"With Digital We Often Just Blast Away"

I know I've harped on this "secret" stuff a few times before, but before I write what I want to write about I thought I'd mention I received the October issue of PC Photo magazine in the mail a day or so ago and guess what's on the cover? Yep, another exciting announcement about secrets being revealed.

Here's what it says on PC Photo's cover: "Top Pros Reveal Their Secrets!" This stuff just cracks me up. The new edition of Rangefinder magazine heralds this: "Mysteries of Lighting Revealed." I guess it doesn't occur to the editors of these rags that, once they've revealed the secrets of the pros and/or the mysteries of lighting, neither are secrets nor mysteries anymore. Maybe they figure it this way: There are so many secrets and mysteries yet to be revealed they can continue printing secrets and mysteries articles forever? Oh well. What do I know? That kind of cover-copy probably sells magazines or I doubt they would be hawking these, uhhh... revelations over and over and over.

If I ever get a chance to write an article for a photography magazine, I think I want to call it Jedi Photo Tricks of JimmyD Revealed! That assumes, of course, I have any Jedi photo tricks worth revealing and not already addressed in the many articles about pro's secrets and lighting mysteries in which they've probably (and most-likely) already been revealed... once or twice or more, believe it or not.

Anyway, back to the subject of today's post: I was perusing one of my fave glamour photography forums, Glamour1, and I came across a thread that interested me. Actually, it wasn't so much the intitial subject of the thread that caught my attention but a reply within it and posted by the thread's author, R. Frederick Smith, an excellent shooter and graphic designer from the Dallas/Ft. Worth, Texas, area. (Note: You might have to register on the G1 board for the link to RFS's most-excellent portfolio to work.)

Smith wrote, "I shot hundreds of weddings, commercial jobs, etc over 40 years using film and have been shooting digital now for 5 or 6 years. I find that digital is uniformly sharper than film. The out of focus problems with digital plague many photographers because of poor technique. With film we tended to shoot more carefully because we didn't get instant feedback of our results and we were shooting many fewer frames, so had fewer chances to get it right."

Mr. Smith goes on to write, "With digital we often just blast away. I try to be very aware of the tendency to shoot too fast, and consciously slow down and take time to focus properly. That means being very careful of the focus lock and recompose method that so often causes problems for digital workers. You also have to know you lens and your camera and know if the lens focuses right on or not."

Right on! I totally agree. I've thunk on this myself more than a few times.

RFS continues: "The other problem that many digital shooters have, is not understanding that an image from a digital camera is generally softer (less sharp) right out of the camera. So we either have to user the in camera sharpening and contrast controls or we do it in post processing. I shoot RAW, and I always go through a routine of several sharpening phases to get the best results."

Personally, I shoot a lot of stuff as Large JPGs but I agree sharpening either in the camera or in post or both is often needed when shooting digital. Less so, I should add, as I progressed from Canon's 10D to a 20D to a 5D.

And finally, RFS comments thusly: "Another factor is how we present photos. In the film days the bulk of our work was either printed or projected. But now most of our work is often displayed on the web. This requires two different sharpening methods, one for the web and one for print. Often times, photographers, are not aware of this, and so get bad results in one of the two areas (if not both)."

Great advice from a seasoned pro! Maybe not a secret or a mystery revealed but certainly important stuff to consider as we march along the path to photo Nirvana. BTW, I don't see anything inherently wrong with occasionally blasting away as long as it's done with skill, a steady hand, and good technique. Sometimes, blasting away means capturing those special, frozen moments in time, that might otherwise be missed.

The eye-candy accompanying this post is model Monica who hails from down-under and whom I've been lucky enough to shoot a number of times. Monica is a lot of fun and always a real hoot to have in front of the camera!