On 7/18/2011 2:49 PM, Brian Swale wrote:
> I'm wondering if the current emphasis on fine detail
Whose emphasis?
> is somewhat passé
To whom?
These issues have been discussed to death since very early in the history of
photography. Early art photography was
dominated by the Pictorialists, whose work was generally at least soft, often
dreamily so, at least in part in response
to artistic criticism of photography as an unartistic technology, far inferior
to painting. Starting in the 1920s, a
group of photographers, including some reforming pictorialists, formed Group
f/64 around a whole different aesthetic,
embracing the inherent ability of photography to create images with more
sharpness and detail than painting as an asset
to be used in service of their art.
Personally, I find much Pictorialist work less than engaging, and some
riveting. Although I tend to like much f/64 style
work, much of it is just sharp photographs, with no content that engages me.
And it's been back and forth ever since. It seems to me that some subjects and
artistic intents are best served by very
soft technique, others by biting sharpness - and everything between. There is
plenty of room for the APO lenses and for
Lens Babies. Why would one want to limit what one views and what one creates to
one sort of image?
Much of my own photography, especially of natural scenes, flowers, etc., tends
to be sharp. I enjoy nailing an
exquisitely sharp, clear rendition of a tiny flower, bug and so on. Still, I've
posted a whole gallery of shots in fog
<http://galleries.moosemystic.net/MooseFoto/index.php?gallery=Travel/Maine/Inside%20Maine%20Clouds>
an image of a ghost <http://www.moosemystic.net/Gallery/MPhotos/Home/Ghost.htm>
impressionist flowers
<http://galleries.moosemystic.net/MooseFoto/index.php?gallery=Travel/NorthEast_2010/Coastal%20Maine/Mt_Desert_and_Acadia/Miscellaneous&image=_MG_1250crstex.jpg>
soft land/waterscapes
<http://galleries.moosemystic.net/MooseFoto/index.php?gallery=Travel/NorthEast_2010/Coastal%20Maine/Mt_Desert_and_Acadia/Cadillac_Mountain&image=_MG_1146cr.jpg>
shadows on a 'screen'
<http://galleries.moosemystic.net/MooseFoto/index.php?gallery=Travel/NorthEast_2010/Coastal%20Maine/Mt_Desert_and_Acadia/Miscellaneous&image=_MG_1641rotcr.jpg>
heavy rain and wind on a marsh
<http://galleries.moosemystic.net/MooseFoto/index.php?gallery=Travel/NorthEast_2010/Coastal%20Maine/Mt_Desert_and_Acadia/Miscellaneous&image=_MG_1136.jpg>
and so on. I think the style or technique should match the photographer's
vision of the subject, not some external idea
of what's au courant or passé.
> See this one from the cvug (Cosina Voigtlander User Group)
>
> here<http://www.dlkphotography.com/displayimage.php?album=25&pos=0>
Sure, that's a nice image, but is that because it's soft? Might it be simply
because it's a good subject and composition
that would be good in any of several photographic styles?
Is it soft? Shot with Leica M9 and 75mm Heliar, the original out of the camera
was probably pretty sharp, except for the
kid behind the screen and the OOF right foreground objects. Looks to me from
the perspective like it's full frame, or
pretty close to it, so the prominent grain is almost certainly added in
processing. There are signs too of
'overprocessing', probably intentional, as they are present in other of his
images, like the bright left edge of the
girls' face. Like the bright halo along the right side of the guy in image #3,
that's usually from USM, Shadow/Highlight
or some such tool.
Looks to me like he nailed focus on the girl with a sharp lens on a high
resolution camera, then did extensive
processing to get his signature look that mixes elements of sharpness and
softness, high and low contrast.
Look at image #3. I appears he may be using post processing to emulate on his
new, digital Leica the effects he got with
his older film Leica and Tri-X. Image #4 shows the noise level of the M9 at ISO
1600. There's no way any of the
grain/noise at ISO 400 in #1 is anything but artificially added. It also looks
to me like he must have done his own,
custom film processing or post scanning work to get the sort of contrast and
grain in #3..
I've nothing against all this. I'm just pointing out that what you see there
isn't simply softness, but a carefully
crafted 'look'. I'll bet a straight, well done B&W version with no added grain
would be excellent, as well, probably
better to my taste.
Soft Fuzzy Moose
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