Is "Image Quality" technobabble?

[pgk]

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I do have moments where I see my old 35mm photos as lacking certain hard-metric qualities because for some time I used crappy old lenses.

My mother has a photo on her wall which I took in the late 1970s when I was a student. It was a Valachrome print (made with a true, physical, unsharp mask on Cibachrome paper) from a Kodachrome 64 transparency, shot on a Nikon FM using a 28mm f/3.5 Nikkor lens. The lens was a borrowed one from the uni photo department's stores and had seen a hard life - the Ai prong had been broken off. The photo is still enjoyable to view and I see it everytime I vist. It has withstood the test of time. The technical details are actually irrelevant and the print is only adequately sharp by today's fastidious standards.

 

I finally got the Kodachrome back a couple of years ago from a photo agency which failed, and its in my 'to be scanned' box awaiting the magic of digital optimisation to finally provide me with a print. I don't care that it won't be as good as If I'd shot it on a current camera.

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[Paul J]

Creating the best images I can is paramount to me and image quality therefore is very important to me. The enth degree matters to me and I spend alot of money to get it. If no one else cares, or doesn't see it, that makes no difference to me. It really does matter to me.

 

I look to get as much of it (IQ) as I can and then I forget about it and take pictures. I am reminded of it constantly though when I view the images large on my monitor.

 

There have been times that I've used other cameras and have not been able to look past the mushy softness of their lenses or flat lifeless colour and contrast. I get really quite disappointed by that.

 

At the same time and at the other extreme I love Lo-Fi. I love Polaroid. I love flaws when they are used intentionally. It's always about intent though. It's always about it's purpose for me. I would rather start off with a high IQ image and mess with it.

[Peter H]

Creating the best images I can is paramount to me and image quality therefore is very important to me. ...............

 

I attended the opening of an exhibition on Friday evening at which the photographer said "the photos are not very strong technically but they really express what I felt..."

 

They were remarkable photogravures of seascapes that melded into the paper and gave a remarkable sense of immediacy and direct and absolute truthfulness. I felt that they'd be salty and wet to touch, though I didn't touch them.

 

There are many ways of achieving the "best image". The inevitably vain search for technical perfection is one of them, but don't you ever feel that it may on occasion be a rather limiting one?

[Paul J]

I attended the opening of an exhibition on Friday evening at which the photographer said "the photos are not very strong technically but they really express what I felt..."

 

They were remarkable photogravures of seascapes that melded into the paper and gave a remarkable sense of immediacy and direct and absolute truthfulness. I felt that they'd be salty and wet to touch, though I didn't touch them.

 

There are many ways of achieving the "best image". The inevitably vain search for technical perfection is one of them, but don't you ever feel that it may on occasion be a rather limiting one?

 

I don't want to listen to a song sung by someone with a terrible voice. On the same account most technically perfect but soulless voices bore the hell out of me too. I want to hear someone who has a voice which is full of soul, life and character. Someone who has the ability and intelligence to step outside of the technical excellence, mess with it, colour it with their soul, ideas and intelligence. Play with the resonance the inflections, the tone. Someone who can make it discordant and still make it sound amazing. Someone who can take the song and manipulate it and express the true meaning and emotion of the song and make you feel the story as well as hear it, sending a chill down your spine. But when all that is done AND is technically brilliant as well, WOW, it makes it so much more special.

 

Same goes for photography. There are so many facets of it and to me, successful photography is using the right tool, at the right time, for the right reasons with full intent. My work is not in the slightest about perfection. I like to mess with things. But to do it properly I need a base level quality to pull it off. I start with the most IQ I can and then I fuck it up, degrade it, mess up the colour and other elements. But I always need, at some point, a reference point of High IQ because I stand for high standards of craft in my art and Photography really is an art and very much a craft. Personally I can't imagine why anyone would think that is vain. I can't understand why anyone wouldn't want the same standards in their work.

 

Photography that shows content AND technical excellence is elevated into another category entirely. It's seriously hard to learn and to execute and when it happens it says so, so , so much more. It doesn't mean every single you shot you take needs to be scientific.

 

I love Lo-Fi looking work that is full of soul and character. But for me, for many reasons I will always employ the highest IQ I can to begin with. I love Polaroid for example. I can make my M9 look like polaroid but I can't make polaroid look like my M9. So high IQ has, ultimaty, a very great flexibility and for me that is ultimately why I choose to use it.

 

One of the reasons I'm drawn to Leica is the high IQ with a wide range of older rendering lenses. Modern ones too if I want. It's a beautiful synergy of high IQ and creative expression when used with intent.

 

The problem with discussions and labels like Image Quality and acronyms like IQ is they try and describe something that is a part of, is intertwined with, something that is as intangible as art and expression. It is not and will never be the be all and end all, but IQ can very much be a protagonist of the message of a photo.

[Peter H]

I don't want to listen to a song sung by someone with a terrible voice. ................................

 

Paul, there's material for a lengthy essay in this alone!

[pico]

Paul, there's material for a lengthy essay in this alone!

 

Illustrated, one would hope.

.

[CalArts 99]

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I don't think this is really a new phenomenon, although perhaps some of the vocabulary and how it's being used is new (as Steve has already mentioned.) But it's been going on since the very beginning of photography. And if you look at the popular photo magazines during the 1970s predating digital, there was always this emphasis on the equipment. And with the film and chemicals, too. And people were saying "glass" and "shoot" back then (terms I also dislike.) People argued about the "image quality" and were using "technobabble." But while it may remain as babble, it is not to them since that aspect is what really interests them in photography. The content and context of the image itself is more often only secondary, or even sometimes of no significance at all other than to mirror the technical capabilities of the devices that are being coveted. And there's also the reality that the technical is going to be easier to talk about over discussing the cultural value of an image itself. I suppose it's the old quantitative versus qualitative issue. Although 'artspeak' can often be the equivalent of 'technobabble.'

 

Nothing has really changed other than the exponential growth of everything (people and commodities), and instant and readily available communication via the internet. Those people inclined to be more engrossed in the technical aspect of photography have probably increased (aside from a basic population growth) due to the digital age and the hyper fast advances of its technology, the reduced costs of being able to obtain the technology, and the plethora of electronic soap boxes on which to stand, i.e., websites, blogs, and forums. So yeah, I think it all feels more like it's 'in one's face' than it was before.

 

Photography has been 'burdened' with the apparatus end of the medium since the very beginning. It can't very easily be detached from the recording device itself. And it's always been attached to the idea that the device has the potential to depict the world as a mirror of the mind's eye. Although there are similarities in other forms of visual communication, too. Painting became recognized as an expressive art form later in its history; initially it was used as a specific form of realistic communication. There were technical devices used in painting (e.g., the camera obscura) and there has always been a premium placed on the painter's ability to realistically capture the world (at least by the lay person.) Those invested in realism (e.g., illustrators) will argue about "image quality" and their tools and all the technical aspects of them. And much of it can be purely "technobabble."

 

And audiophiles will argue about the equipment and "image quality" and rarely the content of the music itself. Some will even only listen to 'perfectly recorded' material despite the value of the content. Many car enthusiasts will talk about the "image quality" and all the technical aspects of their brand of choice despite that they never drive the car to its limits nor will ever train to race on the track. And a lot of this ends up as simply "technobabble."

 

Technobabble has always been around. In this particular case I think it's because it's a relatively easy thing in which to sound somewhat proficient since it's at the lay person's level in respect to its use in photography. Whereas an optical engineer or a sensor manufacturer will normally have something 'real' to say.

 

btw, for those who are interested in these sorts of phenomena of the medium, I recommend Vilem Flusser's Towards a Philosophy of Photography. The two chapters, "The Technical Image" and "The Apparatus" are interesting bits of philosophical observation. Towards a Philosophy of Photography, Flusser

 

And I also highly recommend reading Photography: A Middle Brow Art by the late Pierre Bourdieu. Especially if one is interested in the 'camera club' phenomenon. Photography: A Middle-Brow Art - Pierre Bourdieu and associates Translated by Shaun Whiteside

[Paul J]

The quest was always for quality. Before digital the quest was for large format. 10x8 and 5x4 was considered the greatest image quality that a professional could use. A photographer always gained more credibility when capturing with 10x8. There was so much mystery about it back then but one could clearly see the advantage in tonality and colour alone. The compromise was always medium format and there was a battle between the brands who had the best quality. Mamiya v Hasselblad v Rollei etc. Lenses were discussed and compared ad nauseam, film backs such as the Contax 645 Vacuum back declared unparalleled sharpness and image quality. Then the digital change over happened and we were made to endure years of film v digital threads. People hating people for using digital. It was quite insane and entertaining.

 

To say it is a modern phenomenon is missing the mark completely. THe only thing modern about it was the digital change over happened to co-incide with the internet. Giving people, in droves, a new place to discuss, worldwide, and a new way to scrutinise our images pixel by pixel instead of with a loupe and perception. A mixing of dialogue from different countries bringing new ways of description, new terminology and those dreaded acronyms. lets put everything in a box, describe it and work out how to make it better. But the problem with the internet is that everyone has an opinion. People have opinions that don't know how to verbalise it, terminology gets jumbled and then also there is the inherent laziness of man and trying to fit it all in a box. Image Quality turns into a IQ. A vague and general group of letters that stands for what ever the author feels like. Turth is, it is very difficult to verbalise something as intangible as emotional reaction to art.

 

Nothing has changed. Evolution is evolution and the need to make things better is inherent in all or maybe most of us.