Unreported Equipment

[spohn]

It might be my imagination, but I seem to be seeing more and more

photos with "unknown" for equipment. Is anyone else noticing this?

If so, I wonder if it's just a question of folks not wanting to

bother filling out the info, or if they have a reason for not

wanting to share what equipment they used? Not a big deal in my

book, just curious...

 

- Al

[eric friedemann]

Its your imagination.<div></div>

[lex_jenkins]

I used to list my equipment but when I switched from Canon FD to Nikon AI/AIS as my primary gear I didn't bother to reenter the new stuff. Too much hassle.

 

Where it seems interesting or appropriate I'll enter information about the gear, processing and printing. But I don't bother using photo.net's ready-made forms now.

[markci]

I had a bunch of equipment entered. But I deleted my photos, planning to upload some new ones, and somebody came along and deleted my equipment because it wasn't associated with an active photo. So if I upload photos again, they will certainly say "unknown."

 

And frankly, who cares. Equipment doesn't make photos.

[__piotr_e_recht]

I'd list my equipment, but the rightful owner might recognize it.

[wilsontsoi]

I used to, or at least my older images still have the equipment information in the proper box, but I stopped the practice shortly after PN started displaying "camera" along with "photographer" and "title." The reason is that I do not want the equipment to have any bearing in viewers' initial response to my images, and just focus on the images themselves. I don't want viewers (at least for my images,) to pre-determine that an image taken with a Nikon F5 will be better (in an overall sense,) than one taken with a Canon Elan IINE, or that an image from a Canon 20D is for sure going to be better than one from a Fuji S7000, etc. I do still provide equipment and shooting, or manipulation details in the, "Tech Detail" tab as I realize one can learn something from the information. It's an extra step to click the "Tech Detail," but I feel it's better than having the camera name tagged to the image title under the photo.

[emre]

I am also thinking of not mentioning my equipment in the future. People get fixated on it.

[goemon]

Well, not that I have a lot of pictures uploaded, but I can rarely remember exactly what I

was doing for any given photo unless it's obvious. I can tell the difference between my

two 6x6 cameras because my SLR covers a slightly smaller image, but does it really

matter? I don't go to any particular effort to remember exposure settings, either.

[spohn]

Eric, nice photo! Thanks for the feedback in general, too. I suspected some of the rationales listed here were afoot. Again, for me it just represents an additional learning opportunity on occassion, but again, certainly not a hill to die on. I guess I can't honestly say for sure that it has no effect on what I think of a photo, although I would hope such is the case. I like the idea of burying the details in the tech description so the viewer doesn't process the equipment info on the first pass.

 

As far as the "who cares?" argument goes, that's fine - but to assume that everyone's interest in photography lives and dies exclusively with the impact of the final image is completely unrealistic (but it resonates well in the ivory tower.) That doesn't mean everyone should feel compelled to yield tech details for the sake of the gadget freaks, but I don't think anyone should be mortified that someone is interested in the technical background of a photo. Being a gadget freak and having an aesthetic sensibility are not necessarily mutually exclusive.

[albertdarmali]

Believe it or not, but some people's perception is biased toward equipment/camera used... I reckon it's better to leave it blank, and if someone is interested enough in what equipment you use (or any other tech details), they will/can send query about it.

 

Well, but in my case, I simply don't state my equipment because I only have crappy ones, it's embarassing. :)

 

Albert.

[wilsontsoi]

Darmali, that's a perfect set up, you know. Just let the images speak for themselves. Yours certainly do. I'd rather have people pass judgement on the image itself instead of the equipment used. FWIW, here are <a href="http://www.photo.net/photodb/presentation.tcl?presentation_id=273209">some underdog images,</a> and here are the

<a href="http://www.photo.net/photodb/presentation.tcl?presentation_id=273356">others.</a>

[louis1]

Using the web brings several problems

 

Colour management

Size of image

Monitor resolution

etc.

 

These tend to make the kit used to capture an image irrelevant unless of course it is very

specialised.

[yrj__v__n_nen]

Agree with Louis. I was challenged once about this topic (<a href="http://www.photo.net/photo/2708076">link</a>).

For internet display purposes, I don't think that this is an issue.

[spohn]

Alberts of the world, unite! :-) Mr. Darmali, I must say, you certainly make the most of your "crappy" equipment! Very nice portfolio. My situation is the opposite - my photos are crappy, but I want to at least be given credit from dropping $$ on my D70 and M6 :-)

 

Seriously, the fact that we're looking at web photos that are by definition severely degraded is a good point. But I still maintain there are situations where knowing the equipment can be useful information. But that's the call the poster has to make - I wouldn't dream of ever making equipment information a required field. I think it should ideally be something you have to dig for when the mood strikes you.

[albertdarmali]

Wilson,

 

Thanks for the link. Very nice pictures indeed.

 

About having crappy equipments, the (only) good thing is you will learn more as you are being forced to make the most out of your limited equipment (sort of learning the hard way)... :)

 

 

Albert.