Its not the size of the camera, its the eye behind it!!

TelePaul

magicbastarder wrote: »

the amount of technology in a camera now compared to the mid seventies is absolutely colossal. i suspect your average camera now has as much processing power as a mainframe computer from back then.

but if you're saying that the quality of photographs being produced is commensurately better, we'll just have to agree to disagree.

the only issue i see people regularly going to is high ISO performance - and that's one i'm willing to concede a point on.

I just disagree that the limiting factor is talent, not technology. Probably because I love accessories! I think certain things have made taking better photos easier and in certain instances, have made the impossible possible (faster lenses, IS, higher ISO handling, etc).

I'd love to see some photo mags from back in the day to compare elements like white-balance and colour rendering.

magicbastarder

TelePaul wrote: »

Supposing Miles, Teo Macero et. al were to record Kind of Blue in a modern recording studio, at 192,000 Hz, 24 bit, mixing down to Bluray disc. There can be no doubt that it'd be sonically superior to the original.

yes, the total harmonic distortion etc. of the modern sound would be better than of the original recording, there's no argument there.
but i wasn't talking about raw numbers you can read off a spec sheet, i was talking about how it sounds.
and how technology has allowed them to change the way it was recorded in the first place, which is not always to the benefit of the music.

anyway, we've gone a bit OT.

PopeBuckfastXVI

magicbastarder wrote: »

the only issue i see people regularly going to is high ISO performance - and that's one i'm willing to concede a point on.

This was my only point - and only reason for wanting to upgrade bodies, but according to some here, I can just get better at taking noise free shots at high iso's on my d80.

I'd take a high ISO film in my bronica over running high ISO on my sensor. IMO the electronics are only catching up now in that arena.

challengemaster

jpb1974 wrote: »

A w/p housing is a 'fundamental element of underwater photography'... but the point is that there's much more to photography than underwater photos. We're discussing photography as a whole here.

Not if you're an underwater photographer

We are discussing photography as a whole, but to do that, you have to break it down into different areas and discuss how technology helps in each area. Which means you can't keep ignoring a point because it only applies to a certain set of circumstances - because those circumstances are more than likely an every day occurrence to one style of photography, be it underwater, gig, motorsport, wedding, etc etc.

I recently saw a video of a commercial shoot and the photos which were taken. The photographer was shooting from a helicopter to a boat, and using multiple flashguns to light a subject on the boat. Obviously there was an assistant, but tell me how in the name of... that shoot would have been possible without the technology behind it. Wireless transmitters and even the flashgun technology ( Flashguns themself, and probably E-TTL).

I've also seen photos from a helicopter to helicopter shoot, again....

jpb1974

that shoot would have been possible without the technology behind it.

But going back to the original point of this thread it was suggested by the OP's nemesis that better equipment makes you a better photographer.

Making something possible via technology that was not possible without it is going to make it better by default because you have nothing to compare it against To be honest I really wasn't attempting to argue that point.

Using the example of the u/w housing my point is - If your underwater housing is state of the art and cost €5000 and mine cost €50 it's not guaranteed that your photos will be better than mine because there's far more to photography than just the quality and prowess of the equipment.

Sharp, noise free, perfectly exposed photos don't necessarily equate to good.

T-rev

I have a Canon 300D and absolutely love it. Have used some of the newer models, while they are great I am still only learning so wanna master the foundations before I go to all this new stuff but I still do love that camera, even tho its kinda slow and takes ages to reload flash.

Rodg3

It's a symbiotic relationship really!

Having a good camera with some good glass to work with certainly helps, but it's only part of the equation!
I've seen photographers take a Canon 450D with a stork lens and pump out some gorgeous shots as well.

Yes the technological improvements give the photographer more freedom to push the boundaries of what digital cameras can actually do, but at the end of the day, if you don't have the artistic eye behind it, all you're going to do is take really big, really sharp images that still won't catch your eye.

Promac

A d1ckhead with a leica is just a d1ckhead with a leica. A master with a shoebox pinhole is still a master.

The 5D mark ii is a beautiful piece of technology and I can honestly say it will hugely improve your ratio of keepers to dumpers but it will not make any difference to how good you are as a photographer.

The other side of this argument is people looking at your photos and saying "WOW you must have a MAGIC camera!" - feck off you daft bint - I've been trying to make good photographs for 20 years.

pete4130

You can't measure something qualative and so subjective.

Having a better camera does help to take better pictures.....if you know how to use it to capture what you want.

I got sick of people telling me my camera took good pictures a few years ago, so bought a Nikon D1 from 1999 with 2.74MP and maxed out at ISO 1600 but was crap after ISO 400 and started shooting on that. People were surprised to hear their camera phone had more MP than my camera that cost me €100.

Point being, I utilised the old camera to its best and got good results. It was more enjoyable to use than my D3. It made me think, made me look at things in a different way.

Scoring 88% in your course thing doesn't mean you took better pictures. It could mean your interpretation of the theme was better and you articulated that theme through your images well. It doesn't mean you took better/nicer images (although you might have?). It might mean the person grading had a similar style to yours that Mr. 5D2.
It could have been that the theme suited you better than Mr. 5D2.


At the end of the day, my camera is better than yours, I've got better lenses so I'd get more than 88% for sure......I've got a better camera! :rolleyes:

Eirebear

Does anyone else have a strange image of Miles Davis in a spacesuit photographing jellyfish with a poorly waterproofed pinhole after reading the last few pages?
Or is it just me....

jpb1974

Does anyone else have a strange image of Miles Davis in a spacesuit photographing jellyfish with a poorly waterproofed pinhole after reading the last few pages?

Actually... please consider yourself corrected -

It was Miles Davis in a spacesuit full of holes, photographing White Shark with a D80 in an underwater helicopter.

PopeBuckfastXVI

jpb1974 wrote: »

Actually... please consider yourself corrected -

It was Miles Davis in a spacesuit full of holes, photographing White Shark with a D80 in an underwater helicopter.

At ISO1600...

ED E

My very old 5MP cameraphone (C902) can hold its own against many compacts in everything except v low light. Its the same as golf, having tiger woods' drivers wont make you win the masters.

Geardos are geardos and always will be so no matter what you say, just leave them at it.