Too Many Images

I was reading an article on HDR in the Jan/Feb Photo Techniques magazine and it was interesting and informative but something the author said got me thinking.

He said "The downside of using this technique is that I need more space on my CF cards and disks, as well as more time needed for processing."

My first thought was so what? Storage is cheap, computers are faster, what's the problem? I then had the thought that yes storage is cheap, computers are faster and that is a problem.

The reason that it is a problem is because of the greater volume of work a person can produce in a given period of time. We are getting away from the practice of looking at our subject in greater detail and really seeing what is the best view of our subject before we click the shutter. Just kinda shooting from the hip.

That's ok if you are shooting action or some fast paced event, you can't spend that kind of time. This is the time when you shoot a lot and hope for the best. But when it come down to just every day kind of shooting I think we need to slow down and take the time needed to make a better photograph.

Here's an example of what I mean. Last weekend My friend Steve and I went out with our 4x5 cameras to photograph in a couple of old cemetaries that I know of. In a period of 3 of so hours I'll bet that we together didn't make more that a dozen or so exposures. If we were working with our digital cameras I'm sure we would have taken 200 plus shots each easily.

The mechanics of the 4 x 5 camera and expensive of the film make you slow down and think about what you are doing. I'll bet that we get a higher percentage of keepers, because we more deliberate in our shooting.

I don't want to give the impression that I am against new photographic methods, I love working digitally, but I think we need to stress less about quantity and more about quality.

When we are out shooting the question shouldn't be how many shots did we get, we should ask if we got anything worthwhile.