boberic wrote:
Only thing that matters is the image. How you did it may be interesting but it doesn't matter. The only thing that matters is the image.
* * * * *
Maybe you meant the only thing that SHOULD matter is the image? Obviously it doesn't matter how you phrase or define
anything because for some people the process matters MORE !!! Therefore a raw snapshot may be "better" than a JPEG masterpiece,
but only would they believe maybe if we still had Galen Rowell to tell them.
via the lens wrote:
So, obviously a lot of opinions on photographing RAW or JPEG.
But maybe the conversation needs to be about something else. Maybe it should be about the quality of the overall image, both from a processing perspective and from an image formation perspective, i.e., what is a good photograph, both technically and aesthetically? Maybe it's not so much about file type. I see many photographs on this site that I'd call a snapshot (and snapshots, too, are ok at the right moment and are the keepers of our history at times) more than a photograph where someone is trying to form an artistic image in the endeavor of photography and then many people respond with how great the image is, which I often fail to see (maybe my shortcoming). I am aware that are various levels of photography and photographers and various goals in photography.
What I do know is that if you take a jpg and use it straight out of the camera (no human processing at all) it lacks that personal touch and the artistic perspective that you alone, as a human being and the photographer who took the shot, can give the photograph. Those of us who do take RAW photographs automatically do this as RAW requires processing. So, maybe the conversation should be about how we all, as individuals, actually form and process our images.
I've included below two images below, one is a RAW image (#1 - bottom) that I processed to meet what I saw and wanted to share, the other photo is straight out of the camera, untouched. I will say that the in-camera JPG processing (#2 - top photo) did not account for the degree of bright light, especially in the water in the forefront at the right side. It also made everything much darker than I would have chose to portray the scene. This scene, to me, was about the light shining on the boats and the lovely clouds in the sky (to which I added some drama). (A view from the deck of a motel I was staying at on the estuary in Oakland, CA.) The purple you see in the water on the RAW file only came across when imported on this site and might be because of the darkness of the water. Nikon D800, 24-120 Nikon lens, Fine Quality JPEG taken at same time as RAW, both exported at 2,000 pixels across for import here, 150 ppi, ISO 100, 120mm distance, f/11, 1/1000 of a second. I know someone will want to know this.
Click on the Download to see the photo larger to actually tell the difference between the human-processed photo (RAW version) and the machine-processed photo (JPEG version).
What do you think? Maybe the discussion is not about the file format as much as about the formation and processing of the image?
So, obviously a lot of opinions on photographing R... (
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Only that makes it an entirely different discussion, that has nothing to do anymore with file preferences ?
speters wrote:
Only that makes it an entirely different discussion, that has nothing to do anymore with file preferences ?
...it could be that or not...depends on your take of what matters to you and your goal.
Expressoman1 wrote:
You got the idea.
Thanks for your definition of snapshots verses photo. Sometimes I will produce a pic which is not technically sound but the subject, lighting, and composition are so cool I think it's powerful to keep
On artistic merit in a photograph, from "Looking at Ansel Adams", by his longtime assistant, written after his death, Andrea Stillman: (excerpt from 1927) "...I had achieved my first true visualization! I had been able to realize a desired image: not the way the subject appeared in reality but how it felt [word in italics] to me and how it must appear in the finished print...." As a creative photographer I look at the image in the same way and I try to create my vision of the subject the way I want others to see it. Ansel was an incredible technician but also an incredible get-it-right-in-camera photographer. An artistic image is one that has the photographers hand-mark on it in some way, either by carefully taking the shot or by carefully processing the shot and/or by doing both.
My first camera (which gave me the Photography bug) was a Kodak 110. That led me to a Canon FTb. I never had the time or space or money to process my pictures. That was what the mailers were for back then. After a few years I sold my camera and two lenses and stayed away for a couple decades. Now that I am back (with a Nikon D3300 after short stint with a Nikon and Sony point and shoot camera) I love the ability to "process" like in the old darkroom days, my photographs. For me, the debate between Jpg or Raw is liken to having a full darkroom set-up (RAW and post processing software) or one of those mini-darkroom kits they used to sell in the 70's (Jpeg and limited post processing). You can get fine captures rendered with both, so it really does come down to time constraints or ability to work a computer or just choice.
Cykdelic
Loc: Now outside of Chiraq & Santa Fe, NM
leftj wrote:
Drawing is not a photograph. A photograph is not a drawing. They are two distinctly different things.
Of course, but both are looks at a point in time and a place.
selmslie wrote:
That sounds like a put-down that is all too common here. Your implication is that people who are shooting JPEG are children compared to those of us who understand and do the raw conversion on our computer But some of us only do it on the computer when we need to, when we feel like playing or just to kill time.
1. The Ansel Adams comment was meant to illustrate the absurdity of the notion that computer time is wasted and we should be happy with the results of the jpegs. So carrying it to it's logical conclusion, the consensus on this forum would be that Adams spent TOO much time in the darkroom and imagine how tedious that must of been. I can only imagine that Michelangelo must of felt the same while on his back painting the ceiling of the Sistine Chapel while Pope Julius II was down below berating him for not working in jpeg.
2. Galen Rowel shot 35mm with an N90s. And if he did live into today, he would be shooting raw and loving it. I don't care why he changed, but were his images any less worthy because they weren't taken with a medium format rig? Or was he then just phoning it in? That was the insinuation, that no one can do great work unless it is with a medium format camera. So, who is being the elitist now? And are you putting down DX shooters by extension?
3. The processing power of the computer is a whole tool box and not just a hammer as you say. You pick and choose the right tool for the job and you determine the level at which each is utilized. Less is better.
4. Kids today. Yes, at some point if you aspire to something beyond a snapshot you are going to have to step outside your comfort zone and learn all the tools in that toolbox. To say otherwise is encouraging complacency, laziness and does a disservice to those coming after us. I would rather see a generation of real individual artists than a bunch of drones doing the same thing day in and day out and not pushing the roadblocks aside that others have put in their way. I mean, isn't UHH mean't to be a place to learn something new?
In conclusion; this subject gets brought up time and time again because it get stifled and drowned out by the mob. Rather than just take what is said at face value and try to integrate it into your processes and determine for yourself if it is a good fit; too many get offended and pull a Berkeley riot trying to drown out other voices.
So the next time you see "RAW" in the subject line, just stay away and if you insist on joining, check your anexities at the door.
There is a good reason the subject keeps coming up.
BlackRipleyDog wrote:
1. The Ansel Adams comment was mean't to illustrate the absurdity of the notion that computer time is wasted and we should be happy with the results of the jpegs. So carrying it to it logical conclusion, the consensus on this forum would be that Adams spent TOO much time in the darkroom and imagine how tedious that must of been. I can only imagine that Michelangelo must of felt the same while on his back painting the ceiling of the Sistine Chapel while Pope Julius II was down below berating him for not working in jpeg.
2. Galen Rowel shot 35mm with an N90s. And if he did live into today, he would be shooting raw and loving it. I don't care why he changed, but were his images any less worthy because they weren't taken with a medium format rig? Or was he then just phoning it in? That was the insinuation, that no one can do great work unless it is with a medium format camera. So, who is being the elitist now? And are you putting down DX shooters by extension?
3. The processing power of the computer is a whole tool box and not just a hammer as you say. You pick and choose the right tool for the job and you determine the level at which each is utilized. Less is better.
4. Kids today. Yes, at some point if you aspire to something beyond a snapshot you are going to have to step outside your comfort zone and learn all the tools in that toolbox. To say otherwise is encouraging complacency, laziness and does a disservice to those coming after us. I would rather see a generation of real individual artists than a bunch of drones doing the same thing day in and day out and not pushing the roadblocks aside that others have put in their way. I mean, isn't UHH mean't to be a place to learn something new?
In conclusion; this subject gets brought up time and time again because it get stifled and drowned out by the mob. Rather than just take what is said at face value and try to integrate it into your processes and determine for yourself if it is a good fit; too many get offended and pull a Berkeley riot trying to drown out other voices.
So the next time you see "RAW" in the subject line, just stay away and if you insist on joining, check your anexities at the door.
1. The Ansel Adams comment was mean't to illustra... (
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Well said however I didn't know they had jpeg when Ansel Adams was shooting.
leftj wrote:
Well said however I didn't know they had jpeg when Ansel Adams was shooting.
True, but what I said was about time spent and Adams spent gobs of hours on each print. And as a result of that, that is why we remember him today.
BlackRipleyDog wrote:
... In conclusion; this subject gets brought up time and time again because it get stifled and drowned out by the mob. ... There is a good reason the subject keeps coming up..
The subject keeps coming up because people like to talk about it and show everyone how great they are at post processing.
Anybody who has experience with raw and JPEG straight from the camera knows the difference and the advantage of developing from raw on the computer.
As someone who just showed up here three days ago, you may not be aware of how much this dead horse has been beaten into the ground - half way to China. The same arguments over and over again
ad nauseam.
The reason
via the lens started this topic was to smoke out some other ideas about what makes a good image besides raw or JPEG processing.
Aren't there some other qualities we can talk about for a change?
selmslie wrote:
The subject keeps coming up because people like to talk about it and show everyone how great they are at post processing.
Anybody who has experience with raw and JPEG straight from the camera knows the difference and the advantage of developing from raw on the computer.
As someone who just showed up here three days ago, you may not be aware of how much this dead horse has been beaten into the ground - half way to China. The same arguments over and over again ad nauseam.
The reason via the lens started this topic was to smoke out some other ideas about what makes a good image besides raw or JPEG processing.
Aren't there some other qualities we can talk about for a change?
The subject keeps coming up because people like to... (
show quote)
So I can take it that you will forego joining in the next time the subject comes up?
BlackRipleyDog wrote:
So I can take it that you will forego joining in the next time the subject comes up?
Depends on whether you get there first.
BlackRipleyDog wrote:
So I can take it that you will forego joining in the next time the subject comes up?
Is there an icon where someone is hitting their head against the wall??? How do we make a good image, what does it take, what can we share for learning purposes, how do we help others and ourselves grow and realize our dreams or potential in photography? What do we think about when developing, whatever file format or kind, and how do we visualize when we take photographs? How do we compost to get the best shot? What do we consider when we take photographs? Surely someone thinks of these things and wants to share....
If you want to reply, then
register here. Registration is free and your account is created instantly, so you can post right away.