It is not the gear.

Use the right tool for the job. Some jobs require more sophisticated, more capable, more niche/specialized, or more high end equipment. Some jobs don't.

Some jobs are made easier with the right equipment, others are impossible without it.

Some people may cook up some photographic concept which no piece of equipment yet devised truly supports. Perhaps they'll invent the tool for the job, or a new camera down the road will come with a new feature that addresses that need.

To say the equipment doesn't matter is oversimplifying things.

I'm with Tom, blanket statements typically land folks in trouble

When the old cameras came out people loved the images. Why do they not love those same images now?

Nothing to see....moving along.

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filmuser wrote in post #18133588
When the old cameras came out people loved the images. Why do they not love those same images now?

As far as I know, people still do love those same images. What makes you think that they don't? Has anyone said anything disparaging about photos taken with older gear?

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The photographs of Adams, Weston, Bresson, Stieglitz, Evans, Lange, Davidson, Winogrand, etc are just as beautiful and moving as they always have been because of the content. I think what this should be about is right tools for the job and finding the tool that best matches your vision and the way you work. Whatever that might be. I have a friend that shot a powerful body of work with a Holga. It was perfect for the message she was trying to communicate.

filmuser wrote in post #18133588
When the old cameras came out people loved the images. Why do they not love those same images now?

It depends on the image. We live in a world where so many new images are being taken, that it takes a lot for any given specific image to really stand out and remain impressive in the minds of many people.

But this isn't really a new thing either. Since the time that reprintable photos have been a thing and allowed people to easily see a copy of a given image, then there have always been some that stood out more than others from that era and were carried through. Think about it, there were millions of photos taken in the 1920s. The majority of images from that decade that people are likely to see are usually ones focused on the event they're depicting rather than being carried forward by society as a well known artifact based on its technical merit.

The newest, latest, bleeding edge of imaging will always aid in developing interest for a photo around the time it was taken. More dynamic range and detail resolution, photographing things that haven't been photographed before, or in ways no one has really done before, and other 'new' things. But eventually all the 'new' things, those images that were produced in no small part because of the advances in the technology or ease of use behind the camera used, become more common place as the tools and methods become more wildly known and available to others, and then we effectively "get bored of it". The image, if it is to stand a chance of lasting as a thing of any real relevance, thus needs to have some reason to remain important beyond pure technical merit.


Frequently the reason a given image survives in the public eye is simply down to being a "Reasonably good image", with regards to the technical aspects, of some historical event, but one that also had some unique aspect to it that caused it to resonate at the time and become widely known, and widely remembered. Other times the image stands the test of time because the event in it was important enough and no other image exists of it. Other images do so because they were the first to hit that critical mass of recognition within the art world, or world at large.

john crossley wrote in post #18133250
But older gear was NEW GEAR when it was first released and its technology superseded that of its predecessors.

Yes and it was great at release. But technology advances and that means that the gear that was once new, now becomes old(er) and has more limits than the gear that came after.

It's the same with every other piece of technology. My first computer was an Apple MacIntosh Classic. It had a hard drive of 40MB and 4MB of RAM. I loved that little computer but I'm sure glad I don't have to work on it today...

With aesthetics and creativity in mind, my favorite period of photography roughly runs from the late 1920s to the late 1960s, with noted exceptions on both sides of course.

And in the realm of image quality, must we go there, I ain’t seen nothing more purty than an original Ansel Adams print dating back decades…

Don’t forget those platinum prints from the turn of the century, well, turn of the last century…so warmly engrossing.

And Robert Frank’s “The Americans” is a technical mess but easily the best photographic essay I’ve seen.

That’s the thing about art; new technologies can expand the field or introduce radical new concepts that were beforehand impossible to achieve, but good art survives the trends, whether with or without the help of technology's latest.

I still like the sound of a piano, or Beethoven’s Ninth, or paintings from centuries gone by, or sculptures made by hand, or a human voice (oh so primitive).

But I also know that if I wanted to take a detailed photo of an Osprey just before talon grabs poor fishy, my beloved rangefinder would likely throw a fit.

And then there’s technology helping the ancient, as in albums or CDs bringing me Mozart and the Ramones or the Internet (or high quality printing press) bringing me photos from Weston.

Old cameras took lovely photos that remain, to this day, lovely, whether we’re talking about a hundred-year old large format or the first Canon 5D. Technological progress might add but it does not necessarily improve depending on the goal and style sought or appreciated…sufficienc​y, as I stated earlier.

One can still write a great novel with pen, a typewriter, an old but functioning PC, or on the latest tablet. In the arts, presumed encumbrance is subjective, whereby one might find enjoyment in the very process that another might utterly abhor.

And while no one is saying anything round these parts at this particular time; yes their are folks who would consider a 5D MKI too dated simply based on chronology and little else. These folks have a right to their opinion, but I still think they’re a bit misguided.

Three minutes is huge credit for giant dandelion gearhead dude holding some nothing special picture and nothing special digicam picture somewhere in this video.

Is he capable of taking it with Brownie?

Well, the prime examples of where gear matters in this thread seem to circle around sports, wildlife and extreme low light. I think it's fair to say that these are among the more demanding photographic pursuits when it comes to gear. So I have no argument with gear mattering in these circumstances.

Don't get me wrong. I like gear at least as much as the next guy.

But most of the photographs taken by most photographers are not from these demanding pursuits.

And most people taking pictures think they would do better if only they had better gear.

And experience will do much more than gear to raise the level of photography for those shooting most things such as street, landscapes, portraits, pictures of friends, pictures of things, travel, etc.

So I think the video makes a good and valid point.

Have I been missing some groundswell of gear shaming/blaming?

It seems to me that, gear limitations notwithstanding, most everyone here knows all to well the most profound limiting factor is found behind camera.

I felt limited by gear in the '70s. Shooting semi-pro soccer in Bremerhaven with an FX-2 and 135 2.8 (both manual everything). Taking a 1DIV/70-200 f/4L IS USM to my grandson's ball games provides a lot more opportunities. It doesn't make me a better photographer. Gear matters, but it can't fix stupid. Sorry, Ron.

I still use a 300D. A little fixing in LR and ON1 resizing. I get good rsults that people like.

filmuser wrote in post #18133588
When the old cameras came out people loved the images. Why do they not love those same images now?

I've changed what I can shoot, how I can work as I shoot it, and what level of problems I'm willing to put up with as the cameras have improved. It's not hard to think of examples.

I was shooting indoor sports with very fast primes, and simply putting up with some degree of motion blur softening shots or ruining some as I could only get to a certain ISO level.

As the cameras and NR got better, I stopped having to put up with motion blur.

As they got even better than that, I stopped using primes and started using f/2.8 zooms. That allows me to get more shots in less time.

So yeah.....as cameras have improved in the last decade I've seen improvements in both what I have shot and how I have been able to work. It makes a difference.

Going from a FM2 to a D7200 - and skipping everything in between - it's a slight difference Lol.
I can really appreciate some of the features now for sure.