Valokuvaajien eri tasot - pitkä, mutta herättävä juttu englanniksi! :-)
Carpe Diem
A Spiritual and Satirical Guide. I summarize this into 2 levels here.
© 2006 KenRockwell.com
Artist: Top Level 7 (equivalent to "Heaven" in Christian mythology)
This is the highest level.
An artist fixes his imagination in a tangible form called a photograph.
He captures the spirit of place or person, real or imagined, in this
photograph and the viewer responds to this.
An artist is a complete master of his tools. When creating art an artist
transcends common existence as his spirit flies up to meet that which he
is capturing. He may practice and learn his tools while he is not
creating, however when creating the camera becomes an extension of his
mind. No conscious thought is expended on the technical issues with
which he is a virtuoso while creating photographs.
To make a musical analogy, a musician may woodshed his scales, but when
he's jamming he's not even thinking about fingerings. He's lost in the
passion of the moment.
Just like professional surfers who have a dozen boards or pro guitarists
who have 23 axes, an artist may have a slew of cameras, each for a
different purpose.
Likewise, other artists may only have one camera, or none at all. It
just doesn't matter.
Artists sometimes dress funny and tend to stay up late. They usually
prefer to photograph attractive young women and are proud of it.
No one ever sees their work since they have crummy ability to promote
themselves, and sadly, usually don't even appreciate their own excellent
work. Those that do drop down to Whore, which sadly and paradoxically
means you will never see the work of a true artist unless you know one
personally. Good artists are usually too embarrassed to show their work
to anyone unless you are intimate with them, since their work is their soul.
Artists use any sort of camera, including pinholes and disposables, or 8
x 10s. They use whatever instrument they need to create what they want.
Whore: Level 6 back to top
A whore is an artist who sells his soul by accepting money or drugs for
his art.
By lowering himself to this level his vision is compromised.
Why? Because when one depends on selling one's soul to pay for one's
food and pad one does not screw with the program, which means that one
does not try new styles.
If a whore's work pays his bills after years of trying, it's unlikely
any whore will be open to trying new styles while he still needs the dough.
Artists with representation (meaning they are represented by a gallery
or an artists' representatives just as pimps do in the sex trade) may
lose that representation if they change their style.
Therefore, art for sale from one person rarely gets better or different.
The style that sells is all a whore's johns and pimps (representatives)
want to see. See Barnbaum's book on artistry. It is extraordinarily
difficult for a successful whore to change styles once one has been
accepted.
More about the whore class at level 10 here.
Amateur: Level 5 back to top
People who earn less than half of their income from photography are
amateurs. This has nothing to do with the quality of their photography.
This person loves to create photographs. Good amateurs of pure spirit
can transcend the other levels directly to being an artist.
People who shoot weddings and etc. on weekends as a side line from their
day jobs are still amateurs; they just charge for their photos. And as
you read here they may also charge a lot for their snaps.
Amateurs who think that better cameras will improve their photos are at
risk of descending to the lowest level of equipment measurbator. Too
many amateurs have been misled by camera makers into thinking that they
need good cameras for good images. This thought is poison to creating art.
Amateurs who lose themselves in creating great images are set for a path
of enlightenment.
Being an amateur is a good thing; from this level one can rise to the
level of artist rather easily.
Amateurs almost always shoot Canon SLRs.
Snapshooter: Level 4 back to top
This is my mom and most people. These people want memories, as opposed
to photographs or cameras.
Snapshooters who are graphic artists or otherwise visually literate
people often make fantastic images that impress everyone. These
snapshooters are artists and don't even realize it. They usually dress
better than the artists who think they really are artists.
Believe it: it's the photographer who makes an image, not a camera.
Snapshooters use point-and-shoot and disposable cameras, which give the
same excellent results as the Leicas, Nikons, Canons and Contaxes used
by everyone else.
Professional: Level 3 back to top
A professional photographer is a person who earns his entire living
(100%) from the sale of photographs.
Professionals do not create art for a living; they create images for
commerce. They usually have some familiarity with the tools and can get
out decent images, however they may or may not be able to capture
imagination.
Of course professionals may create great images, but that's on their own
time.
Professionals spend very little time worrying about cameras, except when
they need to get them repaired. They spend most of their time looking
for work and pissing about how all the other photographers in town are
dropping their prices.
Professionals spend more on film and lab fees each month than they spend
on camera gear in a year.
There are no professional nature photographers. They all either have day
jobs or make their wives support them.
Professionals shoot Nikon SLRs, Mamiya medium format and Calumet 4x5"
cameras. They cannot afford gear as good as most serious amateurs.
Unless you are a commercial photography buyer or know one as a friend
you have not heard of professional photographers. The ones you may have
seen in camera ads proclaiming that they use this or that camera are
just spokesmodels.
Professionals don't have websites and don't put out technical
newsletters. Those people are usually amateurs.
Rich Amateur: Level 2 back to top
These are amateurs who, by having too much money, buy lots of equipment
which can fetter their freedom of expression. They are mostly men, and
many are old or retired.
Rich amateurs shoot Leicas, Contaxes, Alpas, Hasselblads and Linhof
4x5s. These are great cameras, but the results are the same as the
Zenits, Pentaxes, Bronicas and Tachiharas.
Today they mostly shoot Canon 1Ds-Mk IIs, 5Ds or Nikon D2X.
These are the same idiots who bought the first 2.7 Megapixel digital
SLRs designed for newspapers like the Nikon D1 back in 2000 just because
they cost $5,000. They gave technically poorer results than the film
cameras used by snapshooters. All because it's expensive doesn't make it
good.
Bad rich amateurs think fuzzy B/W images of poor people are art.
Some rich amateurs fall into the bottom spiritual level easily because
they worry too much about equipment, others go straight on to create
great art since they don't have any worries about equipment since they
think they own the best. Oddly, few rich amateurs produce ordinary work.
It either rules or sucks.
Equipment Measurbator: Bottom Level 1 (equivalent to "Hell" in Christian
mythology)
back to top
These men (and they are all men) have no interest in art or photography
because they have no souls. Lacking souls they cannot express
imagination or feeling, which is why their images, if they ever bother
to make any, suck.
These folks have analysis paralysis and never accomplish anything.
Does poring over a microscope analyzing test images have anything to do
with photographing a Joshua tree at dawn? Of course not. Even worse,
time wasted concentrating on tests is time not spent learning useful
aspects of photography and certainly time that could have been better
spent actually photographing. Test just enough to know what your gear
can do, and then get on with real photography.
They are interested solely in equipment for its own sake. They will talk
your ear off for hours if you let them, but as soon as you ask to see
their portfolio their bravado scurries away, or they think you want to
see their cameras or stocks. You can read why cameras simply don't
matter here.
Most seem to come from technical avocations, like engineering, computers
and sciences. These people worry so much about trying to put numerical
ratings on things that they are completely oblivious to the fact that
cameras or test charts have nothing to do with the spirit of an image.
Because they worry so much about measuring camera performance we have
dubbed them "Measurbators." Unfortunately, many of them wander into
KenRockwell.com looking for information on camera performance.
Many of them also play with audio equipment, computers or automobiles.
They enjoy these toys just like their cameras for their own sake, but
rarely if ever actually use them for the intended purposes.
Younger ones play video games or engage in chat rooms and web surfing.
Older ones join "camera" clubs. (You should join photography clubs, but
never camera clubs or any clubs that try to score art, since art is
entirely subjective and cannot be scored numerically.) Likewise, these
people never create anything notable with any of this other gear either,
but they sure get excited by just having, getting or talking to you
about it.
The one type of gear these people ignore is the only type of gear that
actually helps: lighting.
Someone with a decent portfolio is not an equipment measurbator. Someone
with more cameras than decent photos just may be. People with websites
teeming with technical articles but few interesting photographs probably
are.
Do not under any circumstances deal with these people, talk to them,
read their websites or especially ask them for photography advice. To
the innocent they seem like founts of knowledge, however their sick,
lifeless souls would love to drag you into their own personal Hells and
have your spirit forever mired in worrying about how sharp your lens is.
If you start worrying about this and you'll never photograph anything
again except brick walls and test charts.
These people are easy to identify. If you've read this far you've
probably seen their websites. They always have lots of info about
equipment, but very few real photographs. Beware of any information from
any website not loaded with photography you admire.
Other people have other words for these people. This article here adds
some more perspective.
I had to pull most of the photos of equipment off my site because these
people were spending more time looking at my equipment than my art! The
bandwidth for which I pay was being eaten up by these idiots looking at
my lenses, instead of looking at the photos in my gallery which is the
whole point of this site. That's why all the stupid pages like this one
are in yellow, so that their eyes hurt too much to waste too much time
on the nuts and bolts.
Most people who waste my time e-mailing me with technical and equipment
questions through this site unfortunately belong to this unenlightened
bottom group. Almost anyone who actually worries about the level they
occupy belong to the bottom. Many of these folks stalk the Internet, and
spend hours getting off "contributing" to technical websites and
photography chat rooms like Photo.net, www.dpreview.com and
photocritique.net instead of making photos. The guys here aren't too
bad, and most of the Leica people here are just equipment collectors.
Lähde Ken Rockwell
Matti Vuori
news:e5fd5i$i7t$1...@nyytiset.pp.htv.fi:
> © 2006 KenRockwell.com
Mitä kohtaa yllä olevassa tekijänoikeusmerkinnässä et ymmärtänyt?
--
Matti Vuori, <http://sivut.koti.soon.fi/mvuori>
Sakari Hannula
> The Seven Levels of Photographers
Olipas taas yksi kannustavan positiivinen kirjoitus lisää. :-D
Mutta, onko Ken Rockwell Jore Puusa? Ainakin molemmat ovat
mielipiteiltään jyrkkiä ja joustamattomia, sekä kategoroivat
valokuvaajia hämmästyttävänkin yhteneväisiin lokeroihin. ;)
Rockwell yrittää pehmentää kirjoituksensa sävyä mainostamalla sitä
satiirina, mutta ainakin minusta tuo on vain yksi lisäys samaan
jatkumoon, minkä hänen järkkymättömät mielipiteensä valokuvauksesta [ja
vähän muustakin] muodostavat. Tuon kun lukee Rockwell-filsun läpi, siinä
on paljon hauskaakin. Ja väriä Ken tuo itsensäkin manaamien loputtomien
MTF-testaajien ja CA:n mittaajien kyllästämään nettitarjontaan.
.s
Carpe Diem
> Carpe Diem <Carpe...@poistambnet.fi> wrote in
> news:e5fd5i$i7t$1...@nyytiset.pp.htv.fi:
>> A Spiritual and Satirical Guide. I summarize this into 2 levels here.
>> © 2006 KenRockwell.com
>> (...)
>
> Mitä kohtaa yllä olevassa tekijänoikeusmerkinnässä et ymmärtänyt?
>
tietoa hänen sivuistaan peittelemättä. :-)
Entä mitä mieltä olitkaan itse jutusta?
jaakko
> The Seven Levels of Photographers
en herännyt, Ken on tyypillinen oman osaamisensa mystifioija.
Ilman muuta ammattilaisen on opeteltava tekniikka ja sen mahdollisuudet,
muu on puppua. Ammattimaisessa toiminnassa tekniikkaan paneutumiseen
kuluvan ajan suhde kuvaamiseen kuluvaan aikaan on luonnollisesti eri
luokkaa kuin harrastelijalla. Pätee mihin tahansa
työ-/harrastustoimintaan, jossa on tekniikkaa mukana.
"There are no stupid questions, only stupid answers."
Kuvia voi ottaa ja niiden ottamisesta voi nauttia niin monella tavalla.
--
kirjoitti,
Jaakko
o~
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