The End is Near - Beckerman Goes Digital

[._._z]

And Vic's wrong again....

[claudia__]

well, HCB didn't miss the decisive moment because his battery died. i amuse myself by picturing the SPs out there with their huge lenses finding their battery dead and then going home to find a power outage. the comparison between the current crop of digital guys and the old manual guys is wishful thinking. and you don't have to be a leica fascist to see the irony.

 

also, i am detecting that the guys who have to spend so much time in front of the 'puter to produce their images tend to render the subjects of their photos as objects instead of real fleshy people. just an observation.

 

when i look at the older SPs work i see more connection with the subject, more psychological connection. less scientific observation as if the subject were an insect.

[Spearhead]

<i>images tend to render the subjects of their photos as objects instead of real fleshy people.</i><p>

 

This has been especially problematic for me with mannequins.

[Brad_]

<I>well, HCB didn't miss the decisive moment because his battery died. </I><P>

 

More likely from loading a new roll of film, or reaching in his pocket and not finding

one...<P><P><P>

 

 

<I> also, i am detecting that the guys who have to spend so much time in front of the

'puter to produce their images tend to render the subjects of their photos as objects

instead of real fleshy people.</I><P>

 

Nothing wrong with that if it's your vision. Imagine if everyone's work today, 50 years

later, looking just like HCB's. No thank you...

[ray .]

What have you got against insects?

[ray .]

Huh, I always thought the people in my photos were fleshier than yours Brad... :P

[Brad_]

Bigger butts?

[boris_chan1]

Quiche: "when i look at the older SPs work i see more

connection with the subject, more psychological connection........"

 

You see that in the work of HCB? Regardless of the quality of his

images it's difficult to imagine a more detached photographer.

As you seem to live in Taliban territory I'll put it down to your veil

obscuring the view.

[claudia__]

i think some less twitchy and reactive readers might be mulling over what i said so i am happy. guess i hit a couple of nerves.

[ray .]

Well, it's a novel critique of digital, I'll say that.

 

No Brad, yours are fleshier I think. Amazing you could do it with your cam.

[boris_chan1]

Quiche, I'll ask again. Do you think that HCB made an unusually

close connection with his subjects?

[._._z]

<i><blockquote> well, HCB didn't miss the decisive moment because his battery died.

</blockquote> </i><p>

 

In later years, Cartier-Bresson used a Leica point-and-shoot. One powered by batteries.

<p>

 

Next.

[thomas_sullivan]

I just looked at his site for the first time in over 2 years.........the use of digital didn't help him a bit. I seriously don't understand the facsination some people have with this Beckerman photographer. He's very, very bland with the images he shows. His composition does nothing to enhance the feel of the pic, sometimes it's even counter to the natural flow. That new digital pic of someone walking through man hole steam........almost makes a decent street shot, but his comp on it absolutely destroys the flow. I could go on, but he is just not that "exciting" a photographer............IMHO.

 

As for the rest of the discussion above...........it is NOT the equipment, it is the photographer that makes the difference. Actually, Beckerman is a perfect example of that.......he's still doing the same bland stuff, regardless of equipment.

[._._z]

<i><blockquote> I just looked at his site for the first time in over 2 years.........the use

of digital didn't help him a bit </blockquote> </i><p>

 

Straw man argument. He didn't go digital in order to improve his photography but, like

many pros, in order to make himself more profitable. Whether or not you like his

photography (I like some, am uninterested in most of it), he's apparently comfortable

with his style and he gets enough work to do this for a living while residing in an

expensive city. <p>

 

<i><blockquote> At least he had the sense to keep the G2 </blockquote> </i><p>

 

He's got a Hexar, an Elan, the digi Rebel and maybe still his LF gear, but I'm pretty sure

he sold off his G2.

[claudia__]

<i>In later years, Cartier-Bresson used a Leica point-and-shoot. One powered by batteries</i>

<p>hardly the big power draw that digi_s are! not the point. and then of course he went to the pencil and brush so you could say he was technically devolving. next! ')</p>

[patricks]

if i was smarter i'd stay away from this thread, however, for the records, HCBs was not, as far as i understand, an early adopter of technology, he simply found a tool that fitted his needs and stuck with it.

 

he is well known for disdaining the technical aspects of photography, he never cropped his images, didn't do his own development/souping, and he has been quoted several times of saying something along the lines of 'taking photos with an automated camera is like shooting birds with a machine gun'.

 

Here is an exact quote from the NYT obituary:

 

"My contact sheets may be compared to the way you drive a nail in a plank," he said. "First you give several light taps to build up a rhythm and align the nail with the wood. Then, much more quickly, and with as few strokes as possible, you hit the nail forcefully on the head and drive it in."

 

Equipment doesn't matter to anyone else, but it is BS to say it doesn't matter to the photographer per se.

 

And once for all, people do photogrpahy for different reasons. For it is all about the results, e.g. Jeff Spirer, which is fine and dandy by me, however, other people do photography for the experience, others for the interest in mechanical precision instruments. I'm confident that the sea is big enough for all fish to swim there...

[Allen Herbert]

Well, I'm sort of two thirds in the Jeff camp. However, I can't help thinking about that bloke who uses a Hassy to take photos of pub signs; that's what he enjoys doing.

 

He's enjoying himself..........does anything else matter. Of course, you could argue it does.

[thomas_sullivan]

I didnt say he went digital to improve his photography. I said going digital didnt improve his photography. There is a difference between those two sentences.

 

And I didnt say equipment shouldnt matter to the photographer. I said that equipment does not make the difference, the photographer does. Again, there is a difference between those two sentences.

[._._z]

<i><blockquote> so you could say he was technically devolving.

</blockquote> </i><p>

 

You claimed he didn't use a battery-dependent camera. He did. Tangential suppositions

don't interest me, sorry.

[ray .]

Maybe you should ask her to put her hands up on her desk so you can smack them with a wood ruler. Then have her write on the blackboard 100 times "HCB used a battery operated camera".

 

I mean, who the f*ck really cares?

[Allen Herbert]

One of lifes little mysteries.

[._._z]

People who make incorrect claims surely don't care about the facts. But Ray apparently

cares enough to declare, with profanity, that he doesn't care. Curious.

[fotografz]

What facts? Unsubstantiated counter arguments? HCB may have used a battery powered

camera, but not to shoot seriously... he already "quit" photography by then. In which case

who cares? He was just another tourist with a point-and-shoot. If he published work from

such efforts, I never saw it.

 

Subjectivity, no matter how loudly shouted, is still subjectivity. I subjectively think digital

is highly acceptable because it is being accepted by more and more people who can't tell

the difference. In which case I give it to them because I never forgot the old advertising

saying ... "they wrap fish with your ad the next day". But I have never kidded myself that it

was superior to film for certain applications.

[grant_.]

now hes dead...

[._._z]

<i><blockquote> Subjectivity, no matter how loudly shouted, is still subjectivity. </

blockquote> </i><p>

 

Like your assertion that HCB wasn't seriously using his p&s Leica. Says who? Get a grip.