I think those are very cool, but are ultimately a novelty. There is no sense of immediacy with any of those wraparound views. Photography is based upon creating an impression with a fixed image, not one which the viewer can manipulate.
I’ve seen it taken a good deal further than that too - in the most extreme example, using single-use disposable 35mm cameras.
Obviously that imposes a serious technical crimp on the job, and wrests a huge chunk of control from the hands of the photographer - but even with the worst possible kit, it should still be possible to take pictures that (within adjusted expectations with respect to the quality of the engineering, etc) are ‘good’ - compensating for the lack of exposure control by carefully waiting for the right light, for example.
I think it would be proper to say that Photography was based upon creating an impression with a fixed image. In any case you can extract any single view you want from the file. I personally like being able to control the point of view. Being able to take in the whole panorama or study the texture of a single leaf as I choose. Of course, the current technology is quite primitive. In 5 or 10 years we will be able to do things that are much more impressive.
Yes, they can be easily dismissed at ‘snapshots’ not photography. Yes, they lack the relative artistic merit to change world perceptions. Still
Pretty good for a phone: http://www.flickr.com/photos/33743995@N00/sets/72157628538220551/
I agree, things are changing and there’s no point limited ourselves to what we were restricted to in the past. It’s a different experience, but not one that is inherently better or worse. My digital photography is quite different than my film photography for a variety of reasons. Some general principles hold, mainly composition and story telling, but some don’t. Personally, I spend a good amount of time post processing and I never did with film.
Most people will still take the equivalent of poor snapshots with this new technology, don’t worry.
This is actually quite fun, too. Years and years ago, I bought a Holga for the hell of it. Now, I don’t use it that often, but it was interesting what it did for my frame of mind and shooting. The camera itself, if people don’t know, is just a toy camera. It’s plastic, takes 120 medium format film, has a vague manual focusing mechanism, two shutter speeds: (1/100 or 1/125) and two apertures (f/8 or f/11). The shutter speeds and aperture settings were approximate, at best, and I remember my Holga didn’t seem to make any difference in f/8 or f/11. Basically, it’s a camera that requires you to “let go” of the frame. The framing through the viewfinder is approximate, at best. It was also notorious for light leaks.
And, yet, it was psychologically freeing. With so many controls taken away from me, it freed up that analytical, technical left side of the brain and forced me to shoot instinctually, forced me to let go of having everything perfect in the frame, and had me just looking for the moment or the light, pointing, and clicking the shutter. David Burnett, a distinguished photojournalist, won an award for this photo of Gore on the campaign trail, taken with a Holga. One of my friends actually shot an entire paid wedding (about $2000, IIRC) on a Holga. If you know what you’re doing, you can get some beautiful, although somewhat unpredictable, results from it, which is part of the fun of shooting with it–that element of surprise and serendipity.
David Pogue did a nice video from your point on the iPhone.
Notice Photosynth is available as an app for the iPhone. I’m sure similar technology will migrate to actual cameras in a few years, but the iPhone is it right now.
That video is cute, but it misses a lot of what makes great photography great photography. Sure, a good photographer can take a decent photo using an iPhone. Given the right lighting conditions, I could take great photos in a studio with an iPhone (see the fashion shoot photo linked to above.) But, as a camera (even with all the add-ons), it is quite limiting. Although, for some photographers, those limitations can be a source of inspiration.
I’m sure Pogue wasn’t serious. He spends a lot of his columns writing about various cameras. Come to think about it, since he write a weekly column for the NY Times and does segments on CNBC, he may be the most read writer in the United States on Camera topics.
Because you can’t. For example, if you are taking a picture of a lion in a cage you can use a low f number to make the bars out of focus to get them out of the picture. Without a DSLR type camera, you can’t, and you can’t take the bars out later because there isn’t enough information to interpolate behind them.
It’s a trick of optics, not image manipulation. Long lens, wide open f-stop, focus beyond/thru fence.
I suppose if someone were VERY skilled in photoshop, they might be able to draw in a reasonable amount of the subject, but that’s a lot of work for something I can do in 3 secs while shooting.
I still don’t get the problem. Erasing bars is pretty easy with easy with a clone tool. I have a picture where l erased an an entire girlfriend.
ERASING isn’t the problem.
FILLING in the place you erased IS. You cannot just make up what wasn’t there. Well, you can but at best it won’t be real and at worst it won’t look quit real either.
I think its cute you think made up photographic information is going to totally replace photography of stuff that actually exists.
Which is possible for photos in front of landscape, but how are you going to replace the part of the lions head blocked out by the bar?
I shudder to think that the people that can’t make a competent picture will try to fix it with an even more complicated piece of equipment (seriously, learning the basics of photography is easier than learning photoshop at t he same level).
As Treis mentioned before, it is easier to clone out something out of a vast expanse of the same thing (grass, sky, wall, skin, whathaveyou), but once you paint something that isn’t there you are just making a guess, possibly an educated one, but just a guess. And Og forbid one day photojournalists are allowed to do this.
Another thing I always say is that I’d rather take the time to make a good picture than spend any time trying to ‘fix’ a bad one.
I recently saw a photo of Obama giving an alien dressed as Santa a blow job. Thats right Obama has sold us out. The alien work camps start sometime in 2012. The Mayans were right!
I have many cases where I faked a picture, but it just as valid as an artist’s painting.
I have a friend who had only one picture of her dead father and it was partially torn. Am I being dishonest in filling in enough so she could hang a picture on the wall?
I found one picture of my whole family. My mother left it in a box and part of it was chewed by a mouse. I can’t take the picture again. My parents and my sister are dead. It is either fix it or do without.
I had some friends that needed a picture for a poster for their show, but they couldn’t be shot at the same time. So I took some pictures in the morning and some in the afternoon and spliced them together. It was a bit of a challenge since they were outside, but who looks at a poster with a magnifying glass?
If you might recall, the discussion started when someone said you need a DSLR to be able get a blurred background effects and I said you can always add the blurring later. Am I dishonest for doing something in software that he did in hardware?
I’m not a photojournalist. I’m not using the pictures as evidence in court. If the picture works as art, then it is good enough for me.
…whoa hold on a second: how did we get from “add the blurring later” to repairing a photo that can never be taken again? These are completely different situations. As a photographer you sometimes encounter situations where you run out of options. You list two excellent cases for this.
But a blurred background? Click, spin click snap and I’m done, I have a blurred background. Why would you even think of doing that in post? I’m a photographer not a graphic artist: I wouldn’t have a clue how to use a blur filter in photoshop but I can get a blurred out background in seconds using the camera controls.
And I think that really is the point that people are making. As a photographer your first instincts are to figure out a way to do things in camera where possible. Blur is one of the easiest effects to get in camera: there is nothing dishonest about doing it in post, but why would you do that when it is so much simpler to do it in camera?
Because this is the dope.
-Intentional misunderstanding,
-“my way is the only way”
-I disagree with you, therefore you’re wrong
-You missed this edge case, therefore your whole thesis is invalid
are key tenets in debating topics here. 