Wallen Loc: Middle Earth

Many say Photography is an artistic medium and maybe just as many, (more or less) says it is not. It just came to my attention that some artistic description seems to be "off" when applied to photography.

Say for example Cursive writing. Cursive is a style, a type and can even be a persons signature or way of doing things.
We say digital is a type of photography, but is it a style of photography? It definitely is a way, but a signature?
Same goes for film, or other types of photography.
Street photography may be a persons signature. It may be called a type of photography but calling street photography a style does not seems to fit.

There was a long thread about style and even then, I feel it has not been fully consolidated. For one, it seems that in photography, we tend to define "style" and "process" as the same banana. In music, style is way easier to distinguish. Even in the same genre, some musicians definitely have their own style in singing which can not be called a process, Isn't it?

As a paint/ink artist, my favored style is realistic and my signature, incomplete drawings. I like impressions but not when they are abstract. Yet in photography, going abstract seems to be the norm, which is sticking to one style and inevitably lead to singular, repeated and monotonous images.
When it comes to image signature, I believe no one has noticed mine yet, but it is there in almost every image i post

Any thoughts on these?

rook2c4 Loc: Philadelphia, PA USA

Obviously there are personal styles. With some photographers personal style is well-defined and identifiable, with others not so much. But universal style categories? I don't think it would be particularly helpful to compartmentalize photography in that manner. To what purpose or benefit?

Wallen Loc: Middle Earth

Which photographer style are you familiar with and what exactly is his/her style? How do you define its particularity?
Personally i find it hard to compartmentalize my own works into one homogenous group. As for others, I see trends & types of photography, styles-not so much.

Is Abstraction in photography what you meant with universal style? I'm still weighing ideas on that, either to call it style or ism. But truthfully that is the general trend of photography. Even when when making panoramas, photographers tend to refine/compose the scene to its simplest form.

Longshadow Loc: Audubon, PA, United States

I view a style as how one creates the images (composition, exposure, subject matter, telephoto compression, ...),
not what recording media is used (film/digital).

rook2c4 Loc: Philadelphia, PA USA

I don't think you quite understood my post. I was making a case against the categorization of photography styles, not for it. Even if it was possible to some extent, it wouldn't really be useful.

Longshadow Loc: Audubon, PA, United States

Humans love to group and categorize things.

rook2c4 Loc: Philadelphia, PA USA

True indeed. But in situations when grouping and categorizing has little usefulness and potentially stifles creativity, it is best to suppress the urge!

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Your problem and your premise add up to nada, zilch, zero. Who cares what media allow what "artistic descriptions" ?

Show me a classic statue that expresses "Rembrandt Light". Find some common descriptors between earthworks and stained glass (might be some, but its a stretch). Anywho, why make a problem outa stuff like that ? Different media will have different "artistic descriptors".

Longshadow Loc: Audubon, PA, United States

Impressionist and realist are good enough for me.
Don't need fifty sub-groups; sub-sub-groups...

Wallen Loc: Middle Earth

I understand your comment on being against the idea. But you also pointed out "some photographers personal style is well-defined and identifiable".
hence I am asking which or who is the photographer that you know, who has a clearly identifiable style and what are the particulars of his style that makes it identifiable.

Because I believe, that is where categorizing things becomes useful if not important.
Categorizing is understanding things on a deeper level. If i love a certain style, then understanding what is the essence or make-up that produce such style means i can re-create what i love and enjoy it more.

Wallen Loc: Middle Earth

That is what i meant when i said that in photography, "focusing to a single style will make for a repetitive & monotonous images".
When the relationship between all those aspects of photography do not change, one will have style. But it will also mean everything will be similar and a detriment to creativity.

Wallen Loc: Middle Earth

We are a community based lifeform. Category is inevitable for accurate communication.

Longshadow Loc: Audubon, PA, United States

Wallen Loc: Middle Earth

Creativity comes in many form.
Purposeful/directed creativity, needs deep understanding of the knowledge.
Teaching/extending creativity needs deep understanding of the knowledge.
Deep understanding of the knowledge means categorizing, it means Knowing what makes it different from one another.

How is that not useful and stifling?

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You want to re-create the styles of other photographers ?