T for three...

Ask any photographer about the three Ts and he will look at you blankly. And yet the three Ts – Talent, Technique and Technology – are contributing factors, in varying degree, to every photograph ever taken. Mastering the relationship between the three is key to mastering both one's equipment and oneself.

Let me explore each element in human terms. At one extreme we will find the Techno-Tubbies, whose unswerving devotion to the essential rightness of every technological advance is breathtaking in its thoughtless, naive simplicity. Bloatware bingers and feature-creepers to a man (and indeed exclusively male), many if not most are early adopters, eager to consume the latest and greatest even if it is barely teetering on the bleeding edge.

Technique is far less important than Technology, and Talent hardly figures at all. Why bother to learn the basics when you can rely on your whizz-bang, state of next-week's art, CaNikOny camera to do it all for you? Why concentrate on the essentials of getting a single shot right, when you can hose down your subject and pick the shot that works best? In the mind of the Techno-Tubby, quantity has a quality all of it's own, a bit like going large on your Big Mac – more must be better – mustn't it? Time spent at a location taking photos is kept to an absolute minimum in favour of time spent in front of Lightroom, Aperture or Photoshop, deciding on which shot is “best” and then “improving” it.

Our second group of extremists is the Techniquerats. To them, Technology is merely a tool and Talent something random, capricious and intangible and hence to be distrusted and downplayed. Like the Techno-Tubbies, they crave the newest and best, but only because it provides them with a platform to achieve a higher, purer state of nerdy Nirvana. The Techniquerats obsession is less with the tools and more with the sterile perfection of the end result. The Techniquerat spends hours poring over MTF graphs and debating which is sharper – a Global kitchen knife or a 50mm Summilux ASPH.

The Über Techniquerats of course eschew all forms of manufacturer or third party testing in favour of their own painstaking research, haunting hardware stores and stationers hunting down the optimum ruler to act as their unwilling subject in their quest for front (or back) focussing. Never as vociferous, as thin-skinned or as cocky as the Techno-Tubbies, a Techniquerat, if cornered, will adopt a pained expression and retreat to his shed with cries of “You just don't understand”

A splinter group of Techniquerats, the Bokeh Barons, obsess over out of focus areas, seeking the meaning of life, the universe and everything in each swirl and blur. The biggest frustration for the Bokeh Barons is that their particular fetish is in and of itself hard to quantify in objective terms so they are looked down on by the rest of the metronomically precise Techniquerat community. This causes them to sulk and to play with FSU lenses in fruitless attempts to prove them optically equivalent to Leica's finest.

Our third and final group, the Talent Scouts, are loathed and distrusted by the Techno-Tubbies and the Techniquerats in equal measure – and for good reason. The true Talent Scout lives in his right-brain to the extent of struggling with mundane and insignifiant matters like teabags, doorknobs and light-switches. Unworldly to a degree not seen since the glory days of Woodstock, the Talent Scouts make the capture of an eyeball-achingly beautiful image seem like child's play. It doesn't matter what camera they use – a Box Brownie, a Leica MP, a mobile 'phone or a webcam, everything is just – right.

A Talent Scout is always in the right place at the right time, blessed by lighting that Michaelangelo would have given Venus de Milo's right arm for. Every shot is pin sharp and perfectly exposed, except of course those that are deliberately and artfully out of focus or darker than an economist's heart. If you ask a Talent Scout what camera or lens or exposure he used he won't be able to tell you, simply because to him it really doesn't matter. Corner a Talent Scout and he really won't care.

Then there are the rest of us. The mere mortals that strive to balance all three sides of the equation in order to achieve an aesthetically pleasing end result. If we rely too heavily on non-existent talent, our images will turn out dull, uninteresting and as tedious to their audiences as a National Trust guidebook on the dry stone walls of England and Wales. If we overcompensate for our lack of talent with vast and expensive injections of technology we will end up with equipment that does everything for us including think. We will not learn, grow or improve because the technology will act as a crutch. Laziness will result, and will culminate in the watching of X-Factor catch-up shows on overcast Tuesday afternoons.

Consider for a moment the dubious benefits of “Auto-”; autofocus, auto-exposure, auto-iso, auto-color (sic), auto-levels, etc. Every element in an image averaged out, all randomness eliminated and with it all personality, verve, style and individuality. Or the levelling power of the burst-mode; no need to wait for the decisive moment, no need to concentrate, to observe, to develop a sense of timing – just put your finger on the trigger and pump away like an over-excited Bandido on Che's birthday. Pick the best later, eh, in the comfort of your own batchelor pad, with a Bud in one hand and a reheated pizza at your elbow.

The power of Three; keep them in balance, eh?

Technique – true technique – is something to be nurtured, practiced and perfected, and balanced with Talent and Technology. Learning how exposure works, either by using a basic camera or by turning your Hokey-Cokey 2000 to “manual” - is not just a liberating experience, it is a revelation. Learning to rely upon yourself instead of a faceless programmer in Osaka is part of growing up as a photographer and fulfilling your potential.

In the UK, at least, it is possible to learn to drive on an automatic car only. Your licence is truncated, what you can drive is restricted. You can only ever have the gears changed for you by a CPU. Never will you feel that moment of adrenaline-fuelled satisfaction when you time a gearchange to the instant, dropping down at just the right moment to maximise the power of the engine as you sweep through that challenging set of curves, clipping the apex of each and powering out to the next straight. It's the same with photography – the sense of satisfaction that ensues when you finally see the photo that you made all the choices on is far greater than that when you pick from the lucky-dip SD card the shot that is infinitesimally better than the five before, and the 28 after.

Finesse is an art, not a range of beauty products. Timing is a skill, not a menu setting. A moment is singular, not plural. The true photographer picks his moment, plucks it from the stream of time, visualises it in his mind and captures it in his camera because he has decided, then and there, that it is special, worthy of preservation and of later display.

The lesson is simple – everything in moderation, especially moderation. Balance the triangle of the three Ts and satisfy your inner photographer.

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- All images on this blog are copyright Bill Palmer and may not be reproduced in any format or medium without permission.

Unplugged...

I think it was MTV that first made popular the "unplugged" approach to music performance. It came as a reaction to the at the time almost inescapable use of electric this, synth that. I particularly remember the acoustic version of Layla by Eric Clapton - still recognisably the same song, but completely re-interpreted. Different. Fresh. What interests me about the very concept of doing something "unplugged" is that it implies a state of plugged-in-ness preceding it - less unplugged than post-plugged.

A musician performing acapella with nothing but an acoustic guitar is in effect putting their talent on the line. They cannot hide behind producers with mixing desks, or digital enhancement. It is them, their capabilities, their instrument and the music. It separates the men (and women) from the boys (and, er, girls). Not everyone can do it. Not everyone, to be fair, feels the need. Those that do, however, show a new dimension to their skills, and earn the respect of their peers and audience as a result.

In the photographic world, the relentless drive to bigger, faster, better digital cameras has led to an explosion of innovation. Product cycles have dropped from years to months or even weeks. From nowhere, it is now possible to buy, for considerably less than the price of a decent weekend break, a digital SLR that produces clean, high quality images without a film in sight. It is all so easy, quick, predictable, efficient, clean, clinical... did I mention soul-less?

I have in the past owned some of the finest film equipment in the world - Nikon, Leica and Contax SLRs and rangefinders, with lenses that were (and are) second to none. When digital happened, I joined the bandwagon after a while, then sat out a few rounds of innovation before rejoining in the shape of an Olympus DSLR. It does all that I ask of it and more, but like the most sophisticated film cameras, you are not always sure what it is doing, or, more crucially, why. There is so much inherent complexity in the modern DSLR - any modern DSLR, not just the Olympus - that it is indeed possible to get yourself caught at the bottom of a sub-menu and trapped there forever until your air runs out and you drown. The modern viewfinder is now more like a dashboard than an optical instrument, with head-up displays and overlays.

*sigh*

I had been aware of screwmount Leicas for as long as I had been aware of the brand. I knew they were the precursors to the M, and much more primitive for that. Separate view and rangefinders, the need for accessory finders for anything other than 50mm focal length, even the need to trim the leader - none of this was lost on me. It all seemed a bit old-fashioned, a bit anachronistic - even, for modern use, a bit masochistic. Why, I thought, would I ever want to use something that didn't even have a built-in meter? Where's the fun in that?

It was about two and a half years ago that I succumbed and bought my first "Barnack". My local dealer had a IIIc in the window, complete with 3.5cm Elmar - still the most compact lens in that focal length ever produced by Leica. It winked at me through the window like a rascally old lady - past her prime but still full of charm, fun and joie de vivre. It took minimal thought for me to go in, plant down my money and walk out with it in my pocket.

I resolved from the outset to go the whole hog and live the Barnack experience - I didn't own a handheld meter, so I decided to rely upon "Sunny 16". I also decided, to make my life a little easier, to only feed the old girl a limited diet - Kodak 400CN. Reasonably fast to compensate for the slow lens, easy to get developed in the high street (even today, if you know where to go), plenty of latitude and somehow black and white just seemed appropriate.

I cheated a little - I used a Panasonic digicam as a back-up to my exposure guesstimation at first, treating it as a meter that could take photos. I kidded myself that I was carrying it as a backup, but I soon realised that I didn't need it - practically or psychologically.

A couple of rolls of film through the gate also made me realise that, in the UK at least, Sunny-16 is nearer to Sunny-12. The little IIIc became my constant companion, in my bag, briefcase or pocket at all times - partly because it was small enough, and partly because it was really just that much fun to use. I got used to the poky rangefinder, and with switching over to the viewfinder for composition. Mostly I used it for "street photography"... I lived the HCB dream, or at least I wandered about with a Leica and snapped people doing vaguely interesting stuff in the street.

Caught with a camera older than you and me put together...

Continuing with the unplugged analogy, if the IIIc is equivalent to an acoustic guitar, then the II that followed is probably nearer to a lute. The II was an impulse buy, from the US via eBay. You know what I mean - I put in a bid and went to bed, and woke up with less money and a parcel on the way. When it arrived it was, er, "crispy" to say the least. Years of gunge meant it handled like a chewy toffee and the view and rangefinders were "atmospheric". A trip to CRR in Luton soon sorted that out, and a new chapter began.

My II is actually a I - it started life in 1930, and was factory-upgraded in 1934. It is both a demanding mistress and a delight - there is nothing between me and my subjects except a thin layer of brass and glass. I don't miss the slow speeds at all, and I find the wider spacing of the view- and rangefinders actually, if anything, make life easier. There are (many) days when it is the only camera I carry.

So does it take more skill to use a Barnack than a modern DSLR? In some respects, I would contend that it does. If you nail it - if everything comes together and you get it right - then the resultant image is all your own work. When you trip the shutter on an old Leica gears whir, springs contract and silk curtains part. When you press the shutter release on the DSLR, you send a command to the CPU that in turn starts a process that...

Let me conclude with this thought; the 40th anniversary of the Beatles' Sgt Pepper album has been marked by some of today's "stars" going into the studios at Abbey Road, using the original analogue 4-track equipment to record cover versions of the songs from the album. Their only recourse to getting it wrong was to re-record... Again, and again, and again... Without the aid of the Antares Autotune - the technology that ensures that however sharp or flat your voice is, you can appear pitch perfect when you "perform" (we have it to blame for the Spice Girls and many others) - the "Talent" struggled to rise to the occasion...

Enough said.

Bill

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- All images on this blog are copyright Bill Palmer and may not be reproduced in any format or medium without permission.