Looking at the latest crop of advanced cameras from the big makers, festooned as they are with buttons, dials, and multi-coloured menus, I can't help but feel a certain pining for the good old days of unencumbered simplicity. Of course, I use the word, "unencumbered," purposefully here. When one considers the camera, one cannot lose sight of the goal: to produce excellent photos. In holding to this goal, we must ask, what factors need to be considered in the pursuit of that result? From the photographer's point of view, things like composition, framing, point of view, shooting angle, subject matter, and balance within the frame are omnipresent considerations. That is the art of photography. The science is really pretty simple, how to get the right amount of light into the camera in the right way to capture the desired image (not including gathering and focusing the light, which is the job of the lens, and is beyond the scope of this article).
There are essentially three ways to control the amount of light that enters a camera: 1) shutter speed; 2) aperture, and; 3) ISO sensitivity. If you're using a flash, add to this some options to control flash power, flash groups, etc., but it’s those first three variables that really count, controlling the amount of light that impacts the film or the sensor housed within. That’s it!
Accessing these essential controls on your camera should be as seamless and natural as operating a car. In fact, this is a good analogy given that we are dealing with essentially the same number of primary inputs: three. In the case of an automobile these are steering, braking and acceleration as provided by the steering wheel, brakes and accelerator. Like a camera, the car will have all manner of optional extras such as a radio or stereo system, air-conditioning and electronic windows that make it more desirable, but none of these are essential, and more importantly, none of them can in any way compromise access to steering, brakes and acceleration or the car will be an unmitigated failure.
Modern cameras come with extras that often make a luxury car seem under specked. GPS, electronic filters, face detection, and anti-shake facilities to name a few. But unlike a good car, it would seem that designers sometimes put so much emphasis on these “extras” that the essential controls, aperture, shutter speed and ISO, get submerged. When this happens, the camera becomes more difficult to control in day to day use, and begins to “get in the way of the photograph” as it were.
Perhaps camera designers need to start at the right place, with the essential inputs, and then add the extras. A number of years ago, I imagined a camera design with three prominent wheels, one for each of those essential controls. No need for a top mounted LCD panel, no need for a complicated menu system. Everything controlled from those three wheels. It really isn’t radical thinking, there already exist good examples from the past for this approach.
In the heyday of the single lens reflex camera, when film was still king, in the 1970s and 1980s, the aperture ring almost always fell naturally to hand no matter what the make or model, because it was where one would expect to find it, on the lens. The aperture is, after all, a function of the lens. The shutter speed dial was similarly well positioned, on the camera body, which contained the focal plane shutter, characteristic of the SLR type. The dial for this usually also included the ability to adjust ISO (ASA/DIN). Although the positioning of these inputs wasn't exactly the same on every camera, Olympus OM cameras for instance, placed the shutter speed dial on the camera body at the base of the lens rather than on the top plate, they were always easily accessible and obvious to the user. Once you became comfortable with your particular camera, changing shutter speed and aperture could be easily managed without even removing your eye from the viewfinder. A simple match needle light meter, inside the finder, ensured that your adjustments didn’t result in over or under-exposed images. In short, the designers were producing elegant tools that worked as intuitively as a good automobile. Today, such obvious placement of the primary inputs seems to be the exception rather than the rule.
Another thing that has changed over the years is the sense of value that one used to expect from something as personal as a camera. Nikon, Canon, Minolta, Pentax and Olympus, among others, all produced reliable metal bodied masterpieces that also felt solid. The same could be said for the lenses. Slapping down $500.00 for a good camera was never all that easy, but you always felt as if your hard earned money was being exchanged for something solid and lasting.
Today, while cameras are more advanced in terms of electronics, which are often intrinsically reliable, the camera bodies and lens barrels often feel cheap and toy like compared to their predecessors. This impression is furthered by the plethora of plastic buttons, and dials which may have only dubious relevance to the primary inputs described earlier. Most perplexing of all, while SLRs in the 1970s and 1980s were often mechanical masterpieces with hundreds of widgets, pins, springs, gears and oddly shaped stainless rods or arms held together by miniscule screws, the complete camera was often smaller than modern dSLRs whose internal workings are almost entirely electronic.
Consider the Nikon FM and FE, the Canon AE-1 and A-1, the Minolta SRT-201 and X-700, Pentax ME and MX. They were all solid representatives of an age when the camera was a truly valued acquisition. Also consider the Olympus OM-1 and OM-2, in my opinion, the pinnacle of design in single lens reflex cameras. If you have any doubt, find one in a used camera store and hold it for a few moments. Incomparable!
Fortunately, after years of plastic cameras, it looks as if the industry is beginning to learn. Fujifilm’s success with the Finepix X100 has certainly not gone unnoticed. Here we have a camera that in all but technology could have been created in 1978. Form, as a product of function, may be on its way back. Likewise Sony’s newly announced NX-7, and Samsung’s NEX-200 seem to be getting back to a more minimalist formula where solid build, access to basic inputs and compact design are once more being considered. I was especially pleased to see Sony adapt a dual control wheel design on the body of the NX-7 that suggests a more careful analysis of the camera as an extension of the photographer. Hopefully, there will be more of the same to follow from all of the major manufacturers.
In my opinion, big sensor, sturdy construction, simple controls, exceptional image quality, and compact form factor is the formula that makers should be leaning towards. Pentax was certainly on the right track with its K-3 and K-5 designs. Unfortunately, most cameras seem to offer only part of this formula in any one package. Walks through the local big box store, especially past the camera counter, fill me with dread. Picking up the latest consumer dSLRs or super zoom is a regular disappointment. Their incredibly light plastic designs, especially their featherweight lenses, scream disposable! It's not the impression one wants from any consumer device costing more than a couple hundred dollars, and it certainly wouldn't have sufficed for any of the serious brands of the past. Even many entry level SLRs in the 70's felt impressive. The K1000 from Pentax is a case in point. It was notoriously robust, a first choice for art school and photography students, and often used continuously for decades after. Surely this is the better approach, especially in an age when we are supposed to be more, rather than less, environmentally aware.
A good camera should function like an extension of the photographer. It should speak care in design and strength in execution. It should be a product that one keeps, not only because it works well, but because it has become a friend. Ultimately, I think this is what people want.
Saturday, September 3, 2011
Friday, June 10, 2011
Conformation or Creativity?
A few days ago I noticed that Darren Rowse’s Digital Photography School (DPS) was running its fifth annual Which Camera Do You Use reader survey. He called it a census, but I think survey is probably more accurate.
In any event, as someone who receives the DPS e-newsletter and occasionally visits their site, I was intrigued to note how quickly the the responses piled up – close to 3,000 after only two or three days. Scrolling down through the posts, it seemed pretty obvious that most of his readers were proud owners of Canon or Nikon cameras with the odd Pentax, Olympus, or Leica thrown in to keep things interesting.
I suppose this survey does little more than confirm what the marketing types have been telling us all along; Nikon and Canon pretty much run the dSLR show. Something else it suggests to me is just how much stock people put in their equipment, and this raises a few important questions.
First of all, isn’t photography, primarily, a creative pursuit? By that, I mean isn’t the point to explore visual possibilities? I may be the naive product of the Art School I attended as a young man, but I thought the point with most art forms, including visual arts such as photography, was to explore. Let’s not diverge into a debate on post-modernist versus modernist, or classical motivations. Exploration can favour the process or the product, and in both cases, should result in growth.
While exploring possibilities or results may not be the primary objective for photojournalists, or forensic photographers, even news photographers I’ve met will hunt for photos that offer more than a photocopier interpretation of the scene. In fact, truly good photojournalists regularly produce newsworthy photographs that not only record events, or tell a story, but also offer a compelling visual composition.
A creative photographer is someone who invests something of themselves in every image they take. These people are informed by their own aesthetic, their knowledge of composition and their experience. Whether the thought they put into their photographs is muscular and hard won, or essentially automatic and seemingly easy, the image is intentional and reflects the content of their artistic toolbox, or visual vocabulary. We are talking about art and craft, not mere reproduction. Each image is not only an interpretation of reality, if one can even say that, it is something special and unique. Certainly not a snapshot or a photocopy.
If we can agree that photography, like any other art form, is a creative endeavour at its core, we must learn to dispense with useless concepts like “professional” or “amateur” when our intent is to consider the art rather than its disbursement.
So what is the real value of the photograph? There can be many answers here. If you are a professional, or one who earns his or her living through their photography (which is all that term means), then the art’s ability to inspire a purchase may be front and centre. If you are an amateur, then you can enjoy the luxury of many more possibilities, any one of which can be paramount: Personal growth, process, technique, simply seeing the world in a new way…
Whatever reason, or reasons, you have for pursuing photography, one thing is almost guaranteed: the creative journey is ultimately a personal trip about you, and your unique relationship with the world around you.
Now, having briefly considered the art of photography, we find ourselves back at the beginning considering the camera survey at the DPS website; how is it that a question about a tool can be so much more popular than posts about technique, setting, or subject matter, and why will a creative endeavour like photography spawn so many passionate arguments about who is using the best camera? Yes, that will almost certainly happen at some point.
While artists should explore new tools to facilitate new craft, perhaps the emphasis should be placed on what each tool does differently rather than on which most closely matches a standard check list. A sculptor will use a broken chisel if it produces a more interesting line than its pristine companion sitting on the other side of the tool chest. When he or she picks up that chipped steel the reasoning isn’t based on technical advantage, but on creative possibility.
A photographer who is willing to use an old Brownie box camera because it gives voice to his inner vision is far more interesting, in the long run, than the guy who uses the 5DMKII because it won the review at ISO 6400.
Endless debates about the “best equipment” ignore the fact that depending on a photographer’s unique vision, the “worst camera” in the bunch, from a reviewer’s point of view, may produce the “best picture” in terms of the user’s photographic style.
Like people, every camera model will be different, each one offering its own unique qualities. In this way, considering the differences may be more valuable from a creative standpoint than looking at standards. What is it that you are trying to achieve visually?
One of the promising products to arise out of this debate is the camera phone. Take a look at Flickr’s camera finder to see just how they are growing in popularity. You may notice that the iPhone has even passed the best of breed from the biggest traditional camera manufacturers in terms of popularity on that site. Yet camera phones with their miniscule lenses and equally small sensors are unlikely to win a detail or noise test against a more traditional camera. So what’s the deal? The knee jerk reaction might be, it’s just convenience and hype, and there will almost certainly be some truth to both. Still, there are other possibilities...
While it is true that camera phones are almost always available and convenient, look at how many camera phone images utilize creative filters to achieve a retro look, unique colour cast, or grainy texture. Consider how the diminutive size of these units suggests, almost begs, for a more intimate composition - bringing the lens that much closer to the subject.
What we are seeing with camera phones are both traditional and non-traditional photographers picking up that strangely bent chisel because it offers an alternative that facilitates their creative side. We are seeing people think beyond the limits of the pixel-peepers and reviewers to achieve something they like.
Finally, out of a few phones comes the sense (the possibility) that photography is regaining its purpose; the joy of interpreting our own worlds. But for those who want to focus on the tool rather than the process, or the result, consider this: it might be more sensible to simply use a reliable photocopier and dispense with the camera altogether. The quality would certainly be predictable!
If my thoughts about the creative importance of photography are even close to the mark, then we might do well to celebrate our differences. Instead of finding satisfaction in the knowledge that some impressive percentage of us chose a particular model or brand, we should be heartened that there is still choice. Possibilities expand with choice, and variety stimulates creativity. In my estimation, creativity is the prize accorded free thinkers while conformity may just be a little less interesting.
In any event, as someone who receives the DPS e-newsletter and occasionally visits their site, I was intrigued to note how quickly the the responses piled up – close to 3,000 after only two or three days. Scrolling down through the posts, it seemed pretty obvious that most of his readers were proud owners of Canon or Nikon cameras with the odd Pentax, Olympus, or Leica thrown in to keep things interesting.
I suppose this survey does little more than confirm what the marketing types have been telling us all along; Nikon and Canon pretty much run the dSLR show. Something else it suggests to me is just how much stock people put in their equipment, and this raises a few important questions.
My family’s collection of photographic equipment has grown over the years.
Photo copyright Chris Wheeler, 2011
Photo copyright Chris Wheeler, 2011
First of all, isn’t photography, primarily, a creative pursuit? By that, I mean isn’t the point to explore visual possibilities? I may be the naive product of the Art School I attended as a young man, but I thought the point with most art forms, including visual arts such as photography, was to explore. Let’s not diverge into a debate on post-modernist versus modernist, or classical motivations. Exploration can favour the process or the product, and in both cases, should result in growth.
While exploring possibilities or results may not be the primary objective for photojournalists, or forensic photographers, even news photographers I’ve met will hunt for photos that offer more than a photocopier interpretation of the scene. In fact, truly good photojournalists regularly produce newsworthy photographs that not only record events, or tell a story, but also offer a compelling visual composition.
A creative photographer is someone who invests something of themselves in every image they take. These people are informed by their own aesthetic, their knowledge of composition and their experience. Whether the thought they put into their photographs is muscular and hard won, or essentially automatic and seemingly easy, the image is intentional and reflects the content of their artistic toolbox, or visual vocabulary. We are talking about art and craft, not mere reproduction. Each image is not only an interpretation of reality, if one can even say that, it is something special and unique. Certainly not a snapshot or a photocopy.
Some fun on the road results in a unique interpretation of the experience.
Photo Copyright Chris Wheeler 2011
Photo Copyright Chris Wheeler 2011
If we can agree that photography, like any other art form, is a creative endeavour at its core, we must learn to dispense with useless concepts like “professional” or “amateur” when our intent is to consider the art rather than its disbursement.
So what is the real value of the photograph? There can be many answers here. If you are a professional, or one who earns his or her living through their photography (which is all that term means), then the art’s ability to inspire a purchase may be front and centre. If you are an amateur, then you can enjoy the luxury of many more possibilities, any one of which can be paramount: Personal growth, process, technique, simply seeing the world in a new way…
Whatever reason, or reasons, you have for pursuing photography, one thing is almost guaranteed: the creative journey is ultimately a personal trip about you, and your unique relationship with the world around you.
Now, having briefly considered the art of photography, we find ourselves back at the beginning considering the camera survey at the DPS website; how is it that a question about a tool can be so much more popular than posts about technique, setting, or subject matter, and why will a creative endeavour like photography spawn so many passionate arguments about who is using the best camera? Yes, that will almost certainly happen at some point.
While artists should explore new tools to facilitate new craft, perhaps the emphasis should be placed on what each tool does differently rather than on which most closely matches a standard check list. A sculptor will use a broken chisel if it produces a more interesting line than its pristine companion sitting on the other side of the tool chest. When he or she picks up that chipped steel the reasoning isn’t based on technical advantage, but on creative possibility.
A photographer who is willing to use an old Brownie box camera because it gives voice to his inner vision is far more interesting, in the long run, than the guy who uses the 5DMKII because it won the review at ISO 6400.
Endless debates about the “best equipment” ignore the fact that depending on a photographer’s unique vision, the “worst camera” in the bunch, from a reviewer’s point of view, may produce the “best picture” in terms of the user’s photographic style.
Like people, every camera model will be different, each one offering its own unique qualities. In this way, considering the differences may be more valuable from a creative standpoint than looking at standards. What is it that you are trying to achieve visually?
One of the promising products to arise out of this debate is the camera phone. Take a look at Flickr’s camera finder to see just how they are growing in popularity. You may notice that the iPhone has even passed the best of breed from the biggest traditional camera manufacturers in terms of popularity on that site. Yet camera phones with their miniscule lenses and equally small sensors are unlikely to win a detail or noise test against a more traditional camera. So what’s the deal? The knee jerk reaction might be, it’s just convenience and hype, and there will almost certainly be some truth to both. Still, there are other possibilities...
While it is true that camera phones are almost always available and convenient, look at how many camera phone images utilize creative filters to achieve a retro look, unique colour cast, or grainy texture. Consider how the diminutive size of these units suggests, almost begs, for a more intimate composition - bringing the lens that much closer to the subject.
A unique point of view suggested by the small size of my Android phone resulted in this image processed with the Vignette camera app.
Photo copyright Chris Wheeler 2011
Photo copyright Chris Wheeler 2011
What we are seeing with camera phones are both traditional and non-traditional photographers picking up that strangely bent chisel because it offers an alternative that facilitates their creative side. We are seeing people think beyond the limits of the pixel-peepers and reviewers to achieve something they like.
Finally, out of a few phones comes the sense (the possibility) that photography is regaining its purpose; the joy of interpreting our own worlds. But for those who want to focus on the tool rather than the process, or the result, consider this: it might be more sensible to simply use a reliable photocopier and dispense with the camera altogether. The quality would certainly be predictable!
If my thoughts about the creative importance of photography are even close to the mark, then we might do well to celebrate our differences. Instead of finding satisfaction in the knowledge that some impressive percentage of us chose a particular model or brand, we should be heartened that there is still choice. Possibilities expand with choice, and variety stimulates creativity. In my estimation, creativity is the prize accorded free thinkers while conformity may just be a little less interesting.
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