What one lover of photography wishes photographers understood.

78fivealive · 4 months

As submitter of the other thread, I really hope I didn't come across as just bitching.

You are entirely correct.

We are the proxy for everyone who could not be there.

icanjusttypeanythi · 4 months

It's the same for us as well.

icanjusttypeanythi · 4 months

There is nothing wrong with that! The Facebook route is totally fine. your experience with the pro didn't invalidate your idea, it's all good.

I just think many of us can provide another service, to more beautifully document a wedding. I think I want to reach out to couples who see both options as equal, or are incapable of seeing that they can even compliment each other.

icanjusttypeanythi · 4 months

I am a full time photojournalist. 40 hours a week. Every week. I have been for some years now.

I shoot weddings on Saturdays to supplement my income and support my people.

icanjusttypeanythi · 4 months

I think it's important to ask oneself "did it look like this when I was there?"

Sometimes we can tweak a photograph into something unrecognizable to those who were there, making the light more beautiful, making the shadows richer. I can't underexpose to silhouette a speaker if their side was not a shadow. We forget this because we want our photos to be pretty.

You will know when you go too far.

Removing dust specks and removing unnecessary vignetting to better preserve the scene, however, can be totally acceptable.

icanjusttypeanythi · 4 months

There existed a Kodak/Nikon hybrid camera available to PJ's in the late 90's when I was in college.

I think it was less than 1 megapixel, had terrible color reproduction, horrible grain at ISO400 and above, and you could lease one for a couple grand a month.

We've come a wonderful, wonderful long way.

That said: the D1x can still do some amazing shit.

icanjusttypeanythi · 4 months

Not at all. You are NOT fucked.

Here is exactly what you do:

Learn how to take excellent photos.
Learn how to write excellent articles.
Learn how to shoot excellent video.
Learn how to record excellent audio.
Learn how to edit excellent multimedia pieces.
Learn how to code CSS/HTML from nothing if necessary.
Learn how to set up and transmit any file via FTP.

You will be okay. You will be MORE than okay.

It is specialization that is fucked.

icanjusttypeanythi · 4 months

Honestly I'd say more about that but I'm rather afraid to.

Pre-press #1 would love RAW. Pre-press #2-12 sees it as a pain in the ass to format photos at all.

That's ...unfortunately all I can say about that. :/

icanjusttypeanythi · 4 months

I admit, it is tricky to point to a threshold of manipulation and say "there, see, that's too much" because the gradient of change is large and cruelly smooth. Someone mentioned a well-repeated photodesk rule "if you can't do it in the darkroom, you can't do it on the computer." And that's silly because of course we can do lots of crazy things in the darkroom.

Instead: an easier rule would be "did it look like this?"

The most important thing we do is recording that which happens.

Would a person present recognize this as an accurate depiction of what happened? Or has the art surpassed the record, rendering a scene beautiful and alien?

We have to admit to ourselves "the light was not this beautiful" and drag the slider back.

2.Not at all. I certainly got help acquiring my equipment, too. But we have to admit the advantages we have. We have to recognize them. It is important to recognize them. It keeps us from being assholes :)

icanjusttypeanythi · 4 months

We all do it! Even photographers. Press-pass photo day is the worst day of the year.

Next to election day, anyhow.

icanjusttypeanythi · 4 months

Your experiences are sadly not uncommon but I can tell you there are a hell of a lot of us that do things the right way. There are a lot of photographers, right around this city, who would help each other out in a heartbeat if we needed it. Truly great people.

We counsel the couple first and foremost: "do you have a style of photography in mind?" This is weeks before the engagement shots that we ask this question. If they aren't familiar with styles, we show them. If they want to try something different, we take safety shots anyway, just in case.

And we never, ever, shoot alone.

My worst nightmare is the perfect missed shot. I gladly pay a second shooter, not an assistant, mind you- a second shooter, every bit as experienced as I am, to double cover every moment. Missing things happens. But if you have a partner, you can dramatically reduce them.

Also: panicky flower girls and ring bearers are the standard, not the norm.

I can't criticize the photographer if I didn't see what happened, but it is common sense to prepare for that.

There is, however, no excuse for missing the first dance.

icanjusttypeanythi · 4 months

I always include a release form and a .pdf of the release form on the jump drive of all the edited photos. I point them in the direction of an excellent printer, but wherever they take their photos (WalMart, Sam's Club and the like) can always find it right away.

icanjusttypeanythi · 4 months

I agree with you.

And I am rather embarrassed to say I have quite a few of those kinds of photos showcased on my site. For one reason: that's the kind of photo for which the client asked. They google "cool wedding foto", hit image search, and point up at my screen saying "I want THAT. Do THAT for me."

I'm not going to tell them they have bad taste, I'm just going to shoot it the best I can for them- make it pretty.

Doesn't mean I'm going to like it after, of course.

icanjusttypeanythi · 4 months

That's true. But I don't think I could do that to the couple.

There is no doubt I lose money giving them all the images and allowing copies. But it is the right thing to do, and much easier on me and my shooting partner. If they want me to put together a really beautiful album, I'll be more than happy to- but I'm more of a photographer than a salesman- I don't push upsells.

Maybe it just comes from shooting for newspapers all these years, but once I shoot the photos, they are yours. Not mine. The really nice ones will go on my site to help sell future stuff, I might give the florist and the cake artsts copies of files showcasing their work for their site, but apart from that the couples can take them and do as they please.

icanjusttypeanythi · 4 months

None- these are all things that could be done with darkroom techniques as well.

And, similarly, we weren't allowed to do those things either (except filters, which were necessary for decent contrast.)

The most we were allowed to do to manipulate an image is push-process and crop. Those were the rules. Dodging, burning, vignetting, stretching- all forbidden at the newspapers where I worked a film camera.

icanjusttypeanythi · 4 months

That's entirely fair.

I want to show people how much better than that we can be. The photos belong to the bride and groom after, so they can post them to Facebook if they'd like, or copy them on thumbdrives to give to their parents or friends, it's all good- whatever they like. We even help them out if they don't know how.

But they're getting really, really nice photos.

It tickles me to find somebody using one of our photos as their Facebook profile photo and they weren't even the bride or groom. Or comments like "Jesus Christ... This is the best photo that's ever been taken of me... Where did you find these guys??"

We can make a wedding as beautiful as they wanted it to be.

True: not everyone wants this service. Changing markets change- not much I can do about that.

But I can advocate for The Photographers.

icanjusttypeanythi · 4 months

I don't do this. For weddings, it's a flat rate.

It is much easier to work with people. They get all the photos and the edits, I get the comfort that comes from telling people snapping away at formals "you don't need to do that, you can have all the photos we take for no additional charge at all, just ask the bride and groom later!"

icanjusttypeanythi · 4 months

No.

But illustrating the words in an ancient, flourished calligraphy makes it more impressive, I'd say.

Don't get me wrong, it's not about artsy- it's about the sum of one's talents.

icanjusttypeanythi · 4 months

That is fair.

Let me put it another way: I envy their skill. I am impressed at the amount of work necessary to reach their level of talent and the distance between their level of skill and my own created by that body of work.

I can distill the whole of my experience into a few months of study.

It embarrasses me when I attempt to see us both as artists on equal footing because I think I am ashamed it took me years to get here.

Comparatively, photography is easy.

Ambrose Bierce always haunted me on this one:

PHOTOGRAPH, n. "A picture painted by the sun without instruction in art."

icanjusttypeanythi · 4 months

I do not know how to make editors see the value of documentation anymore.

They ask for smaller files to accommodate pre-press and don't care about archiving the raw files. And yet they study over a microfiche machine daily to find a glimpse of the past to share.

icanjusttypeanythi · 4 months

I think we agree.

It's what I see when I think of the future of photojournalism that frightens me.

I try to explain it like this: There was a very prescient moment in, of all goddamn movies, Star Trek Generations. I think it was Generations. It's the one with both Kirk and Picard. Anyway, at the beginning of the movie, Kirk is on the bridge with Ferris Bueller's friend and a bunch of journalists lean in to ask him some questions.

Right in the middle of all that, for just a second or so, you see what they thought a future photojournalist would look like: a guy wearing a camera on his head with a filter over one eye to compose the frame.

And the headset with his camera is kinda small, right? So it's really just this dude's face.

Staring.

Unblinkingly staring ahead at his subject.

That scene scared the shit out of me.

Imagine a bank of sports photographers at some future game, say.. basketball. What would that look like if the headset theory was correct? Just a line of assholes sitting on the floor of the court staring up at the players with Village of the Damned looks on their faces. They don't really require skill or talent, just a flexible neck and a spot on the top of their skulls.

The eventuality of professional equipment being available to everyone doesn't frighten me.

Irrelevancy does.

icanjusttypeanythi

TROPHY CASE

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