larryepage Loc: North Texas area

Last week, Mac started a discussion around the notion that sharpness in photography is overrated, at least in some cases. Unfortunately, it got moved to a different section, where it quickly died. I've had opportunity to do some photography in connection with a convention I am attending this week. My intent here is to reopen the discussion in this section (without the link to the article), because I do not think the subject had a chance to be fully explored. My experience this week has caused me to have some additional thoughts on the subject.

I am still pretty well distracted by my meetings and activities and may be limited for a couple of days in responding to the discussion. But perhaps we can see if there may be some energy left for discussion.

larryepage Loc: North Texas area

Here is the example photograph that rekindled my thinking. It was a one-shot opportunity that I didn't get quite right. I was with a group of folks who had ridden Amtrak to a location where we detrained at a small community station. We were invited to use the station platform to watch and photograph trains for a while before returning to our hotel. The space available was quite limited, so we were constrained to be much closer to the track than is usually considered a safe distance for train watching and rail photography. In addition, the track speed limit through the community is posted as 70 mph, which means that trains may be travelling as fast as 80 mph when they pass.

I call this image "Not a Good Idea," because even though I was standing behind a fence, I was within about 8 feet of the track when the train passed by me at a speed which has been verified as 70 mph. I had to chase down both my sun hat and the remains of my lunch after the train and its associated windstorm passed by. (I then moved to a location a significantly greater distance from the track.) Unfortunately, I made a mistake in my exposure setup, and did not capture any motion blurring in my image. What should have been a pretty intense image is instead rendered as a fairly ordinary representation of some guys taking photographs of a train. What you see is what I shot...there has been no processing done to the image.

(Download)

Mac Loc: Pittsburgh, Philadelphia now Hernando Co. Fl.

Nobody told the Impressionist painters that their art wasn’t any good because it wasn’t sharp, or if they did, the art won out anyway. Using blur in photography to express or emphasize is just as acceptable. By the way, it was me who started that thread.

larryepage Loc: North Texas area

Thanks for the correction. I have edited my first post accordingly.

Mac Loc: Pittsburgh, Philadelphia now Hernando Co. Fl.

Thank you Larry.

bikinkawboy Loc: north central Missouri

If you look at magazine ads for John Deere farm equipment that’s under way, it’s obvious from the smeared texture of the bars on the tires that it was done post processing to make one believe the machine was moving. Or that the chaff blowing out the back of the combine was added afterwards. Somewhere I have images of real chaff being spread and what they have ain’t it. I’m not criticizing, just not believing it’s really moving.

Mac Loc: Pittsburgh, Philadelphia now Hernando Co. Fl.

I’m not talking about post processing, I’m talking about doing it with the camera.

bikinkawboy Loc: north central Missouri

The point I was making is that blur makes one think of movement whereas a sharp crisp image does not. And if you want to convey the impression of movement or shaking on motion pictures, you simply jiggle the camera. Basically, there’s a time for crisp images and a time for blurry depending upon what you want to convey.

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Maybe Im missing something, but any lack of sharpness is irrelevant to that photo. Its basically your own personal private memento, is it not ?

larryepage Loc: North Texas area

Now it is...just a snapshot. But if it properly included the visible evidence of motion of the locomotives, it would be more than that. It would tell the whole story without the need for any words. Unfortunately, in this case, the sharpness effectively kills the entire train and makes it appear as stationary.

Mac Loc: Pittsburgh, Philadelphia now Hernando Co. Fl.

Have you ever seen an Impressionist painting? Blur/lack of focus isn’t used to show movement, but to emphasize color, or a feeling, etc. A growing number of photographers are capturing the Impressionist style. Sharpness is not necessary to capture the beauty of a building, or a garden, or a field of wild flowers.

larryepage Loc: North Texas area

I did some of that several years ago when doing plain paper printing from Polaroid peel-apart film. It also used to be a common approach for some when doing IR film photography, although that was usually done in monochrome, rather than color.

My photography "coach" has a deep understanding of the modern and contemporary styles. I've asked her to help me as I get competent with IR, which she's not familiar with at all. I'm not interested in just creating weird looking standard images with IR.

This is new to me. I'll know more later.

dpullum Loc: Tampa Florida

Cameras may improve, but the image as presented struggles to print or project as crisp as the camera records. And finally, our eyes/brain are limiting factors in the final part of the Sharpness game. In our real-world vision thing do not have sharp edges... especially for us bifocal wearers.

Will the Fully Functional Female Robots from Japan have vision sharper than we mere humans? Tesla working with Panasonic has upgraded the resolution of their "relax, I'll drive for you" system. The world improves, but we don't.

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Got it ... I think. So youve presented an example illustrating that "sharpness may be inappropriate". But OTOH "Sharpness is overrated" strikes me as an entirely different concept.

R.G. Loc: Scotland

And the first thread shouldn't have been titled "Sharpness is Overrated", it should have been called "Softness is Underrated".