Fleeting Glimpse Images : Visions in words ~ Sagas in light: Opinions and Musings

Blogging in Person

Fri, 18 Apr 2008 15:21:56 GMT

The Blog has hit the fans!

In this blog, I have covered photography, image editing software, presenting and a host of other topics. It is rare that I write on the phenomenon of blogging itself. I know little of blogging save my own experience and the scant absorption of infrequent visits to other blogs.

Bloggers have an intrinsic advantage when it comes to spouting opinions, pontificating authoritatively and creating an environment in which they are a respected and acknowledged as a legitimate voice in their arena of the blog-o-sphere. That advantage lies in the relative obscurity of the individual on the Internet and the quasi-anonymity offered by the nature of the blogging medium.

Taking it to the Streets!
Rikk Flohr on a Digital Photography Tour in Costa Rica
Photo Credit: Nicole Flohr

Some bloggers are very much like the people who shout (or shout down) opinions from the darkened recesses in the back of auditoriums. It is relatively easy to sit in the comfort of your home and attempt to influence the masses. It is harder to get off of your chair, leave your house and to out and meet the people who comprise the intended audience of your writing. Ultimately, it is far more rewarding.

I have taken this to heart. My blogging began in 2004 as a means to explore my writing, deal with grief, and connect with the kind of people who shared my interests, beliefs and needs. As my blog evolved, I found it to be a forum to share my knowledge, challenge my peers, and explore my worth as an mentor in a variety of fields. As my confidence grew through my blogging and other online activities, I found myself wanting to actually meet the kind of people with whom I have interacted online.

"There's no substitute for
'pressing of the flesh'."

Fast forward to 2008. My evenings are now full of meetings and sessions where I attend, offer opinions and conduct classes. Last night, I spent my evening with the wonderful folks at the Crosstown Camera Club teaching the basics of Waterfall Photography. As I gave my presentation, I found that I felt like I was blogging-in person-only better! This makes me wonder-is blogging really something new? Or, did it take the place of something valuable societal interaction? Or, in the right hands-administered properly, does blogging augment personal interaction?

Like purveyors of many disciplines, bloggers come from different camps. Some grew into prominence through their blog and others were in prominence and decided to blog as well. I am neither.

"There is no substitute for 'pressing the flesh'", Rick Altman of PowerPoint Live maintains. It is one of the reasons his conferences are so successful. A closer-knit community forms from the proximity and interaction that is inimitable in a virtual community. Shaking hands and connecting with people enhances the messages you share and the passion you seek to invoke.

Blogging was originally a way to express myself and work through my internal issues. It is now become a way of giving back by sharing my expertise in photography, image editing, computer use, and what little I have gleaned from life's lessons by living. I try to live my blog now and only report on it here.

Teaching Digital Photography?

Wed, 16 Apr 2008 20:53:08 GMT

I had the opportunity for epiphany today. That is a rare enough occurrence in and of itself. A phone call with a speaker coordinator prompted me to take a walk down semantics lane toward a destination I didn't expect.

The speaker: Do you teach Digital Photography?

Me: Yes, I do.

Inner Me: That was a dumb answer! You don't teach Digital Photography, you teach Photography, period.

Then the speaker asked: Do you teach Photoshop?

Here, I was on my toes. "I teach Image Editing in a variety of software packages." Then, I sought in vain to quickly name them. She didn't want to hear me. I taught Photoshop and Digital Photography and that was enough for her. I really teach Photography and Image Editing .

The mechanics of technique and the subtle art of photography are not altered dramatically by the media in which I shoot. There are subtle nuances to be considered but composition, exposure, color choice, and all the other things that go into making a good photograph are pretty much independent of the camera's method of capturing light.

The same is true of Image Editing software. The theory and practice of enhancing an image once it is converted (by camera or by scan) to digital is pretty much the same - no matter which software package you choose. They all, pretty much, crop, adjust contrast and color. Each package may get there a little differently but the general idea is the same.

When we reduce photography to 'digital photography' and the 'other' we box ourselves in. When people ask if I am professional photographer, I don't correct them and say: "Yes, a professional digital photographer." I simply say, "Yes." I create images captured in essence from the world around me. I happen to do this digitally but they rarely ask how I do it - only that I do it and that I get paid for it.

The same thing happens with software. "Can I just photoshop out those telephone lines?" my student will ask.

I reply. "Yes, if you have Photoshop. If you don't you can do it in Paint Shop Pro, Photo Paint, Elements, and any other program which might be lurking on your hard drive. Me, I would do it in Corel PhotoPaint - because I am a professional (I get paid) and time is money. But I can teach the student how in the varied editors I have installed on my computers. That is my job. I teach Image Editing.

Now blow your nose with a kleenex while I go make a xerox. (Note how they are all small letters when used as a verb or a noun and not a trademarked name of a corporation.)

I teach Photography and Image Editing. (Digitally-for the most part.)

The Memory Divide

Tue, 25 Mar 2008 20:03:58 GMT

A call from my sister-in-law last night and a simple request got me to thinking about the wet-digital interface and how it is gradually creating a divide in our memories. My in-laws will be celebrating 50 years of wedded bliss this June with a modest party and a minor family reunion.

It seems like only yesterday I was laying out their 40th invitation in CorelDraw 8, or was it 7? I still have the file and Version X4 (14 for those of us Roman Numerally-challenged) will still open it across the immense gulf of time of 10 years. On this invitation is a scan I did of their original wedding photograph taken in the late 50s.

It is a stroke of fortune that I am able to open the file. Had it been but a scant few versions older, I would have been stuck installing an intermediate version of the software for the purpose of translating the older data. This is of course providing I could find the disks, the serial number and had a computer capable of reading the ancient media.

"…vast amounts of our sweat and toil are accessible only at the whim of backwards compatibility and engineering deadlines…"

Those paper pictures, stored lovingly in a dark cool place, survived remarkably well. I was able to take decades old photographs and reproduce them for the upcoming slide show, invitation and other purposes.

Negatives and prints, if properly stored will last decades. How many file formats are so resilient? In the dawn of my computing experience PCX emerged as a stalwart of image files. I haven't seen one in years.

My first Digital Camera came with proprietary software to read the file format that was nothing like I have ever seen. I still have the disk vintage 1997, the same year as the Draw file above, although none of my new computers purchased in the last three years have a floppy drive to read it.

Now the photograph is 50 years old, the file 10 years old and the floppy disk 10 years old. The photo was a slam dunk. I can use it. The file-just barely. The disk, well, I suppose I could find a floppy disk drive and install it and hope it can still read this 10 year old 2MB, that's right 2 MB Type 1 Compact Flash Card.

Let's fast forward ten more years. How many of my digital files will be readable then? The analog box of photographs is more cumbersome to work with but the principle upon which it is founded (the reflection of light) is stalwart and robust enough to last until we evolve past eyes. My first digital photographs have already evaporated.

Memories must be preserved generationally to further the advancement of our society. How much of the digital work we create will survive for our children's children to reap. Vast amounts of our sweat and toil are accessible only at the whim of backwards compatibility and engineering deadlines. What if the recipe for Ice exists in WordPerfect 4.1 and the latest version of MS Word refuses to read it. Are we doomed to warm soft drinks forever.

We are in danger of creating a Memory Divide between the analog and digital worlds. The latter will be much easier to use and contain vast amounts of data at our finger tips but the former is just a little more likely (today at least) to survive into the future.

"How come there are pictures of Grandpa but none of Dad?" the toddler asks.

"Dad's pictures were digital," comes the wistful reply.

"Oh."

Software is not Absolution for the Sin of Poor Technique

Tue, 18 Mar 2008 14:35:14 GMT

Recently, I was made painfully aware of the the mentality of sloppiness that exists among the current work habits of many of today's Digital Photographers. I find this trend both distressing and comforting. It is distressing because of the general lowering of the standards of quality and comforting because I know I can compete against it by exemplifying excellence in my own work.

Digital photographers are both born and made but not in the traditional sense. There are those who were incubated in the womb of film and transparency and then traversed the birth canal of digital capture to emerge in modern day imaging. Then there are those who arrived in the realm of image capture without paying the price of study and technique in the previous incarnation of photography. They entered imaging directly through the advent of the digital camera.

"That's ok. I'll fix it later."

Two camps have staked out territory in this vast land called Imaging and placed their emphasis upon different areas of the imaging process. The two camps are divided into those who are about the capture and those who are about the enhancement with both espousing the position of the final product as being the standard by which they should be judged. Both raise good points as to their admonitions that their way is the right. Both miss the boat on some other points.

Capture aficionados tend to view the camera as an extension of their creative self. It is the brush in their hands that they put to canvas. Enhancement proponents view the computer, and by extension, the image editing software as an extension of their creative self. It is the chisel to which they put to stone. My conversations with folks from both camps lead me to realize that they each regard portions of the process as necessary evils. The Capture crowd tends to view the computer and software as a necessary evil to release their imprisoned image to paper. The Enhancement crowd tends to regard the camera as the necessary evil, providing them with a raw image on which they can work their creative vision. It is the difference between toiling to grow the grain for harvest and grinding the harvest for bread. Both the farmer and the miller are necessary to the loaf but neither regards the other as equal.

My fear in this is that many more people tend toward competency in the editing side of the process rather than the capture side. It is natural for an industry movement to gravitate towards the growing critical mass. One only has to compare the photography publications of today with those of twenty years ago to see evidence of the trend. Any issue of a photography magazine today will have detailed articles on software and technique. Software gurus are writing books on digital photography. In the past, chemicals, paper and enlargers never enjoyed the page count which software enjoys today.

The danger in all this is that the intoxicating lure of quick fix image editing is going to lull those firing the shutter into a haphazard complacency with regard to technique. As I pointed out in my article on Level Shooting, the simple technique of holding a camera level produces a superior image. Certainly, I can repair the unlevel image in software but I will have a much better image that will produce a higher quality enlargement if I capture right in the first place.

"When randomness through repetition yields the acceptable image why bother with technique?"

What of exposure, color balance, composition, or sharpness? All of these things can be repaired in software if you are presented with a deficient image. One of the antecedents of deficient images is sloppy technique. Essentially, in most cases, using software to fix images means we are correcting sloppy technique.

The other side of the slippery slope of sloppiness is the ease and lack of expense of shooting lots of pictures. I shoot lots of pictures-because I can-because I must sometimes to ensure I get the shot. The danger is in thinking that taking lots of images will make up for poor technique. Dilution of skill spread across multiple chance cheapens the capture process. We value the technique less if we can use randomness to mitigate capture difficulties. We are accustomed to throwing away large numbers of captures in the name of that pristine capture never realizing that with better technique we might have two exceptional images from which to choose instead of one.

Despite my tone, I am in favor of robust image software and taking many photos. However, I am even more in favor of using impeccable technique in acquiring these captures so that the time and effort spent in software is much less and that attention can be given to enhancing rather than repairing.

If you choose to be a proponent of Software Repair and Blast and Pray capture, I think I can compete favorably against this.