The responses to last week's musing on
the potential hidden costs of professional digital photography intrigued me. The digital darkroom and workflow
technologies are things photographers feel strongly about, and our discussion here was no exception. Most people seemed
to think that even given the steep learning curve and potential extra effort, digital is still a road to increased
productivity and quality. In the process, though, we reignited a perennial discussion. It comes in many forms: RAW vs.
JPEG; postprocess vs. capture and print; manual settings vs. built-in presets. In the end, though, it boils down to a
simple question: what is good digital photography?On the one hand, we have by far the vast majority of digital photographers, people who see Photoshop as not only a digital tool, but an integral part of their daily workflow. These are the RAW advocates. They see JPEG as a hindrance to productivity and quality because you can't make lossless adjustments.
On the other hand, we have people like Ken Rockwell, and a growing number of professional photographers. The argument is that instant review, the ability to take an almost unlimited number of shots of a subject, and the ability to digitally remaster images are making photographers lazy. JPEG tends to be the favored format here because, as the argument goes, you can't tell the difference in a final printed product between an untouched JPEG and a converted RAW image, and if you get the shot right the first time, you don't need CameraRAW to cover your mistakes later.
I have a great deal of sympathy for both camps. If your goal is to make the best picture possible, it's silly not to take advantage of all the tools at your disposal, and that includes both the camera and the digital workflow. How you divide your time between the two will vary depending on where your technical expertise lies and what approach will do your subject matter the most justice.
At the same time, though, I wonder how realistic the Rockwell position is in the long term. Is it really fair to see the digital part of 'digital photography' as unconnected from the photography part, a CCD or CMOS as simply a drop-in film replacement? I often wonder why we cling to old paradigms when it comes to digital cameras. Does it really make sense to talk about digital ISO? There's no reason I can think of to limit sensors to film sensitivity ratings, other than habit. The same goes for shutter speeds. Why set the interrupt timer on a digital device that can cycle in nanoseconds to be an approximation of a fraction of a second? Auto exposure modes will happily set shutter speeds like 5/23 or .21739. Why limit our thinking to 1/8, 1/4, 1/2, 1/4000, etc.? Likewise, the servos in most lenses allow for continuous aperture adjustments as well. Why continue to think in f-stops? Isn't most of what goes into photography really just an artifact of the technology available and the limitations of film as a medium, not to mention the limitations of the human brain? Sure, it's convenient to think of everything connected to photography on a scale where every modification doubles or halves the amount of light that trikes the film, but do we need that simplicity when we have tools to do the calculations for us, and faster than we can?
When we get to the point of seeing digital imaging as a continuous process from lens to screen or print, we'll be in a better position to answer that question "what is good digital photography?", and in a better position to evaluate what's been lost and gained in the process.
1. I think that digital photography is different enough from film that we should consider rewriting the books on photography, techniques that were developed because of the limitations of film needs to be updated. The freedom of digital has awakened my artistic side, something that the cost of film has always prevented. But despite all the advantages of digital, I do agree with Ken Rockwell in that, there is an underlying thought in the back of my mind that says "oh I can just delete this later" And I do try to avoid thinking that way, but with digital it's somewhat harder than film, it teaches you to be lazy in one respect. So i wholeheartedly embrace digital, but reluctantly let go of film.
Posted at 1:23PM on Apr 24th 2006 by Charles