Becoming documentarians
Feb 25, 2023 15:39:45 #
gvarner wrote:
It’s good that you have a story to tell. It’s what documentary photography is all about.
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Feb 25, 2023 15:44:13 #
Longshadow wrote:
For all the years I shot with film, couldn't afford dozens of rolls for an outing/trip,
so I was very selective when/what I shot. I simply carried that over to digital.
Just because I CAN take 100 shots of one thing doesn't mean I should or have to.
so I was very selective when/what I shot. I simply carried that over to digital.
Just because I CAN take 100 shots of one thing doesn't mean I should or have to.
Doesn’t mean you can’t either. Some people (like me) will take shots of the same thing using different settings, angles or lighting. I’m not that smart yet, so it teaches me something.
Feb 25, 2023 16:36:44 #
Points well taken here. The most important point of any of these documentaries is date, time, location, people in photo. It is useless for someone to have a zillion photos digitally stored or in a box printed out if there is no information to identify what it is that we are looking at 25, 50 100 years later. When the people die who have the institutional knowledge of the photo then much of it is guesswork or happenstance patching together of pieces. We find this out every day trying to piece together genealogy and photos of tombstones, headstones and obituaries.
Feb 25, 2023 17:22:05 #
bobbyjohn wrote:
Methinks part of the problem is COST. Back in the FILM era, first you had to buy the film, then each click on the camera might cost you dearly 25¢ - 50¢ in developing, whether or not you had several duds in the roll of film. With digital, the only thing you pay for is a one-time SD card and a nice Post-processing program (hopefully one-time). Each click on the camera is virtually free after that. You can discard duds to your heart's content.
That’s only a small part of it. It’s certainly had an impact but the biggest impact is the improvement in cellphone cameras. A lot of people had digital cameras. Those cameras were carried when they were going to an event or brought out at special family get together. Not everybody had one and those that did didn’t carry them everywhere. Cellphone cameras changed everything. Virtually everybody has one and they always have it with them. People that rarely if ever took photos now photograph everything!
Feb 25, 2023 17:49:00 #
Bill_de wrote:
All the digital images will someday disappear unless the files are updated to whatever becomes the 'medium of th day'. How many images are archived on 3 1/2 inch floppies, or Jazz drives, or whatever. Sure there will be some that survive, but most will fade from existence. Many won't be missed by anyone.
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I don’t really think that’s true. I will say that although the technology exists to access old media types pretty much anything that matters is no longer on 3 1/2” floppies or Jazz drives as a sole source. With the advent of the internet and streaming it really doesn’t matter anymore. I will agree that anything that doesn’t survive won’t be missed. And much of what does survive wouldn’t be missed if it was gone.
Feb 25, 2023 21:36:41 #
RodeoMan
Loc: St Joseph, Missouri
PHRubin wrote:
Much of my photo activity is documenting country music events. I enjoy when people refer back to these photos years later. I have photos of celebrities who are no longer with us.
Two questions: who did you enjoy photographying the most? and who did you enjoy the most just for the music and performance apart from the photography? Thanks.
Feb 25, 2023 21:45:28 #
I have been printing lots of my photos lately, but" when I'm dead and gone someone might find one of those masterpieces in an attic somewhere and say, "Well he was no Ansel Adams".
Feb 25, 2023 22:16:10 #
ssmiller
Loc: crescent city, ca
Hum, I never thought about it, but I believe you to be correct. Wow.
Feb 25, 2023 22:53:29 #
RodeoMan
Loc: St Joseph, Missouri
BebuLamar wrote:
You can write all the 0's and 1's on a scroll. Someone in the future if interested can reconstruct your image perfectly.
Where do you store these "0's" and "1's" with relevant information about what is on these images so some can decide whether or not they want to or have a need to reconstruct them? Unreconstituted "0's" and 1's" you see as being available for reconstruction for future use, I see as images on hard drives, SD cards and in the "cloud" destined for oblivion in the ether. The fact that the technology is available to extract the information means nothing relative to the more than 99 percent of the captures that will never get to the position of being printed or even put in a video or similar form. I collect examples of work by photographers who have worked in the city where I live. I have examples over a hundred and fifty years old. I have never gone into a antique or thrift store and found an envelope of SD cards labeled "family photos". For me, I will print those images I want to keep and bequeath to the future. Additionally, I will identify each image so that someone decades in the future will know who or what they are looking at.
Feb 26, 2023 07:38:44 #
jerryc41 wrote:
Yes, I agree. These million of photos could be of interest in the future.
For the past few years, I've been taking pictures around my town. Structures come and go, and it's nice have a pictorial history.
For the past few years, I've been taking pictures around my town. Structures come and go, and it's nice have a pictorial history.
And there are many more millions that will have people wondering WTH###
Feb 26, 2023 07:45:06 #
RodeoMan wrote:
Where do you store these "0's" and "... (show quote)
I said if someone is interested with your image. But I don't know. I think nobody is interested in my images.
Feb 26, 2023 09:01:20 #
I have tens of thousands of photographs, all of which I will be sending to Jerry.... 
Feb 26, 2023 21:08:54 #
Feb 26, 2023 23:27:27 #
RodeoMan
Loc: St Joseph, Missouri
BebuLamar wrote:
I said if someone is interested with your image. But I don't know. I think nobody is interested in my images.
I believe we are considering two different matters. You are referring to recovering a particular image of yours or mine that someone might want to recover. I am referring to the entire corpus of digital information that is stored in various places that could be an important and essential source of documentary evidence to tell the story of our age but won't be available because it even though there may be the technology to recover it, most of the data will never be in position to be recovered.
Feb 27, 2023 10:17:46 #
gvarner
Loc: Central Oregon Coast
RodeoMan wrote:
I believe we are considering two different matters... (show quote)
There will always be technology to recover the 1's and 0's, it’s simply a matter of someone wanting to do it.
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