Does choice of photographic gear matter to creative expression?

[BellSystem]

Usually when people ask if they should buy XYZ camera they are not asking for anything but justification for the decision they already made to buy it. Too many people make it about the camera and think better tools = better results. Most of the time the most creative things are from the most random gear that isn’t top shelf. You either have creativity and skill or you don’t. No amount of money will buy you more creativity or better quality of content. If you think the camera is the problem with your work….it’s probably not. Sure there is specific gear for specific outcomes. To get a medium format look you need a medium format camera. But buying a better camera so your pictures look better in terms of creativity and composition….well that’s not gonna work. If you can’t take a Pentax *ist and make creative and quality photos…the modern Sony isn’t gonna be any better for ya.

 

[bruinsrme]

If taken some incredible photos with my iPhone and I’ve taken some trash pictures with my canon set up.

The equipment can surely affect the creativity. Not every camera and lens combo produces the same types of images.
As an enthusiast, I’ve learned creativity comes from within.
I’ve taken some pictures of weddings and learned equipment helps but the ole mighty angle and lighting can make an iPhone photo rival the professional equipment.
The iPhone portability can offer the user some opportunity a bigger camera can’t do and vice Berra.
I took a photo of a bride and groom with their hand crosses and looking up at the camera.
I thought the picture was incredible.
People that were looking at it on the presentation after the meal they nearly snarled.
The photographer came up to me and she said, that picture is incredible.
the funny thing is, the bride and groom had a get together a few months later and people liked that picture.
Moral of the story, Creativity is not solely based on equipment, but opportunity, mood and situation.
Then again, the right equipment can help with capturing that perfect picture

It’s not always the bow, but surely always the archer

 

[Analog Kid]

What you are describing is what I called the transformational perspective.

I don't think so...

The conceptual perspective, on the other hand, is concerned with value judgement. For example: this picture I just took is boring; maybe if I climb up that hill I can get a more interesting perspective.

No tool is going to tell you that your picture is boring or climbing up the hill can give you a more interesting perspective. That has to come from you.

What leads you to think that going up the hill can give you a more interesting perspective? I would argue that experience gives you that idea. Gear can often help provide those experiences, for example if you had a drone at your disposal you could experiment with different perspectives and integrate them into your thinking about composition.

I understand where you're coming from. I once shared those misconceptions of science and creativity because of poor pedagogy in school.

My language classes focused on narrative and persuasive writing, while my science classes focused on calculations and testing.

Through narrative and persuasive writing, I was encouraged to impose myself on the world. That is, make my story or push my beliefs.

And in science class I was given a "hypothesis" and through the act of "experiment", I had to gather data to show that it was true. But what I was actually doing was verifying a known relation. We never examined the difference between hypothesis and conjecture or negative experimental results, because the purpose of my science classes was to teach principles, not the scientific method. So in this way, science became the study of following steps to get positive results.

But this is not the reality of science and creativity.

The purpose of science isn't to support a hypothesis through experiment like a persuasive essay is to supporting a position. You aren't trying different techniques, experimentally or otherwise, to get a positive result.

The purpose of science is to prove your knowledge (i.e., how do you know what you know).

That's why PhD programs have what's called a thesis defense, where you must defend your knowledge to a doctoral panel.

The same concept applies to art. The intention should not be to make a beautiful film, but to make a film to understand what beauty is. Whether the film is beautiful or not is dependent on how well you came to understand beauty. The film is your defense of that knowledge.

So when I assert that creativity is a generalization of the scientific method it's because I view both as epistemological exercises, not experimental or experiential exercises, as you put it.

As you further describe the parallels you see between creative expression and the scientific method, I'm increasing less sure I agree. It does sound like your education missed the mark on explaining the scientific method. It is neither a way of following steps to get a positive result nor of defending your knowledge. It is a way of integrating new knowledge into the scientific canon.

It's not a question of what you as an individual know, it's a question of whether a theory is refuted by evidence or not. And it is absolutely based on experiment and experience.

Creativity comes out of you, it's not something of happenstance.

Creative expression does come from us, but it's a synthesis of experience and experimentation. I wouldn't say it's happenstance, I'd say it's an orderly recombination.

 

[kenoh]

I agree with that in principle, but I‘ve seen people buy or receive gear that far exceeds their abilities and they practice like hell to feel worthy of it. It may not make them great, but it certainly makes them better.

I agree

 

[Berti10]

Those of you who have been following the drama over in the innocent sounding “I want to move from a D750” thread have seen the discussion get fairly heated, with it unraveling even to the level of a political discussion forum, typically the lowest form of intellectual debate there is, in my opinion. “I know you are, but what am I?”, that sort of thing.

The rough topic is “ Does one’s choice of photographic gear matter to creative expression?”. That quickly became a discussion on cost vs value and cost vs outcome. It also became a discussion on marketing and mythology. Some interesting philosophical topics. I wanted to attempt to move that discussion out of the poor thread that started it to its own area. This may or may not work.

My own stance (yours will be different):

• There’s no “scientifically objective better” camera, approach or choice of photographic gear. There’s a choice between broader or more narrow feature sets and capabilities. Cost doesn’t always directly correlate to those features and capabilities. Does it matter?
• The choice of camera won’t matter to the viewer of the image, in general. They’ll most of the time not know whether it’s an iPhone, Sony A1 or Nikon Z9.
• The choice of tool does matter to the creator / photographer. It’s said that a good photographer can make a great image with any camera, but it’s equally true that they often find the choice of tool they use very important. They don’t use “any camera”, they use the cameras that they feel work the way they want to in order to achieve their vision. That’s where the discussion can devolve into marketing and mythology. Leica is a great example, but all companies use marketing and mythology very well, of course. As humans, we’re subject to it and interact with it.
• Humans are creative but we’re rarely rational.
• There are tools to help anyone express their creative vision at any price point. This is a good thing.
• Lenses have “character”. Some are clinical, some have known flaws that define that character. Some are designed to be shot wide open, others are defined to be sharp across a range of apertures. Some are designed to sharp edge-to-edge, others for center sharpness. Some correct for color focusing (aberrations and such), some deliberately don’t.
• Choice of body is personal and up to the individual to decide based on ergonomics and features. There’s no one “best body” to use for creative expression. It’s up to the individual’s needs and budget. Some pack tons of features with amazing AF, video and other things. Others have very few features and are entirely manual. Some have are larger, some smaller. Some let your receive phone calls .

It would be awesome to keep any discussion here civil and it’s purposely a broad topic so can “wander”. I will do my best to keep my own interactions as “adult” as I can - I’m not always good at that .

So does your choice of photographic gear matter to your creative expression?

To kick things off, here’s a short article by someone you may not know - he’s a reviewer that runs a paid website but has made this article free to link to. His name is Sean Reid.

https://www.reidreviews.com/examples/yes.html

Everything depends on want you want as a photographer. I like the outcome of a classic analogue picture, but it is too expensive for my needs. A big DSLR often shies people away, so some of my best portraits are made with an iPhone. But I like the DSLR, because it does not distract me, because it has no messenger installed, pictures are stored on a SD and not instantly accessible. And the outcome of your photography depends on those factors as well.

 

[ThunderSkunk]

Sure gear matters to me, but only the gear I’m using. Since I’m out with a Nikon Z, I have no time or need for thoughts of Sony vs Nikon, or Canon vs Nikon, or f mount/dslr vs Z/mirrorless. Spending time obsessing about the tools you don’t have is ultimately a distraction from making work with the tools you do have.

The only real difference in technical limitations that I have to consider is environment. I still keep my crazy little Nikonos V in service for rough conditions. The new Z gear is so far and above that level of performance it might as well not even be called a camera, but both systems are each 100% capable of producing different interesting and captivating images, and the V is just an absolute tank of a camera. When I’m going out in a storm, swimming, on a surfboard, a kayak, or a mountain bike in the wet spring mud where it is certainly going to fall and end up underwater, the Nikonos V is made for that, and is my camera of choice. Otherwise I’m thinking about DoF, Ape & SS, & pondering what ISO even means in an always-on sensor.

 

[Jumpthesnark]

Reading the replies in this discussion has made me think of how much photography has changed with the advent of new photographic tools, and how that has affected the creative expression of myself and other photographers.

An example that comes to mind is astrophotography. During the recent Geminids meteor shower, I was able to pack my gear and head out into a dark sky area in the desert east of me, put down a tripod with a digital camera, set its internal intervalometer to take a series of 15-second exposures at a high ISO, point it in the direction I wanted and let it fire away. Then I set up a camp chair and watched the meteors whiz overhead.

After that I drove home, imported the files into a folder, opened up my editing software and found the images that had meteor streaks in them. Out of more than 1000 images, that left me with less than two dozen. I did my post processing on those files, then stacked them to combine them into one image of the night sky with multiple meteor streaks, added a foreground exposure so the Anza-Borrego badlands weren't a mere silhouette and got the below image.

With some basic tools and widely available, inexpensive software, I was able to create something that would have been beyond my abilities with film. Beyond the abilities of all but the most technical and advanced photographers, with an enormous amount of expensive and rare gear. Everything from the digital sensors on modern consumer cameras to the software to the file storage on a memory card to the YouTube tutorials and the phone app that showed me where the radiant point in the sky would be are tools for creative expression that simply weren't available years ago, and I have chosen to use them to create this image and others like it.

Which all goes back to the question posed by @r.harris1 : does choice of photographic gear matter to creative expression? In this case and for many others, I'd say the answer is a resounding yes. The right gear and some learning gives us the ability to create images that previously we could have only imagined.

 

[Klae17]

Yes it does. If I want to express resolution of a nature landscape in very high detail with a tremendous wide angle, I cant do it with a polaroid.

 

[mectojic]

For a professional use, any pro-model digital camera after 2010 will be good enough. Actually, film photography was also perfect for professionals, so any film camera from about 1940-today would also be just fine.

In my experience, bad artists try to justify their work with expensive equipment. That's all it is.

 

[r.harris1]

I appreciate the thoughtful discourse here and the different points of view. Keep them coming!

A fair number of new voices here in the Digital Photography Forum (film too!), so I’ll give a shameless plug for the “Picture of the day” thread (POTD) where anyone is invited to post one image each day that they enjoy and also to the themed P52 challenge - one theme per week on a given topic (this week is shallow depth of field, last week was low light). Additionally there’s a weekly contest you can join in and a “Photo Association Game Thread” in the sticky session. All are welcome, and any, all gear . It’s the image that’s the thing, at the end of the day. All of these threads are usually at the top of the thread list so are easy to find.

 

[tis100]

What leads you to think that going up the hill can give you a more interesting perspective? I would argue that experience gives you that idea. Gear can often help provide those experiences, for example if you had a drone at your disposal you could experiment with different perspectives and integrate them into your thinking about composition.

I consider past experiences as tools. To call upon a particular experience is to make a value judgement. That is, you are free to accept or ignore past experiences in the present. It's for this reason I considered my example to be from the conceptual perspective.

Now, if you decided to bring a drone with you, it's because of a technical and/or value judgement. For example, a specific drone may be chosen to shoot a scene because of its compact size, so for technical reasons you bring it. In a different scenario you might make a value judgement to bring a drone because you believe experimenting with the drone could yield some interesting results.

The footage you capture from the drone can be viewed from a conceptual and/or transformational perspective. For example, you can make a value judgement of the quality of a shot or learn of a different possible perspective while experimenting, assuming you didn't already know about that type of perspective or missed details.

It's not a question of what you as an individual know, it's a question of whether a theory is refuted by evidence or not. And it is absolutely based on experiment and experience.

I didn't say that it was a question of what you know as an individual, what I said was that it was a question of how you know what you know. Those are two different concepts. It's "I saw a cat." vs "How do I know I saw a cat?". Whether a theory is refuted by evidence or not is a consequence of the later type of questioning.

I'm going to go through each step of the scientific method to better illustrate what I mean, but before I do I need to make sure I clear up one point.

Science is difficult to discuss if everyone has different concepts for the same words. This is especially true with the word "experiment." For me, experiment has three distinct meanings:

1. Trial and error (Colloquial General Sense)
2. A test of validity (Colloquial Scientific Sense)
3. A process done by an experimentalist (Formal Scientific Sense)

In the previous section the word "experiment" was used in the colloquial general sense, this section you were quoted in the colloquial scientific sense, and when I talk about the scientific method I use it in the formal scientific sense.


The Scientific Method

1. Observation

Experience the world and develop a model of it in your mind. Along the way something may catch your interest. Perhaps you see a pattern, run into a problem or simply like something. Write down everything you know about it.

You now have a bunch of raw data. If you observe patterns in this data, the patterns will be called conjectures.

But how do you know that your observations are verifiable and representative? Or put another way: How do you know what you know is verifiable and representative?

2. Research

You must look again to find evidence to support the observations.

Read and cite papers, refer to principles of science and math, increase your sample size, etc.

Through this process you refine your data. You can continue this process to infinity if you like.

It's like putting rocks in a rock tumbler and leaving them in.

But what if instead of leaving them in, you took them out when they got shiny enough?

3. Hypothesis

You try to observe patterns in this refined data, where the patterns are called hypotheses.

A hypothesis is a hierarchy of observables. For example, in "there may be bears that have brown fur," the hierarchy of observables is (bear, (fur, (brown))). In other words, the fur has the property brown and the bear has fur.

But once again you are confronted with a familiar problem:

How do you know a hypothesis' observables all exist and in a specific relational order? Or put another way: How do you know what you know exists and in a specific relational order?

4. Experiment

You find evidence to support the hypothesis.

But how do you do this? You must first observe the hypothesis' observables within the reality the hypothesis is based on.

Unfortunately, this isn't an easy task because even if you know the hypothesis' observables, how you do you know you're observing them and not something else?

You must find evidence to support that you are indeed observing the observables you are observing.

Only when you have found sufficient evidence, in a process known as reducing experimental bias, can you say, with a margin of error, that you've observed the observables or taken a measurement. And if you can observe all the observables in the specific relational order dictated by the hypothesis then you'll know the hypothesis is not false.

For an experimentalist, whether the hypothesis is false or not false is not and should not be important. The work is in developing schemes to know how to know what you are observing.

And, just like in research, you can keep the rocks in the rock tumbler for as long as you want to continue reducing experimental bias, but at some point you just say, good enough.

That's why you can never prove a hypothesis true, you can only prove that it is not false.

 

[scottrichardson]

Anecdotally, when I upgraded from a D7000 consumer SLR to the big daddy D850 full frame, my photography improved a fair bit. Because the D850 has substantially better low light capability, I was able to create more expressive shots in the evening and low light situations. The full frame sensor had a vastly nicer look to the images as a whole also. Sure, I also had better lenses to go with the new full frame setup.

If I wanted to make better video, I would definitely go to a mirrorless z9. That’s not to say I couldn’t do great video on my D850 but the focus just isn’t up to scratch for fast refocusing for video.

So, personally speaking, yes the gear does have an effect, if you’re in fact benefiting from improvements in the gear you’re using.

Technical improvements aside, if we are just talking about creativity - which you are actually asking - then I believe you can be as creative as you want on any device up to the technical limits of said device. So an old, slower, lower res camera in a bright scene on a still subject with great lighting may not look much different on a higher end camera, apart from more dynamic range and resolution.

 

[_timo_redux_]

So does your choice of photographic gear matter to your creative expression?

I've been mulling this question on and off since r.harris1 posted it. While my favorite answer so far was the reaction where someone pointed out some who buy expensive gear feel compelled to use it since it was, well, expensive, such a compulsion doesn't address the question of is there a link of gear with creativity.

I have a different take than most because I view the imposition of intentionality onto creativity as an imperfect, sometimes even destructive, layering. It's the idea of authorship, or photography like painting; that is, something planned out, and then executed. So, a plan to be creative, in which the choice of tool is very important. E.g., I will make a creative landscape picture, so therefore I'll need this kind of lens, this kind of sensor, this kind of tripod, this kind of light. I'm sure all of us make these kind of pictures, often successfully.

But of course creativity, as I understand it, is neither compelled to appear by one plan nor restrained in its intensity and duration by another plan. Don't get me wrong: I love plans, and actually I do planning for a living, and can report there's plenty you can't get done without a good plan. At the same time, creativity isn't at base about a plan. Rather, creativity is about a process. A process is like a "plan" (noun) turned into "planning" (verb), but not planning as we conventionally understand the word. Rather, it's action, it's sequence, it's iterations, it's think and react, it's guess and process, it's realizations unfolding gradually or the right alignment of influences pushing out an epiphany.

Garry Winogrand's oft-quoted "I photograph to see what the world looks like in photographs" got me thinking along the lines of process. Now I generally dislike explaining art via biography, because it suggests a person's background and experience (as distilled by the author of said biography) is more than enough to decipher intentionality. In a majority of cases i don't think that's true, and furthermore I don't really want to know what was intended, because that clouds the question of what is there.

Rather, I want the effort to stand on its own feet, so to speak. What I've found, literally, via seeing what something looks like in a photograph is a combination of learning to see differently, along with discovering what was right in front of me that perhaps I didn't even see. You make a picture (with whatever intentionality, or even none) and then find what's in it. Sometimes there's something in the corner or side of a picture that "activates" it. Sometimes there's a juxtaposition of elements that's more powerful than the intended subject. Sometimes framing -- the act of selection -- starts a dialog with what has been framed. And sometimes, it's a "mistake." But I was taught and firmly believe in owning your mistakes, even taking (intentionally) credit for them, as they can be more interesting than the intended work.

Given this point of view, once can see that choice of gear is an adjacent question. Not unimportant, but also not important -- to the side. Certain types of processes are going to be harder with or without certain types of equipment, but the ease of doing something may not summon the muses as much as difficulty in doing something might. It can't be known beforehand, it seems to me, so you have to try. But you need to try with something, so yes, we have to chose something with which to photograph. To this end, feeling comfortable with what you use is paramount, such that something trusty is much better to find a flow, or to feel creative, than working with tools that no matter how powerful are awkward in one's process: ergonomically, or in terms of size, or in terms of too many choices.

Too many choices: an issue in making pictures when the process of picture-making is settling on one framing. Having, on top of that search, your tool also present too many choices is arguably a process heading in an unhelpful, unfruitful direction.

The world loves yes or no answers. In this case, the answer is no. The gear doesn't matter like you think it does. It matters like I think it does: that is, it matters in terms of how successful I think any result of your created-with-gear process was.

 

[Clix Pix]

Good points brought up here! I know that sometimes I'll have a specific idea that I want to try, and then once I'm engaged in the actual shooting process begin to see other possibilities and that's when I really get into "the zone," tapping into my innate creativity as I explore what all I can do with the camera, a particular lens and the particular subject and its setting. Sometimes my original idea turns out to not be as good as I'd thought, but instead in the process of exploration I've discovered something much more interesting.

Occasionally I'll swap out lenses during the shooting session as I think, "OK, I've pretty much exhausted the possibilities with THIS lens, but what if I try xx lens instead?" I grab the other lens, put it on the camera and the experimentation and exploration continues, with obviously somewhat different results because of the different lens. For me, this is part of what makes photography such a fun and interesting endeavor.

 

[robgendreau]

I appreciate all the insights and deep thinking, but if one answers "no" then one would seem to need to explain why photography is somehow different than all other human art save rather spoken word and song, and dance. Those being the only two endeavors that quickly come to mind that require no gear.

One of our ancestors had to figure what pigment stuck on the walls of the cave, and how to replicat that bone with a hole in it that made such a pleasing sound. Or how to hole some beads to wear around the neck to be the belle of post Ice Age fashion. I suppose if Michelangelo was on Reddit he would have got into arguments about chisel brands too.

Our desire to create pushes us not only to use tools but even to make new ones. Sure, the JWST is for science, and so were those cameras on Apollo, but they both also created images that are iconic and emotional, like the best photos should be. Some pretty fancy tech was involved in getting that, so the gear mattered.

 

[Clix Pix]

Something which is key here, too, which hasn't really been addressed much in this discussion, but which plays a significant role in our final results is not just the gear we use, or our skill at using it or editing the images afterward, or our passion about photography, but also simply the opportunity to shoot the image(s) in the first place. I happen to live in an environment which is absolutely wonderful for photo ops, but not everyone has that delightful experience of looking out their kitchen or living room window and seeing a GBH, a gang of Hooded Mergansers, a gaggle of geese, all doing their thing right in their own watery "back yard."

Other people have other unique photo ops because of where they live or where they travel....all of this is good to keep in mind when thinking about photography and what one might want to shoot, and where.

Another key factor has sort of been touched upon earlier in this thread, and that is the ability to look at and see -- really see -- something interesting and intriguing in the otherwise ordinary and mundane -- say, an everyday household item, perhaps a kitchen tool, or the intriguing shape and lines of something used frequently in the household, or looking around further, there's an unusual decorative item in the home..... All of this is photographic fruit ripe for the picking. It's a matter of having the awareness to spot this possibility for an interesting image in the first place, plus the curiosity and interest enough in it to explore that subject in depth and and indeed create an image or two or three from that....

And, yes, quite often a macro lens or at least a close-focusing one is also going to be the tool best suited for shooting something like these suggestions I've mentioned, so in some situations if that gear is not available it might not be possible to capture elements of that intriguing kitchen tool or interesting decorative object after all. However, as has been already observed over the past several years, these days even iPhones and other Smartphones can do an amazing job getting into a subject really up-close and personal, too.

In thinking about this, I suspect some of us are more limited by ourselves than we are our gear....

 

[apostolosdt]

I've only recently begun to realize how lucky I have had it to have been able to experiment so freely in digital. Oddly enough my parents did have one or two decent cameras, but i never remember them being used as a kid and those little yellow disposables came to be what i knew. Well, polaroids before that, god flapping those things was fun.

You're right to mention the group discussing it as well: a lot of frequent or infrequent MR forum users are still a small subset of a larger population.

I'm also wondering if depending on where you started (or rather, where you wish you'd started?) in your photographic journey correlates to how you answer the question. I think my (original, unreasonable, absolute) position of yes as a teen was highly influenced by the tech zeitgeist. I don't know if there's a ton or correlation, and that that equals causation in this instance, but I'm curious.

I was also going to include my (tongue-in-cheek) comment that some people may view painting as photography, but I wasn't sure if anyone was ready for that discussion, haha.

I started, long ago, by attending seminars and classes, which influenced my choice of equipment. When digital appeared, I did try them (a lot), but they just didn't fit my viewpoint. As simple as that. Your remarks are pretty sound, though.

 

[citysnaps]

Does choice of photographic gear matter to creative expression?​

My view...

In a word, no. Strong photographs are made, not taken. And that has little to do with gear.

It's more about the photographer, life experiences, creativity, ability to see and read light, recognizing gesture, knowing what to include and not include in the frame, being willing to let details and information drop into shadows/darkness to stir a viewer's imagination releasing some kind of narrative/story and emotional reaction, and on and on. It's about image crafting, rather than image taking.

For the last seven or so years I've only been shooting with various iPhones. They're good enough for what I like to make photographs of.

Obviously many cameras and phone-cams are not suitable for some kinds of photography; professional sports, birds in flight, etc. Some people would say weddings. But I'd love to shoot a wedding with an iPhone.

IMO, too many people get wrapped up in owning the latest gear - always searching for the best camera or lens. And that's ok if it makes you happy.

For me, that's not photography.

 

[r.harris1]

Does choice of photographic gear matter to creative expression?​

My view...

In a word, no. Strong photographs are made, not taken. And that has little to do with gear.

It's more about the photographer, life experiences, creativity, ability to see and read light, recognizing gesture, knowing what to include and not include in the frame, being willing to let details and information drop into shadows/darkness to stir a viewer's imagination releasing some kind of narrative/story and emotional reaction, and on and on. It's about image crafting, rather than image taking.

For the last seven or so years I've only been shooting with various iPhones. They're good enough for what I like to make photographs of.

Obviously many cameras and phone-cams are not suitable for some kinds of photography; professional sports, birds in flight, etc. Some people would say weddings. But I'd love to shoot a wedding with an iPhone.

IMO, too many people get wrapped up in owning the latest gear - always searching for the best camera or lens. And that's ok if it makes you happy.

For me, that's not photography.

I love what you do and I've honestly never said "jeez, what camera is citysnaps using?" You produce images I enjoy. You enjoy and find "creative freedom" (whatever that is ) in the tools you use, full stop. I enjoy your eye and the way you tell stories, again, full stop. Thank you for this answer.

 

[citysnaps]

I love what you do and I've honestly never said "jeez, what camera is citysnaps using?" You produce images I enjoy. You enjoy and find "creative freedom" (whatever that is ) in the tools you use, full stop. I enjoy your eye and the way you tell stories, again, full stop. Thank you for this answer.

Thank you for the kind words - greatly appreciate it!

 

[r.harris1]

And just to chime in again, I do enjoy my particular tools ("paint brushes") for *me*. I'm 100% certain that anyone looking at any image of mine (a) wouldn't care and (b) wouldn't know what any given image was created with. It's the making of them that I find joy in, using the tools that I like.

 

[AlaskaMoose]

The gear used matters only to the person using it. Choice is a personal thing based in numerous factors, including: ergonomics, weight, dimensions, bells and whistles (whatever these may be, such as Wi-Fi, GPS, burst modes, and so on to no end), being accustomed to buttons layout, menus, etc.

The gear are tools one can use to take photos, and the most proficient one becomes with it the easier it is for one to take a photo. The same for a painter and his or her brushes, canvas, and so on. The fact is that most often one upgrades a camera, long before one knows everything about it.

 

[tis100]

Another key factor...is the ability to look at and see -- really see -- something interesting and intriguing in the otherwise ordinary and mundane

I think this is important insight.

Why should we limit photographic gear to being physical tools? Why not broaden the definition to include mental tools?

How to think about seeing is essential to creative expression.

Something which is key here, too, which hasn't really been addressed much in this discussion, but which plays a significant role...(is) the opportunity to shoot the image(s) in the first place.

Other people have other unique photo ops because of where they live or where they travel...

In this context, one's innate abilities of perception could be considered equivalent to the opportunities an individual has to experience different environments.

Even though we may have different opportunities, there is still room to maximize our own potential within those environments.

I'm now wondering if it would be possible to develop a cameraless photography class about observing. Just your eyes, a notebook, writing instruments and different locations. Since there is no camera, you could frame shots with your hands. (Note: this wouldn't be a drawing class, but a class on communicating and reflecting what and how you observe.)

Is this a thing in art school? I'm in engineering, so i'm not sure.

Thanks for the inspiration!

 

[kenoh]

Not sure if this is useful for anyone but I agree with above that a key lesson to learn is how to see. Not just look for a scene but to SEE it.

A couple of tools that I find help me are these:

1. SRB MonoVue - an eyepiece that you hold up to your face and it gives a feel for what a monochrome image could look like.
2. From Stearman Press I have a Zone View card. this does the same as the Monovue above but with the advantage of having it in a 4x3 frame so helps composition too.
3. Grey Scale and Value finder - This is a card with sections printed according to the zone system, it also has holes in each section so you can hold up the card and look through the hole to help with working out zones.
4. ViewCatcher - this is a great little tool for seeing compositions. It is a neutral grey square (usable for white balance also). It has a square cut in the middle and then markings for different aspect ratios. There is then a slide out piece in it that you slide in and out to change the size of the hole in the centre to give you a compositional tool.

Images attached to help my waffle make more sense above.

 

[chengengaun]

I'm now wondering if it would be possible to develop a cameraless photography class about observing. Just your eyes, a notebook, writing instruments and different locations. Since there is no camera, you could frame shots with your hands. (Note: this wouldn't be a drawing class, but a class on communicating and reflecting what and how you observe.)

Not sure if this is useful for anyone but I agree with above that a key lesson to learn is how to see. Not just look for a scene but to SEE it.

A couple of tools that I find help me are these:

Or...

The simplest "photographic tool" I use is a piece of paper with some shape cut into it, or sometimes just represent a rectangle with my fingers. Good way to imagine composition in a pinch!

Or one can make sketches. John Ruskin wrote the following back in 1838:

Let two persons go out for a walk; the one a good sketcher, the other having no taste of the kind. Let them go down a green lane. There will be a great difference in the scene as perceived by the two individuals. The one will see a lane and trees; he will perceive the trees to be green, though he will think nothing about it; he will see that the sun shines, and that it has a cheerful effect, but that the trees make the lane shady and cool; and he will see an old woman in a red cloak; — et voilà tout!

But what will the sketcher see? His eye is accustomed to search into the cause of beauty, and penetrate the minutest parts of loveliness. He looks up, and observes how the showery and subdivided sunshine comes sprinkled down among the gleaming leaves overhead, till the air is filled with the emerald light, and the motes dance in the green, glittering lines that shoot down upon the thicker masses of clustered foliage that stand out so bright and beautiful from the dark, retiring shadows of the inner tree, where the white light again comes flashing in from behind, like showers of stars; and here and there a bough is seen emerging from the veil of leaves, of a hundred varied colours, where the old and gnarled wood is covered with the brightness, — the jewel brightness of the emerald moss, or the variegated and fantastic lichens, white and blue, purple and red, all mellowed and mingled into a garment of beauty from the old withered branch. Then come the cavernous trunks, and the twisted roots that grasp with their snake-like coils at the steep bank, whose turfy slope is inlaid with flowers of a thousand dyes, each with his diadem of dew: and down like a visiting angel, looks one ray of golden light, and passes over the glittering turf — kiss, — kiss, — kissing every blossom, until the laughing flowers have lighted up the lips of the grass with one bright and beautiful smile, that is seen far, far away among the shadows of the old trees, like a gleam of summer lightening along the darkness of an evening cloud.

Is not this worth seeing? Yet if you are not a sketcher you will pass along the green lane, and when you come home again, have nothing to say or to think about it, but that you went down such and such a lane.

"Essay on the Relative Dignity of the Studies of Painting and Music, and the Advantages to be Derived From Their Pursuit", via "Art and the Mind’s Eye: How Drawing Trains You to See the World More Clearly and to Live with a Deeper Sense of Presence"