PS as a crutch

elven

Something I’ve been reading/hearing a lot recently and again today when I read a list of top ten things that are bad about digital photography:

1. Over Dependence on Adobe Photoshop
I’ll go out on a limb and say that most photographers have a secret love-hate relationship with Adobe Photoshop. Photoshop creates a world of endless possibilities for photographers. Photography purists can clean up their image to accurately represent the scene they photographed and those with more of an artistic slant can transform their photo(s) into a unique creation. The problem with Photoshop is that it has quickly become a crutch for photographers to make up for their technical shortcomings. We all have areas that we need to improve upon, but more times than not when out in the field I’ll hear the commonly used phrase “I’ll just fix it in Photoshop later.”
For many Photoshop is the fast path to perfecting ones image, even if it were possible to avoid that work in the first place by learning the technical skills to do the same thing in camera. There’s no point not to take advantage of Photoshop’s functionality, but at the same time there is no reason to avoid learning how to maximize the use of your camera to avoid extra or unnecessary post-processing.

OK… without starting a general PS vs purist argument, I’m looking to discuss a particular point: what technical shortcomings can people ‘fix later’ in Photoshop?

There are only 3 things that I can think of -

1. Cropping
2. Adjusting exposure
3. Cloning

So to take each one and consider it individually –

1. Cropping – why would you want to reduce the already limited amount of pixels, and increase the softness of your image by cropping later instead of in camera, by more than a few pixels each side? Seems silly and pointless to me. Unless, of course, you’re at the physical limits of your equipment – ie shooting wildlife with a 300mm and you really could do with a 400mm, in which case would you rather do the PS crop and come away with a picture you’re happy with even if it isn’t as high res as you’d like, or walk away saying “I’ll come back when I’ve spent another few hundred quid on gear”?

2. Adjusting exposure – If you’ve over exposed and the details in your highlights are totally gone, it’s game over anyway and no kind of magical program will get that back. If you’ve totally underexposed, at a high ISO, and you push that histogram farther to the right you’re going to end up with a load of mush, basically, that is difficult to pass off as a decent picture. Even underexposing by a stop or so will produce nasty noise in the shadows and bad separation of lower tones. But again – say you’re at the limits of your equipment. I’m in a big old castle with a suit of armour in front of me. On the 350D I loathe going any higher than ISO 800, so here we are, 50mm f1.8 wide open, handheld limit is usually 1/125th of a second, but I really want a shot of the detail on that armour! Steady myself against a wall, turn the dial to 1/60, breathe in, shoot sniper style, squeeze the button gently… get home and push the picture in ACR so that I get some detail in the armour, let the background fade to black. I’ve got a shot I’m actually happy with! Would I rather have said “nah, never mind, it’s too dark, I won’t bother taking that shot” and walk away? Would you?

3. Cloning – it’s a pain to do it at all well. It’s not easier than changing position so the lamp post isn’t growing out of someone’s head, or putting that coke can in the bin, so calling it laziness is a bit of a red herring. But some people insist on ignoring just how crappy it is trying to get rid of unwanted details like that and continue to shoot first, tidy up later. It annoys me. However… there’s the other case – where you can’t change position. You’ve got one chance to get a shot and it’s just not going to work with that little distracting element. Or, you’re shooting something beyond a fence so you physically can’t move the obstruction. You can choose to get the shot and put in a bit of work removing that distraction, or walking away.

There also seem to be misconceptions about just what is actually capable in post processing, like sharpening – you can’t put in detail that was never there! I’ve seen Valentia do some cracking stuff with pictures that weren’t crisp to start off with, but at the same time they weren’t blurred or out of focus either. You just can’t do that, same as you can’t blow up an image from a CCTV camera x50 to read a phone number from a business card

I think this post is both for the people who instantly think that whoever uses photoshop is inclined to use it as a ‘crutch’, and also for those who are actually being lazy while shooting and think they can sort out technical mistakes in post processing. The point I hope I’ve made is that you’re not going to come up with an equivalent quality of result, or anything like it, so it’s not even a shortcut to the same result. But when I’m able to take shots that I simply would have had to walk away from otherwise, I don’t see what’s so ‘bad’ about it. Its definitely not laziness, its not a lack of technical ability, and its not against the rules – whatever they actually might be!

Are there any issues here that I’m just not seeing? Are there other technical mistakes that you can actually fix later, that I’m not aware of, that are contributing to the spread of this opinion? Has anyone else actually rationalised this stuff in their head before deciding what they agree with, or is a blanket kind of thing?

Valentia

elven wrote:

S I’ve seen Valentia do some cracking stuff with pictures that weren’t crisp to start off with, but at the same time they weren’t blurred or out of focus either.

My nose was itchy and I was wondering why.

I don't have time to read this in detail yet Julie but ther is one really really important point that everyone should remember. Unless you have some sort of processing already set up in your SLR camera EVERY photo needs post processing. That's the way they are made. Many people are initially disappointed when they get their cameras and see the results. This was certainly true with the 10D, less so with the 5D. They are set up for neutral results that can sometimes appear flat. In other words, like film, they need to be developed. The taking of the photo is only the first stage in the process, exactly like film.

As far as how much to use PS. As far as you like I say so long as you aren't trying to con someone.

magicbastarder

Valentia wrote:

In other words, like film, they need to be developed.

that analogy doesn't hold water. development is primarily the chemical process to wash unexposed chemicals from the emulsion, not a 'development' of the image taken in the sense that it modifies it.

pete4130

I use PS for the things you mentioned as when I need to. Sometimes a little rotation if the shot wasn't spot on, sometimes a crop if my lens wasn't long enough or I didn't have time to change lenses to get a tighter shot and I'm left with no option other than to crop to get the composition I would have wanted. Some small sharpenning as all images rfom a digital camera are somewhat soft. All sharpening does is increase the contrast between shapes and colours so it appears more crisp and sharp (as is my understanding on sharpenning, please correct me if I'm wrong??).
I do correct the exposure too. The light meter in camera can tell you that you've nailed the exposure but you might want to brighten or darken images to create a different feeling to them or tone down something bright and distracting.
I would clone out some things that are impossible to move or get out of the shot (again only small things as cloning is a pain in the a$$ to do well).

To me digital is a different medium for capturing an image than film but alot of the underlying principles of traditional darkroom techniques still apply regarding printing full frame prints from film with borders or having marginally cropped prints, dodging and burning detail, toning, spotting dust from prints. These things can make an image differ completely from how a scene looked when it was shot. Photoshop allows us to do these things digitally and gives us the freedom to manipulate our images in ways that aren't possible with traditional darkroom techniques. These new techniques are part and parcel of the digital medium. Photoshop allows people to see something they like and if there is something not perfect about it but is aout of their control, they can correct this in PS and have the image as how they originally intended it to look.

I'd say it's not entirely correct to say PS makes up for technical shortcomings. If a person isn't technically capable of taking a good image then no amount of PS work can make it good whereas somebody with a good understanding of the technical and artistic side of photogrpahy and PS can capture the image they want and fine tune it using PS.

Photoshop can only work with what you give it. If you give it a cr@p image, you'll more than likely end up with cr@p. If you use it properly with a good image then you should be able to improve on it and be happy with the end result.

I agree with you Elven. It gives more freedom and flexibility to the photogrpaher. As for people havnig the idea of rules and I get the impression you agree that there are none.

Well, thats my take on it.

Pete

Valentia

magicbastarder wrote:

that analogy doesn't hold water. development is primarily the chemical process to wash unexposed chemicals from the emulsion, not a 'development' of the image taken in the sense that it modifies it.

Excuse me if this comes across as rude but that is ....oh never mind. I spent many many years developing and printing. There are many things that can be done during the developing stage to affect the end result. Anyway, as I said I was in a rush and I should have included (that's what I meant) printing as part of the whole process.

God I find this PS arguement tiresome.

magicbastarder

Valentia wrote:

Excuse me if this comes across as rude but that is ....oh never mind. I spent many many years developing and printing. There are many things that can be done during the developing stage to affect the end result. Anyway, as I said I was in a rush and I should have included (that's what I meant) printing as part of the whole process.

well, my repsonse was valid, given that your response made no mention of printing.

Valentia

magicbastarder wrote:

well, my repsonse was valid, given that your response made no mention of printing.

Hmm

I was using the word "develop" in the broad sense of its meaning.

magicbastarder

printing is less versatile than photoshop, however.

i use photoshop myself, though the "i'll just fix it later in photoshop" attitude makes my teeth hurt. if you know it'll need to be fixed, and can do that at the point of taking it, do it at the point of taking it. a large part of that reaction is a gut reaction.

what i use photoshop for is mainly driven by my scanning needs - crop down to the pic; rotate if necessary (as in to landscape or portrait); dust and scratches, and some exposure adjustment. that'd cover over 95% of my time in PS.

elven

I thought that the actual developing part could affect the negatives you end up with, never mind the prints - if you use rodinal (sp?) to make it contrasty as hell, or use C41 chemicals instead of E6 on slide film, or even push/pull to end up with different effects? Most of the 'effects' i would apply in ps will be an echo of a style of film, or developing, like velvia saturated colours or Mark's favourite, the bleach bypass... I see an image file as an ingredient, almost a base, for the creation of a picture, not the final result that I'm stuck with like I was with my slides. But that's kind of a whole other discussion...

elven

magicbastarder wrote:

i use photoshop myself, though the "i'll just fix it later in photoshop" attitude makes my teeth hurt.

But what is it that people are saying they will fix later? Is it the three things I mentioned earlier, or is it something else?

magicbastarder

elven wrote:

I thought that the actual developing part could affect the negatives you end up with, never mind the prints - if you use rodinal (sp?) to make it contrasty as hell, or use C41 chemicals instead of E6 on slide film, or even push/pull to end up with different effects?

yep, but my point was that you don't have an image until development has taken place. the 'development' in the camera would probably be most accurately compared to whatever algorithm applies WB info, etc., when saving as jpg.

severe cropping instead of using your feet as an alternative might be an example of what i find lazy.

pete4130

Technically there is a latent image on the negative before developing. The chemical process for developing B&W actually mulitplies the latent image by something in the region of a billion times to get what you see after development (which is what was explained to me in college) as the silver crystals that were exposed to light are chemically different than those not exposed to light, hence the latent image the same as an exposed but undeveloped sheet of photogrpahic paper.

FreeAnd..

severe cropping instead of using your feet as an alternative might be an example of what i find lazy.

I find cropping as a solution to the limitation of lens focal lenght. Its easy to say move location, get closer etc..but this generally applies to static scenes/images - not always suitable for capturing a moment in the time available. I think anyone taking images with a view to cropping later rather than simply repositioning to get the shot in camera is wasting their own time owning the camera. Use the tools you have at the time to take the shot you can and use the tools you have later to finish the shot you want.

Personally, anything that means less time in PS, less workflow gets a huge thumbs up from me..I am not a big fan of cloning and i generally only change exposure to get the effect i want when converting to black and white. Ideally i would never want to crop an image to save quality and pixels and someday i might achieve that when i get my 10-600 "L" Lens

mikeanywhere

elven wrote:

But what is it that people are saying they will fix later? Is it the three things I mentioned earlier, or is it something else?

I would say its a combo of everything depending on what was felt had to be done to the image to make it the way you want ie it could well be that a picture might look better as a B&W conversion or with blur eg. In the end it really depends on what you are trying to create.

Oriel

Yet another stupid post.
So cropping is "seems silly and pointless"?
FFS :rolleyes:

/edit - and if you think adjusting exposure is cheating then I take it you've never developed your own photographs from film.

elven

Cropping is only 'bad' if you care what you're left with...

And if you think it's yet another stupid post, you're free to ignore it. You're like one of those old pernickety people that watch TV shows after the watershed and then complain there's too much sex and violence....

rymus

sinecurea wrote:

Yet another stupid post.
So cropping is "seems silly and pointless"?
FFS :rolleyes:

/edit - and if you think adjusting exposure is cheating then I take it you've never developed your own photographs from film.

If you dont like the posts here, find somewhere new. In fact at this stage, just go find somewhere new anyway. Consider this as the last warning you're going to get on the subject.

Zillah

elven wrote:

But what is it that people are saying they will fix later? Is it the three things I mentioned earlier, or is it something else?

1 - You can artifically add depth of field. By selectively bluring the background you can make it seem as if the aperture was wider.

2 - Add grain, compensating for low ISO.

3 - Reduce grain, compensating for high ISO (of dubious value a lot of the time though.)

4 - Sharpening. I know you mentioned it, but I think you're under estimating its power. You can make a shot that was not focussed properly appear sharp. Obviously there are limits, if a shot is completely out of focus theres no hope, but photoshop gives you something of a buffer zone.

I'm sure there's more.

440Hz

Zillah wrote:

1 - You can artifically add depth of field. By selectively bluring the background you can make it seem as if the aperture was wider.

See I think things like this can actually work out very nicely sometimes... Im useless at PS, so I never bother doing anything much with it, but my Dad has taken a good few of my photos and turned 'alright' shots into much much better shots. If I could, I probably would, within reason of course. And mostly just for personal photos.

Zillah

Oh don't get me wrong, I'm not saying its a bad thing to do, I'm a photoshop fan-boi. I used that depth of field trick on about 20% of my photos for college this semester (street portraits). It greatly improved them.

I only mention it because Elven was asking what kind of thing you can do in photoshop that could have been achieved in the field.

440Hz

No I was agreeing with you Zillah!! oops!!

Zillah

But...this is the internet... You can't just agree with someone and leave it at that...where the fire, the argument?

440Hz

Zillah wrote:

But...this is the internet... You can't just agree with someone and leave it at that...where the fire, the argument?

Well we could start a fight if you like.. but you'll win!! Im a right little door mat hehe

Roen

Thought this carry on only happened on Fridays. And where's B0rg when you need him?

Valentia

440Hz wrote:

my Dad has taken a good few of my photos and turned 'alright' shots into much much better shots.

Ah! But what was happening was that you were initially looking at an alright version of a much better shot.;)

mikeanywhere

Roen wrote:

And where's B0rg when you need him?

HAHAHAHAHA

Yeah, he has been very very quiet of late!!

Valentia

If I cropped all my shots in camera I would have died of Pneumonia years ago.

440Hz

Valentia wrote:

Ah! But what was happening was that you were initially looking at an alright version of a much better shot.;)

More that he could realise in PS what I didnt have the skill to do with my camera, or the equipment as the case may be. Not the vision that was lacking, just the implementor!

Carrigman

Valentia wrote:

EVERY photo needs post processing. That's the way they are made. Many people are initially disappointed when they get their cameras and see the results. The taking of the photo is only the first stage in the process, exactly like film.

I agree 100%.

I use PS not as a crutch or to fix mistakes but to enhance the image. I try to get as much right as I can when taking the photo but practically every shot will require some basic Cropping, Levels, Saturation and Sharpening adjustments.

Like Valentia, I have spent many hours slaving over a hot enlarger and used the printing process to crop and adjust for exposure. Ansel Adams said something to the effect that the negative was the score and the print was the performance. The better one's darkroom printing skills the better the photo. It's the same with digital: the better one's PS skills, the better the finished image.

I don't have a love/hate relationship with PS - I love it. PS - or whichever image editor one uses (the free download Picasa is very good) - is an essential part of digital photography. Amazingly though, there are still many people with decent camera gear who can't be bothered to learn the rudiments and are happy to bring their memory card to the local camera store for prints.

minikin

health warning
The following statement will damage your understanding of photography.

development is primarily the chemical process to wash unexposed chemicals from the emulsion, not a 'development' of the image taken in the sense that it modifies it.

Oriel

rymus wrote:

If you dont like the posts here, find somewhere new. In fact at this stage, just go find somewhere new anyway. Consider this as the last warning you're going to get on the subject.

Ryan, firstly, I don't have to like or dislike the posts here to disagree with them.
But here we have a poster commenting, negatively, on some of the most common post-production techniques of nearly all modern day photographers. In my opinion, ridiculously so.
What are you going to warn me against? Disagreeing with her?

Secondly, and most importantly, I have never "personally attacked" anybody on here on their photography, and would never think of it. So don't accuse me of that.
You haven't yet, but I feel that this is where you're going to do next.

Lastly, I would like you to send me an e-mail or a PM stating why you feel you have to "warn" me on this occasion, on this forum. "At this stage".
Just to keep everything above board, as usual.

Thanks,
Steve.
www.stephenlynn.co.uk/gallery/

Valentia

Zillah wrote:

But...this is the internet... You can't just agree with someone and leave it at that...where the fire, the argument?:)

Zillah

sinecurea wrote:

Lastly, I would like you to send me an e-mail or a PM stating why you feel you have to "warn" me on this occasion, on this forum. "At this stage".
Just to keep everything above board, as usual.

I dunno, while I can't remember any specifics, I have noticed lately that you've been posting a lot of the "quick and rude" variety... When I read Rymus' post above I thought "well, that was bound to happen".

311

Sinecurea ,you can be very smart at times. It can be a pain ,to be honest.

ThOnda

:-) It's really fun to read all of this. I am learning, however the main point is - the author of the mentioned article is not a photographer, has minimal experience with both film and didjital photography and (s)he is writing an "interesting" article about one kind of "art", to make him(her) look very educated.

rymus

Steve,

sinecurea wrote:

Ryan, firstly, I don't have to like or dislike the posts here to disagree with them.
But here we have a poster commenting, negatively, on some of the most common post-production techniques of nearly all modern day photographers. In my opinion, ridiculously so.

Then state your opinions without sounding like a condescending asshole in future.

What are you going to warn me against? Disagreeing with her?

No, That'd be a warning against abusing people on this forum.

Secondly, and most importantly, I have never "personally attacked" anybody on here on their photography, and would never think of it. So don't accuse me of that.
You haven't yet, but I feel that this is where you're going to do next.

Thankfully you don't know me well enough to make those kind of calls, so I'm going to let that one slide.

Lastly, I would like you to send me an e-mail or a PM stating why you feel you have to "warn" me on this occasion, on this forum. "At this stage".
Just to keep everything above board, as usual.

Just because I love to give you reasons to bitch and whine when you do eventually get banned for abusing users, I'm not going to enter into any PM or email tennis with you now. Its perfectly obvious I'm not the only one that's formed the opinion that you've been a smartass of late.

Thanks,
Ryan.

elven

sinecurea wrote:

Ryan, firstly, I don't have to like or dislike the posts here to disagree with them.
But here we have a poster commenting, negatively, on some of the most common post-production techniques of nearly all modern day photographers. In my opinion, ridiculously so.
What are you going to warn me against? Disagreeing with her?

I really do wonder if you actually read the original post. I think if you do, you'll find that I pointed out a common misconception that a lot of people think that all photoshop users are lazy when it comes to technique at the point of capture. I then went on to point out that if you do try to make up for a number of technical mistakes using photoshop, it's not going togive a comparable result and I gave real live facts, based on experience, to back that up.

Your reply of "Yet another stupid post" is pretty obviously a personal insult, and you're stupid if you think that's not how it would sound to any normal person. If you don't agree, you could always *gasp* consider actually explaining what it is you don't agree with and giving facts to back that up. But that would put you on shaky ground since you don't seem to know what it is that you're disagreeing with, and you're too busy trying to come off sounding like a hard man to actually join in a civil discussion.

You don't bring anything to this place except snarky comments and pathetic jibes, and if that's not grounds for a ban, I don't know what is...

magicbastarder

minikin wrote:

health warning
The following statement will damage your understanding of photography.

fair enough, i was confusing the developer with the part of what the fixer does:
"In film developing, photographic developer (or just developer) is a chemical that makes the latent image on the film or print visible. It does this by reducing the silver halides that have been exposed to light to metals of elemental silver in the gelatine matrix."

it doesn't radically alter the point i was trying to make, though.

magicbastarder

sinecurea wrote:

But here we have a poster commenting, negatively, on some of the most common post-production techniques of nearly all modern day photographers.

the fact that they're common is moot, though.

Zillah

Getting slightly back on topic. I was planning on giving out about the article from the OP but I forgot, so I'll do it now.

5. Gear Envy

Nonesense, this applies to all aspects of photography. A person is either the type who will keep up with the Joneses or not, whether its film, digital or plasma TVs.

4. File Organization

This is only a problem if you're not savvy with PCs. Its easy to organise thousands of photos if you're smart about it. Its no harder than organising negatives or prints tbh.

3. Backup Paranoia

Burn to DVD. Far more durable than negatives.

2. So Many Photos, So Little Time

We've had a whole thread on this. My opinion was that digital doesn't cause you to rush, it just makes it possible. A little discipline goes a long way and the benefits are immense.

1. Over Dependence on Adobe Photoshop

Not really an issue, as we've discussed. Even if it was, it'd be just as much of an issue for scanned negatives. Digital just takes out a step of the process.

magicbastarder

Zillah wrote:

3. Backup Paranoia

Burn to DVD. Far more durable than negatives.

you have far more faith than i do.

sineadw

My mother always taught me if you can't say something nice, don't say anything :rolleyes:

Zillah I think you hit the whole PS thing spot on for me - I knew there was something about all this but I couldn't quite figure out what it was. This whole thing shouldn't be about digital v's film, whatever way you look at it. Before I switched to digital I had long given up on simply getting the negatives printed as was. Scanned negs, then photoshopped, then printed (if that...). I think most people who work with film do that, whether it be in a darkroom or on the PC.

I gotta go do some work

Oriel

Zillah wrote:

Burn to DVD. Far more durable than negatives.

Negatives will last decades, DVDs won't last ten years.

440Hz

Guys for people giving out about Steve making personal attacks you are giving a fair return whack! I had a big lengthy reply typed out and now I have decided against it cos I dont think any opinion I would give would influence an 'opinion' which seems to have been formed long before any comment in this thread.

All I can say is something I have said countless times in other threads, and that is that everyone has different senses of humour, and something said in jest, or meant as a passing humourous comment by one, may not always be interpreted as such. People say things on this forum all the time that not everyone finds amusing, even yesterday the thread about the photobags, Im sure a lot of posts in that may have been considered 'distasteful' humour. The point I'm making is everyone is entitled to their opinion about a thread/topic, some of us choose to voice those opinions, others do not. We dont have to agree, but we should feel that we can voice those opinions, sarcastically or otherwise.

No offence intended Julie but

"Yet another stupid post" is pretty obviously a personal insult, and you're stupid if you think that's not how it would sound to any normal person

, at the risk of sounding like stupid myself - I really would not have read that as a personal insult - more an opinion about the topic of the post, and not about you, or your other posts for that matter. I would have interpreted as 'yet another stupid post' in a general sense, rather than a personal sense. Thats just my personal opinion, but everyone will have their own interpretation I guess.

Calina

The one "I'll fix it in Photoshop" tool mentioned in the top post which really annoys me is "I'll clone that out". I hate cloning. Possibly it's because I'm really bad at it, it's terribly time consuming and above all else I think it's fundamentally dishonest. However, I realise that not everyone agrees with me.

I'll use cropping and exposure tools at will. Cropping because occasionally (even frequently) I'll change the aspect ratio of the picture because I prefer it to be less than the usual 3:2 and anyway, I have 500mm worth of zoom and sometimes it's still not enough and getting closer means drowning the camera.

The feeling I have about articles along the lines of the above is that they often paint something as being black and white whereas reality is a bundle of grey areas. But then I would say that.

thebaz

440Hz wrote:

No offence intended Julie but
, at the risk of sounding like stupid myself - I really would not have read that as a personal insult - more an opinion about the topic of the post, and not about you, or your other posts for that matter. I would have interpreted as 'yet another stupid post' in a general sense, rather than a personal sense. Thats just my personal opinion, but everyone will have their own interpretation I guess.

if the comment had been directed at me , i would have found it insulting -- i've picked up bans and warnings for a lot less in rugby , good job ruggiebears not the mod !
sometimes its good to get non flattering criticism , but it can be done in a pleasant way , to help us all improve , none of us our perfect -- even sinecurea

440Hz

thebaz wrote:

sometimes its good to get non flattering criticism , but it can be done in a pleasant way

agreed, but honestly I dont think it was directed at the person, more the TOPIC. If someone called me stupid for posting something then I would be upset, depending on how it was put of course. All Im saying is that I dont interpret that as a personal insult to Julie, I would read it as a personal opinion about the topic being discussed, regardless of who the OP was.

People might not feel that is different, but personally I do.

Debate is good, it helps us learn! So healthy disagreement should be encouraged IMO. I guess the point you are making is how that disagreement is stated - fair point, but I also think that sometimes people take things too literally - its hard not to as this is text and easily misinterpreted, but isnt it just possible that not everything posted here is meant to be entirely serious and/or insulting??

I know I say things intended to be humourous on here sometimes, and in no way would I ever intend them to be hurtful or personal.

mikeanywhere

sinecurea wrote:

DVDs won't last ten years.

More like 20 years

magicbastarder

yeah, and laserdiscs are probably still structurally sound.

Oriel

mikeanywhere wrote:

More like 20 years

15?
*offers hand*

elven

440Hz wrote:

No offence intended Julie but
, at the risk of sounding like stupid myself - I really would not have read that as a personal insult - more an opinion about the topic of the post, and not about you, or your other posts for that matter. I would have interpreted as 'yet another stupid post' in a general sense, rather than a personal sense. Thats just my personal opinion, but everyone will have their own interpretation I guess.

I know you've made a similar point before about the whole thing, and I can see the point you're trying to make, but I think what you're maybe not considering is that he jumps into most of my non gear related (ie anything with a bit of thought behind it) threads and posts some sarcastic 'get a life and don't talk rubbish' sort of comment which we could all do without. The 'yet another' bit is referring to all the others to which steve responded in a similar way. I think it's obvious that I'm not being overly sensitive because plenty people are familiar and also frustrated with it. It's not one of those situations where everyone's having a laugh and some of it goes over the line and could be offensive, it's more just that it's annoyingly sarcastic and not actually contributing to the discussion. I have no problem with anyone disagreeing with me, and I'm happy to listen to their point - but calling something stupid is hardly going to provoke healthy debate now is it?

It makes everyone else respond in a bad way and loses the plot on what could have been a really interesting debate - look at the glasnevin cemetery thread to see what happens when people actually explain their point of view instead of saying stuff like this...

As far as what the actual purpose of the thread was meant to be, I was frustrated with getting the impression that it was a general assumption when people use photoshop, it means they are lazy/incompetent photographers and have to fix all the technical mistakes they make. It wasn't about post processing in general, and whther or not we should/shouldn't because that's obviously feck-all to do with anyone expect yourself (photojournalism aside of course). I wondered if it actually is a commonly held belief, if anyone else had experience of being regarded in that way, if anyone had examples of technical mistakes that you could actually fix later and if anyone would actually admit to the 'shoot now fix later' approach themselves. Fair play to Zillah for actually getting the point and providing an interesting response...

But I suppose it's just too close to the old purist vs photoshop argument and entails the usual highly emotional responses. Never mind.