Alright, so the last lesson of Discourse was last week and it consisted of a debate. The debate was over the question ‘Have computers made life worse [photography wise]?’
Now I won’t lie, I missed the beginning of this debate due to the fact I was tired and fell asleep. But according to my friend who was awake, the start of the debate wasn’t very interesting anyway.
There were lots of points thrown back and forth, for this blog I will title the teams ‘For Computer’ and ‘Anti Computer’ just to make it easier to understand.
Team For Computer were expressing their views in a very shy manner, but they had strong points. Some of their main points that computers had made life better were the following;
> Editing images is now easier
> More resources mean more abstract work can be created
> Thanks to the web, photographers can be seen better around the world and it is easier to get information.
> Online blogs help others see into the mind of the Photographer, which helps bring out the creative side of others.
> Thanks to the evolution of technology, we have more ways to distribute art around the world and into peoples homes, through the internet, television, printing the images off using high tech printing services to give outstanding results etc.
Team Anti-Computer were the complete opposite of the first group, then again they did have one of the best speakers in the class on their team. They made their points clear, here are a few of them;
> Computers have made people lazy. Why work on creating a practical portfolio when you can just edit whatever images you have on Photoshop and make an online one?
> Anyone can say they’re a photographer now thanks to editing programmes. There is no hard work in it anymore. Before computers, people who have to take the images on film, you would get one shot at the picture, you couldn’t see the outcome until it was developed. You would then have to work on carefully developing the film and the pictures. These days people just buy a camera, point and shoot, and say they’re photographers.
> It’s even harder to get your name out there now. Thanks to computers, anyone can share their work online, the good work gets drowned under the bad. Instead of going through around 12 people to get a job, you have to go through hundreds.
> Overall, it has made Photography too easy. You don’t need to go out into the world and find jobs anymore, you can just look online and apply via email, sending a virtual portfolio instead of spending time carefully developing images for a physical one.
Personally, I like how the internet has influenced Photography. Yes, it has made it easier and has made old methods almost obsolete, but it hasn’t completely deleted it from the world altogether. Film is still used to this day, sure it isn’t as popular but it isn’t as convenient as digital. You can only get a certain style with film photography, which is why people still use it, to get that old and grainy feel that you can’t replicate with Photoshop no matter how good your skills are.
Basically, the bottom line is; Humanity is evolving. Either evolve with it or get left behind.
Have an opinion on the subject? Feel free to throw in a comment on your views.
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