Smudgey wrote:
Have we become camera and photography snobs ?
Yes, and it's an ugly thing.
mainshipper wrote:
I’m just completing a month long trip around SE Asia and have just about had it with the throngs of smartphone and tablet snap shooters (not photographers) who clog every venue I visited. Personally, I have two iPhones and three iPads but rarely use them for taking anything other than something interesting like a sign or other local oddity and usually just for my records. I do, however, take the occasional selfie and may have someone take a quick tourist shot of my wife and I in front of something noteworthy. Other than that, I use my Canon 5D III with a long enough lens that I can breach the wall of smartphones in front of me. I do recognize that these “tourist” photographers have just as much right to take shots as I do but it’s the way they take those photos that drives me crazy. Here are my main issues.
1. They must always stand a long way from their subject so that the entire background is included. This means that for some length of time the lane between them is technically closed while the photographer (I hate to use that word) fidgets with the camera and/or the subject goes through several modeling poses so that the shoot can be completed. Inevitably, the shooter and subject change places and repeat the process.
2. With groups, everybody wants every picture taken with their camera which means that the particular location is closed for a while. Maybe someone should invent a selfie-stick that holds 4-6 smartphones so that they can get it done with one click.
3. In order to take a picture with a smartphone or tablet you must raise it well above your head in order to get a clear shot and in most cases a small adjustment with your DSLR will get you around them for your shot. The worst situation is the tablet user when they hoist what appears to be equivalent of a large sign up to take their shot. Sometimes I wish they would turn the tablet on selfie mode so they could see the annoyed people behind them. I attended a few cultural performances (water puppet show, etc.) and was steaming when a lady in front of us with an iPad appeared to want to video the entire performance and who was totally oblivious the attendees behind her.
4. Lastly, selfie-sticks are really annoying because they are not just used for selfies but for all of their photos. They walk around with a phone on a three foot pole and in large crowd it is just not that practical.
We unfortunately live in an age where everybody on the planet owns a device capable of taking pictures and where in the old days only people with actual cameras taking actual photos would be trying to get the perfect shot of something that they deemed important. Oh do I yearn for those days.
I’m just completing a month long trip around SE As... (
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Yes, I fully understand........I go to big stadiums to see top Premier League soccer matches and it's dreadful. There are lots of people there shouting and chanting, singing and making dreadful noises, cheering, screaming abuse at the opposition and referee who is having a terrible match. People taking pictures with those awful mobile phones and those sticks with phones on them. I have to queue to get in and wait to get out because of all these noisey common people. I sometimes wonder it it's worth the 70 pounds entrance fee, plus railway tickets and one thing and another. Maybe I should accept it as the sign of the times and stop moaning about stupid things.
I hope one day you go to a remarkable, fantastic, tourist attraction, the best in the world and there is only you there there, no-one at all to get in your way or block your view, and it's a nice sunny day for you.
Cheers and Beers
Graham\098/
I agree with your sentiments. But maybe the only solace is that difficult circumstances make any good photographs obtained more valuable.
If it bothers you that much do something about it. I suggest you eat the night before large amounts of beans and broccoli. When they get in your way stroll up quietly, drop a stinky one and slowly walk away. The isle will clear for you quite quickly. If you are shy, learn how how it blame it someone else.
In all honesty here, what makes you so special that everyone else should bow to you. They have just as much right as you to be there taking pictures. The only difference is your consedeness and the fact that you are not using a cell phone or a tablet. Maybe if you trade in your Canon for a cell phone or tablet you won't feel so out of place and will be more tolerant to wait your turn.
Your comments are very valid. I was videotaping a band one night, and only used the eyepiece viewfinder, or occasionally the flip-out LCD when I held the camera above my head, in which case the bright (very bright, in an otherwise dark environment) was facing the floor.
This was before the beginning of the viral necessity (has to be viral, I think!) for everyone to record videos of everything.
I was very aware of not getting in someone's line of sight - which wasn't too awkward, because I was 'official' - working for the promoter, I think.
I thought the people up from with their bright little (well, they were in those days!) LCDs waving in front of everyone's face were rather rude.
What to do?
It's like freedom of speech, this freedom to use a mobile device in public. What can one do with such crass behavior as the person walking through a store, carrying on a conversation on a BlueTooth-enabled mobile 'phone at a volume level little short of shouting, oblivious to the annoyance caused to others.
I have been known to step right in front of such a person and ask "are you talking to me?"
In response to the usual "No! Mind your own business," I tend to say that "I'd like to; I just don't want to mind yours, particularly at full volume over speakers. Kindly shut up."
"Der....."
In some locals, you could ask a friendly policeman or official kind to tell the offending selfie (there's an ugly word to start with, perhaps originating in a child-like mentally that has to use something perfectly useful & valid taken in moderation into what has become an obsession) shooters that they cannot block pathways or otherwise cause an obstruction.
I'm 70 this year; 60 years ago, my father said that when I was his age, we wouldn't know what to do with all the time we'd be saving by using technology. The answer appears to be that we have almost all of us devoted ourselves to becoming slaves/servants to said technology, rather than it being subservient to us!
Obviously, in a free world, we make our own free choices. But we need to be aware that with freedom comes responsibility - in this case, a duty of care to be thoughtful of others.
We all need to be more self-aware, less selfish, and maybe that means being less self-centered and, well, dare I say it, less 'selfie!'
Apologies, didn't realize I was going to write an article!
Robert Render Harrison.
Writer of moviemaking equipment reviews, and reviews of interesting, low budget, and documentary movies for InSync Film & Video magazine.
That's today's generation, they want total satisfaction in whatever they do...take a quick snapshot without worrying about settings, go shopping online without leaving the house, text while driving (that way they can kill two birds with one stone) did you ever see the grammar when someone is texting? I'm not against modern technology but it does tend to make a person lazy.
You Sir are a dinosaur, and soon to become extinct.
A generation ago, I toured Greece. When I arrived at Mt. Olympus, I knew I was in trouble as there were over 20 BUSES (each holding up to 50 people) in the parking lot.
I fought the urge to get aggravated and instead, filmed the crowds swarming the hill like ants on a piece of candy. A non-photogenic site was turned into into a comical film.
Roll with it You will live longer.
Peterff wrote:
Perhaps we should just put up signs to the recommended selfie location, it might thin the crowd a little!
Or suggest that it's really cool to get a selfie on rail road tracks in every place you visit, it's a once in a life time opportunity...
...
Look at the two ladies on the rock. They are dancing and having a great time. No fear. In the second shot, one guy is crawling and the other has gone as far as he's going to go. Totally petrified.
Ralloh wrote:
Look at the two ladies on the rock. They are dancing and having a great time. No fear. In the second shot, one guy is crawling and the other has gone as far as he's going to go. Totally petrified.
My impression was... The dancing girls had fallen off the rock, and the guys were trying to see where they were. :-)
Wow, photography snobbery. I agree with CHG Canon........stay home
Smudgey
Loc: Ohio, Calif, Now Arizona
Wow is that a full frame camera? LOL All you need is a trailer to make it fully mobil. Great idea love it. 😁
whitewolfowner wrote:
If it bothers you that much do something about it. I suggest you eat the night before large amounts of beans and broccoli. When they get in your way stroll up quietly, drop a stinky one and slowly walk away. The isle will clear for you quite quickly. If you are shy, learn how how it blame it someone else.
In all honesty here, what makes you so special that everyone else should bow to you. They have just as much right as you to be there taking pictures. The only difference is your consedeness and the fact that you are not using a cell phone or a tablet. Maybe if you trade in your Canon for a cell phone or tablet you won't feel so out of place and will be more tolerant to wait your turn.
If it bothers you that much do something about it.... (
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