I may be opening up a can of worms here, and this is probably an old debate, but I just read an article about a photographic magazine that refuses to print articles or photos by artists who create digital prints.

Does this make sense to anyone? It seems like this particular magazine is telling people that you can't really be an artist if you work digitally. Isn't that like telling a carpenter that he can't possibly be any good because he uses an electric saw instead of a handsaw?

Dunno. I think I'm just venting. I work digitally, but I have a great respect for traditional darkroom methods. Generally I don't do anything to my digital prints that I couldn't do in a darkroom (yes, there are exceptions to this, and I generally note them).

On the other hand, I just picked up my camera like a year ago, so I still consider myself learning. Maybe I just haven't had enough exposure to traditional film. Still, I've seen some pretty amazing stuff done digitally (Michelle's tomato shot comes to mind. I believe she works digitally). Granted, I've mostly seen this stuff in digital form (on the screen) and the digital prints that I personally make aren't necessarily "photo" quality, but that is a limitation of the equipment, not the artists. They don't seem to have any problem printing blurry photos taken with badly-made pinhole cameras.

Like I said, I'm just venting. It just really ticks me off when a "professional" entity tries to invalidate what others are doing simply because they aren't using a particular medium.

Okay. I'm done. Thanks for listening.

-Taltos

Yes indeed, and besides, when you really setup your stuff well enough, there's no need to start digitally altering your photo. Just taking away some minor faults is not an issue - you can't expect people to make the perfect shot and always keep it 100% free of dust and/or scratches. You're not going to do another day of shooting for something that you can take away with Photoshop. But I could understand why they wouldn't post work that's only based on photos, but in a way is digital art...not photography. Photography Technik (german magazine) is really wasted by all this kind of stuff - usually work for advertising. The style just isn't good enough....it shows, cause it just isn't the same as seeing an original print of a portrait shot by Anton Corbijn or a huge enlarged original print featuring one of Adam Ansel's super sharp landscapes. It just isn't the same thing.

I started to write this big long spiel about the pros and cons of digital vs film, but we have hashed this subject before. I guess it's a question of preferences, but there is room enough for both formats. Whether a certain magazine will accept certain work because it's digital is probably not a big deal because by now I'm sure that for every one that doesn't, there is one somewhere that will...

uses an electric saw instead of a handsaw? There are traditions and beliefs in all fields. In woodworking there are folks who do feel very strongly about this topic. In hi-fi, some folks still use vacuum tubes. Archery matches in the SCA must be with wooden arrows. Guess one can admire passion wherever it is found, and choose to join or not. Diversity is a good thing.

I went to digital for the ease and the comfort in knowing that I was'nt wasting more trees. So much waste is going on and alot of people don't recycle enough to alleviate the situation.... some day we will run out of forests,then what? change is a good thing.... just because one chooses to use their computer as their darkroom,should they be vilified? If noone accepted change, we would still be dressed in fur and living in caves.... not my idea of a nice abode and give me DKNY any day lol.

dear, lest we forget, digital cameras requrie a number of things such as batteries, and a computer to work on, and both of these use up electricity, which, depending on your form of it (being on the coast you likely have Hydro, so its not as much of an issue), can also be a waste of natural resources. but thats just me being an arse. Many know I've always preferred a darkroom to photoshop when it comes to straight up black and white photo (if I ever do colour though, one, I'll still use film, but I'll DEFINITELY be scanning the negs to work with them on a computer). Darkroom are much more enjoyable for me, and each paper costs a lot less than any semi-matte computer printing paper (30$, sometimes 20$ Canadian for a pack of 100 sheets of AGFA Semi-Matte RC paper, as opposed to 20$ for 20 sheets of epson high quality gloss... tho I'm sure if yer serious about it, you can buy in bulk for about the same price per sheet, i just cannot afford that much paper in one shot! lol). as for that magazine, f'em. Gauranteed they're using photoshop to retouch scanned images, and the next issue, they're prolly gonna print a few letters in the letters to the editor section about their reader's disbeliefs that suchb a"respectable" magazine would be so closed minded about their own work.

Oh dearest Slynky.... you always have such a way with words... hehe

Yup, I work digitally, but I also use your traditional film and slides too. I think they both have their place. For me digital is a convenience and a money saver. I have 4 rolls of film sitting on my counter that have to be developed but I don't really have the money for it right now. So that is the major advantage that digital is for me. I've only been in a darkroom once. It was a fascinating experience, but it took hours, my back and legs hurt, and all for about 2 images and many tries of trying to get it right. I'd like to set-up a very minimal darkroom in my house to play around and experiment with, but I can honestly say that processing images in a computer is much easier....and although the Slynkster will disagree, I find working in Photoshop also a very enjoyable experience when processing images. To each his own!

I am, therefore I create.......
--- michelleamarante.com

I started of using digital and thought it was great, ease of use was top of the list, 2 sets of fast charge batteries = just over 300 photos, a bit of photoshopping and print, great. Then I brought a film SLR and I shot slide for the first time and I was blown away with the way the slide looks, it as exactly how I saw it with my own eyes (does that make sense) digital is nowhere near slide imho But it is expensive. I havent shot much with digital since.

Eggiwegs! I would like... to smash them!

(30$, sometimes 20$ Canadian for a pack of 100 sheets of AGFA Semi-Matte RC paper, as opposed to 20$ for 20 sheets of epson high quality gloss... Does anyone have a rational explanation for this, or is it just price gouging? Can't gouge too much, since there is competition. The computer paper must sell in higher quantities than the photographic paper. And the silver photo paper should cost more to manufacture, (light tight, etc.) I still want to try the (so called) piezography B&W inks on the Epson someday, but damn that's expensive!

hi, i'm not to fussed whether the image is digital or traditional... when someone sees a photo they don't go "is it digital or traditional?". i think the emotion of a picture will determine the sucess of the picture and not the tools it's created with... digital or traditional they are just tools...let the final image should speak for itself... saying that, my preference is for traditional b&w photos which i would like to process myself...might even get a little digital camera soon...lol

Pictures appear to me, I shoot them.   Elliot Erwitt

My camera club love this debate, Im sure some of the really old members still debate how colour was the death of real traditional B & W photography. LOL For me its all about the final image and as long as I captured some element of the final image through a camera then its photography. My club runs digital print, colour print, colour slide and B&W competitions, I enter them all using digitally produced work and when I suggested we dropped all the categories and just had print and slide I realised why I come to this forum to share my work. :O)

Those who do not want to imitate anything, produce nothing. Salvador Dali

dunno... i read this post too late to partecipate actively... anyway... my really little opinion. first, some unuseful definitions. (from the Webster's Revised Unabridged Dictionary, c.a. 1913) Photography Photog"raphy, n. [Photo- + -graphy: cf. F. photographie.] 1. The science which relates to the action of light on sensitive bodies in the production of pictures (and From WorldNet (r) 1.7) n 1: the act of taking and printing photographs [syn: picture taking] n 2: the process of producing images of objects on photosensitive surfaces ...apparently no one says PHOTOGRAPHY itself imply that the "sensitive bodies" has to be composed by iodides of silver. It appears to me a bottomless pit for garbage. Same for the post-processing. so... why photographers has developed tons of dark room techniqes and printing techniques to enhance, correct or simply add character to their work? This is not a photographer who correct its work in post-processing? so... i'm not a photographer nor an artist. maybe... but surely i'm a sperimental guy... Maybe these guys don't even know how to turn a monitor on... for some people evolving it's simply too hard. We have, today, other tools. Different tools. it's nonsense... or maybe it's only me...