Marc, how many of the greats are known for the 'look' of the equipment they use rather than the content and the way they use them? (honest question)
It's a point I've been musing about for the past few weeks after the end of year exhibition from my art students. So much incredible and diverse work, all 8X12" prints, 90% shot on p&s's or on my lent 5Dc + 50mm lens set at f5.6. I was sitting at the display at the end of the evening when a couple of students from a nearby college walked by. They stopped to look and I overheard a muttered comment about two of the displays 'if I had a better camera..'. I really enjoyed walking over and telling them that the photographs were taken on p&s's, one of which had been set to 3 megapixel mode to make the pictures faster to load up to facebook! That sent them off red faced.
I honestly want to believe, as an artist, that the differences in nuance which most other photographers cannot see nevermind the viewing public, can only be a personal need and not a necessity for producing the art.
Good question Ben, and one that goes to the heart of many of these technical discussions or debates.
My mentor was/is a very successful fashion/lifestyle photographer in mega competitive NYC who initially infected me with an interest in exploring the array of interesting optics and photographic tools available to photographers as part of the look and feel imparted on a photographic artist's vision.
The camera/media was of secondary importance, being just the box to hold the optics. His gear vault was amazing ... all sorts of exotic lenses , mostly Contax and Leica and a few obscure optical delights. Some of it was beyond me, but his talent and skill was unquestioned, as were his results.
He was not a gear snob, and the proof of that came when he chose a 6 meg P&S to shoot a major campaign for international client because it fit his concept and vision for the imagery. BTW, he showed me huge prints from that shoot :shocked: So, size wasn't the criteria, it was the look and feel as part of the idea ... which is why I use those terms a lot in these discussions.
The last point being the most important distinction in relation to some of these debates. Concept, vision, content first, selection of executional tools to follow. NOT pick the tool and force the concept, vision, or content to it.
So, for example, I would not even consider telling an artist like wild-life photographer Doug Herr that his choice of a Leica DMR and the exotic
manual focus Leica Teles he uses ... fraught with all sorts of impediments compared to most any modern DSLR, is technically archaic and there are better tools. That would be techno-snobbery fruitlessly arguing against obvious personal creative results.
I wouldn't think to brow-beat my friend Irakly for his death grip on his long discontinued Contax 645 system and need for expensive DB to shoot digitally ... hard to argue against his use of those Zeiss/Contax optics for some of the work he does. If he eventually changes that out, it'll be for a Leica S2/3/4 ... because of the lenses.
I could subjectively cite 100 such examples, including famous shooters, who bucked or are bucking the homogenization of our tools, and exalt diversity of choice, some very subtile but important to their look and feel. Conversely, I also feel some if not many have stepped backward into a more technologically homogeneous grey area that has lessened their rendering of a personal vision ... just as they were getting it down pat.
So IMO, personal need for a specific look and feel IS part of the art.
BTW, I don't think the differences are all that subtile in terms of how an idea or some content is rendered ... and that people can't tell the difference is at best an indictment of how we have come to evaluate those differences, at worse an indication of the slow but steady homogenization of photographic art ... that does more to hide a vision than to bring it to the forefront.
Of course, if you don't have a personal vision or aren't working on one, then it is all a moot point
-Marc
BTW, I think you are doing the right thing with your students :thumbs: ... teach them about ideas, content and craft ... focus on building that vision ... then they can make more informed decisions as to personalizing it with the tools they choose to use ... be it a P&S, an IQ180 on an ALPA, or anything in between.