Moose thus wroted:
> Bob specifically refers to prints, not camera, not software, not printer,
etc - finished photographic prints. That's his final product, the true
measure of the quality of the process, from seeing the subject out in the
world to seeing it in a print. I'm under the impression from your many posts
and occasional rants that such is the case for you, too. And for Chris C.
Moose, that would definitely be the case. It's all about the final
product--which for argument sake is light-reflective flat art. A print.
> Bob used to do some of his photography using a view camera with 4x5 film,
so he is no stranger to LF, let alone MF, film. He now uses a Nikon D3.
And Bob's experience with it all shows as he tends to use the D3 like a 4x5
camera. That disciple comes through in his work and helps make it as good as
it is.
> I will say that in my opinion, Bob's recent prints from the Nikon are
finer prints than any others we saw, including all but maybe, maybe, a
couple of B&W 8x10 contact prints in the museum show.
Mighty fine praise there. This goes to show that Bob isn't just an excellent
photographer, but also an excellent image processor and printer. Basically
you've put him up there with Ctein.
> I've been a fan since I first saw his prints. Still, I could fault some
prints technically, and did so to him, which led to discussions in which I
probably learned more than he did. One could see his progress in moving from
image capture to print in come cases. In one case, smaller prints of a fall
foliage scene seemed less clear than larger ones. It turned out that the
smaller ones were left over stock made earlier. A rescan of the film,
reprocessing and reprinting led to the improvement, even at larger sizes.
Which is a clear indication of Bob's continued development as a
photographer, image-processor and printer. This may be a bigger factor than
any of us realize.
I won't dwell much on the rest of your monolog, but will say that I think
what has happened here is Bob's work (which sounds quite exceptional--I know
that what I see on the webpages is extremely good) tends to match your own
vision and sensitivities. It is no secret that you dislike grain and that
you lean towards the "California Look". This isn't a criticism, but it does
show differences in how we perceive images. I like grain and I usually
prefer subtle over the overdefining contrasts and colors. But that's me and
that's you. Both are right--but both serve different purposes. Is one better
than the other? That's like arguing over what kind of rice is better--it all
depends on the type of meal.
Anyway, what I'm saying is that Bob has managed to create prints that match
your sensitivities perfectly. Does this make his capture medium of choice
(Nikon D3) better than anything else out there--especially film? For a
specific look and end result--possible and highly likely! Obviously, he has
achieved a level of "perfection" with the entire imaging chain which is
optimized for input/process/output. On the flip side, I've also seen a level
of "perfection" achieved by individuals using an entirely different
input/process/output.
AG
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