Andrew I did read your your article linked above [and very good it was too] and I do think ETTR will result in the technically better image, in the right hands. But as I used to use Acuspeed developer as I preferred the look it gave to the that of 'higher quality' developers, I may also shoot digitally less perfectly, if it gets me the result I want, more easily. The less time I spend tweaking images the better, I'm getting fed up with sitting in front of a monitor. And I like tweaking images.
I will use ETTR in some circumstances where it may be appropriate and have time to fiddle around afterwards. But as I usually shoot RAW+JPEG [tweaked with camera styles] which gives me near as dammit what I want with minimal fuss most of the time, I've now gone from shooting RAW only, to enjoying nice JPEGs straight out of camera. The same way I liked using slide film, even though I loved messing around in the darkroom. And the bonus is that I can tweak the RAW files afterwards, if I want to.
I'd also observe that I've rarely seen any interesting/creative images produced by those overly concerned with the very techy aspects of photography. There are the odd exceptions.
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And as if to prove my point, which refers mainly to those who harp on about techy stuff a little too much, rather than actual photography. It appears in this thread, that those that judge by looking at images rather than worrying about absolute fidelity/maximum dynamic range..etc, not only produce more imaginative images, but much nicer looking pictures too. IMHO
The exceptions you listed above are well...
exceptions, when it comes to photography and geekiness.
Well both posts (yours and toby's) were uncalled for (and there's nothing respectfully being said here). We'd love to have you back when you regain some manners.
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I'd say they were absolutely on point.
The proof is in the pudding - all this hypothectical wittering about various types of exposure can best be judged by looking at pictures produced by the photographers who advocate each method. As no-one ultimately cares what camera is used, what monitor it's edited on, how the exposure was achieved, blah, blah, blah.... what people looking at the image care about is quite simple. Is the picture any good?
[Which is however, very subjective and a whole other thread entirely.]
The images Jonathan showed to illustrate ETTR + it's benefits, look flat + lifeless and oddly very old fashioned. IMO. Though I do like the quality of the DJ shot at the bottom of page. Andre's shots however have real zing and not only look so much better from an exposure point of view, but have more general creativity, even though or possibly beacuse he's not so au fait with all those pesky 1s + 0s. Andre's images look like they were taken by a photographer and not a technician with a camera.
With photography being somewhat technical, of course some technical knowledge is vitally important, but there has always been a tendency for some photographers to dwell a little too much on absurdly fine technical details rather than simply taking nice pictures. Ironically, I was once accused by an Art Student I shared a house with of exactly that, possibly as I actually knew what an f-stop was! Oddly enough he now teaches photography. Examples of his work here - [a href=\"http://showstudio.com/projects/cor/cor_record_fair.html]http://showstudio.com/projects/cor/cor_record_fair.html[/url] - unsurprisingly, he's a big fan of William Eggleston - I doubt very much if either ETTRs.
This also reminds me of a successful food photographer [whose name sadly escapes me at present] who gave up on medium/large format/light meters etc and swapped to 35mm digital. And to simplify further, he shot with auto exposure. And by removing the more techy side of things, he produced more naturalistic, but still very nice images.