what a "real landscape photography" looks like.
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Ask the blogger (http://petapixel.com/2015/01/31/will-real-landscape-photography-please-stand/#more-157150).
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Ask the blogger (http://petapixel.com/2015/01/31/will-real-landscape-photography-please-stand/#more-157150).
He doesn't seems to know, either.
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If the blogger doesn't know a difference between what they mean by "real landscape photography" and what they mean by "landscape photography" then it's not anything we need to wonder about.
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If the blogger doesn't know a difference between what they mean by "real landscape photography" and what they mean by "landscape photography" then it's not anything we need to wonder about.
That's what I thought, in fact...
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I still wonder what a "real landscape photography" looks like.
May I suggest Google Image Dresden Bombing before and after, Stalingrad Battle Before and After, as well as Hiroshima before and after? You will definitely witness the power of the Western technology and its most important concept of man.
For those who really want to make a more valuable commodity in the artwork, let me quote this French guy:
"The market value of suffering and death had become superior to that of pleasure and sex, Jed thought, and it was probably for this reason that Damien Hirst had, a few years earlier, replaced Jeff Koons at the top of the art market."
— Michel Houellebecq, The Map and the Territory
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I'm not sure why the "real" adjective should apply to city bombing's photo but not to "postcard style" photo.
On the marketing value of death and suffering in art, I'm not sure it's a modern trait: most of ancient art deals with battles, fights between heroes and so on.
And don't forget the via crucis, or Michelangelo's "La pietà".
One can surely say that "La pietà" is not about death and suffering but about the love of a mother, but the same thing can be said about Kenneth Jarecke's dead tank driver, that is not about death but about the will of living.
No matter what, I think that death and suffering value in art is nothing new.