Physical formats in every industry are under intense fire at the moment; photographic film, books, vinyl. The migration of content from physical to digital is heavily underway and has been for some time, and the reasons are apparent; digital has an immediacy, a convenience and portability that many physical formats simply cannot contend with. Yeah, there were portable CD players (portable cassette players too), but that required having to carry around the CD’s/cassettes if you wanted more than one album; why bother these days when you can have thousands of albums in your pocket stored digitally? And so on and so forth. But it leaves the question; why then are people trading the cheap and easy approach of sticking their laptops or iPods into speakers for vinyl?

Vinyl isn’t cheap. Relatively speaking. The actual record itself will probably cost you more than a digital or CD release brand new, not to mention the exorbitant prices of some rarer copies, and none of it is useful without owning the necessary gear to play them. A cheap, semi-decent hi-fi setup with speakers, amp and turn-table isn’t particularly cheap; with some corner cutting and bargain hunting mine’s cost about £180 or so (so far, hehe).

Let’s look at the records themselves. They’re nothing more than PVC discs, pressed with an audio waveform onto their surface. Each play has the potential for degrading the quality and damaging the record, and over time if stored improperly (or indeed if stored correctly) they can warp and be rendered distorted or even unplayable. It’s quite a fragile medium, and somewhat intolerant of abuse. Indeed, records themselves are perhaps only barely better than lossless digital files in terms of quality; very high bit-rate digital files with very high sampling rates are practically indistinguishable from the raw waveform of a record, most people would struggle to tell the difference. Indeed, digital does somewhat have an advantage in possessing a “cleaner” sound, absent of clicks or pops. I have an old copy of Eno’s Apollo, for example, and the ambiance is somewhat ruined by the less-than-ideal surface quality.

But it’s not really about the perceived quality or the physicality of the medium that I think makes it so attractive, at least to me. Owning a record isn’t like owning a CD; CD’s require no effort whatsoever. Stick it into the player and you’re good to go. Not so with vinyl. With vinyl, every play is an experience, you make the time and take the effort to sit down and listen to something. You get up, skim through your collection, pick a record and pause to look over the 144 square inches of album art first of all. Glorious. Now that is certainly not a luxury you get with CD’s; it’s nice to have some decently sized, high quality album art to look at every once in a while. You turn on the stereo and briefly hear a hum as it powers on, then slip the record onto the table, drop the needle, sit back and relax. There’s something so much more interactive about that entire process than just opening your laptop lid and playing any old shit off iTunes. I know I can do that anytime (and I do), but settling back to listen to some tunes on the record player is a specific and deliberate thing when I want to kick back and do nothing but just listen to some music (especially when I’m feeling mellow and a little less than sober).

I imagine the reasoning is a little different for everyone; some people are purely interested in the collectibility, particularly in regard to special, limited edition releases. Others strongly believe there is a noticeable quality difference between vinyl and digital files and buy them to sate their audiophilic requirements. Whatever the reason, I’m glad people are still buying music this way and I hope more people join in and continue to use the format.

Ok, that out the way we can discuss this little gem: http://phlearn.com/how-to-great-photographer. Or turd, either way.

The TL:DR of the link in question is that it is a post talking about how much technical knowledge a photographer needs to learn to be “good”. Apparently none according to the OP, who claims that attempting to learn all the little details is unnecessary in the actual process of taking photographs. He would be happy to let people shoot in Auto all the time and have them take photos in a state of blissful ignorance.

I want to make the point clear that, in some respects, he’s right. There is a great deal of stuff out there that is completely redundant and unnecessary to learn. You don’t need to learn how sensors capture light information or why it is that higher resolution images print better to be a good photographer. People learn those things because, most of the time, they want to be better at what they do and maybe to pass on the knowledge to other people that have an interest. Ok, maybe knowing how a sensor converts light into data is redundant in the actual act of taking a photograph, but if you’re interested in photography is it such a bad thing to learn how your camera performs such a process?

“understanding the F-Stop will not make you happier or take better photos.”

What rubbish. Cameras have improved a lot in recent years but Auto modes are none too reliable, even now. Learning about shutter speeds and f/stop ratings is crucial to improving your work. You cannot, and I can’t stress that enough, control the outcome of a shot if you don’t use Manual. A camera doesn’t understand what it is you’re trying to achieve in taking a photograph, you do. If you want to shoot at a low f/stop to decrease the DOF, you change those settings yourself. A camera picks what it thinks are the best settings for the scene in question, but perhaps those might not be the best settings to achieve your vision of the scene.

“Think back to what it was like in the very beginning. Think about what you enjoyed about photography to begin with. Think about all the laughter. Think about all your adventures. Is all of that still there?”

He goes on to talk some garbage about how photography becomes more of a clinical process rather than “something fun” once you’ve learnt some technical details. What tripe. Photography arguably became more fun for me; the power to control the camera how I saw fit made the fiddling worthwhile. Knowing that the outcome was my own doing made each shot more special. Doubly so with film, which is a very hands-on and somewhat more “technical” skill than digital. Yes, I obsess over the technical details and take huge amounts of time taking shots with my Hassy. It’s still fun because I’m taking photos, something I want to be doing.

This guy is doing something very worrying in my mind, he’s reinforcing the view in the minds of many, many amateur photographs, that it’s ok to be oblivious to what you’re doing within photography, that you don’t need to know anything special to take good photographs. Camera manufacturers have been reinforcing this in their own way, making SLR’s cheaper and “more intelligent”. Most people believe megapixels and HD video recording mean everything in a camera these days. They may well be having fun, and I am certainly not taking that away from them, but there is a clear difference between being enthusiastic and competent. Heck, some people are more than happy to remain that way and not care, but there are those that do and this is sending a very, very wrong message. The harsh reality is that there is a point where you don’t have the technical skill to get any better, where you can’t realise your goals using Auto alone. I think it’s high time some people pulled their heads out of the sand and realised that. Perhaps ironically, this guy is considered a professional photographer, and many of his shoots appear to be done in a studio (something that requires a degree of technical expertise, perhaps?)

Believe who/what you will, but I’ll be frank and not Chris for a second here and say that I think he’s talking out his arsehole.

I’m specifically going to be talking about the iPad, but I don’t see why anything I say here cannot be applicable to any other tablet device. I’d like to point something out before I say anything though; this is not designed to be a laptop replacement. Lots of people think it is and then complain about the somewhat more limited functionality of these devices. No, in my opinion the iPad, or any other tablet for that matter, is primarily a portable media and connectivity device. Very slowly are we now beginning to see a movement over into work orientated applications; for instance MS Office is being ported to iOS, and couple your iPad with a keyboard and stand and you have a good laptop equivalent for on the go. I’m not saying it is the be all and end all, I use my laptop for gaming and image editing and when I need to do serious work like essays and such now because that is what it is best at. My iPad, somewhat lacking those features, is what I use largely for browsing now, since that is what it is best at.

“Oh my god my butt is clenched so hard right now! It’s terrible for browsing because it can’t run Flash!” I hear you cry. Well you know what, Flash sucks. It sucks and has been going downhill for years. It still has its limited uses for online games and animation etc but HTML5 should, will and is replacing it for video content and interactive web page design. All the better for iOS users like me and honestly, so many large websites now have mobile versions for their sites I don’t feel impeded in my browsing experience. Besides, if you really cannot live without Flash, Android tablets have Flash support.

“How can you justify the price?! Why don’t you just buy a laptop?” Honestly, if I’d have bought a Xoom or an Archos, people wouldn’t have as much of a problem with me owning a tablet. Mention the iPad and all it gets is hate. The price is the same, if not better, than a number of tablets of similar size and power. The problem I feel is to do with the Apple logo on the back but I’m not going to get into that.
And again, laptops just don’t have the portability or convenience of tablets. I was sceptical at first as to how useful it would be but the iPad has proven to be remarkably versatile and often more useful than my laptop. The laptop is noisy, hot and unsubtle. The iPad is noiseless, cool and discrete. Sure, typing this out has been a bit of a chore, but it’s not impossible. People with smaller hands than myself would find it easier I’m sure.

“It’s nothing more than a giant iPod!” This is directed more at the iPad, but is certainly applicable to other tablets. Think about it, they all do exactly the same thing. The Xoom is an identical media platform to the iPad, it just looks different. Same for any other. Yes, it runs the same iOS as the iPod/iPhone, yes it looks similar in appearance but why fix what isn’t broken? The reason the Touch works so well is because it is simple, sleek and uncluttered. I see no problem in Apple duplicating a look that is aesthetically pleasing or keeping the OS the same, these things have been proven to work and work well. And as I said, it is more of a media centre and dedicated browser than a serious device for work, so if you’re someone who browses the web a lot, listens to a lot of music, watches a lot of video then it’s perfect.

The debate is moot at the end of the day because all it really boils down to is personal choice. I felt that the iPad would work well with my lifestyle and I don’t regret buying it. Other people might feel it irrelevant and a pointless purchase based on how they personally interact with the web, that’s cool, that’s their opinion and I can respect that. In my opinion though I suggest that people get used to the concept, because I think we are going to be seeing much more of these devices in the coming years.

Lately I’ve been getting kind of bogged down with music. In a good way. Specifically, I’ve been mulling over how to make the music that I listen to sound as good as possible on a budget. For a lot of people nowadays, music quality is not so much of a big deal; many people rip music at 128 kbps and listen to it through Apple headphones (they’re terrible, don’t deny it). I must stress that I don’t have a problem with this whatsoever; there are people who’s eyelids begin twitching at the very thought that people listen to music like that, but many do and so long as they don’t mind the sound and still enjoy it, then who cares, right? (Unless you bought Dre Beats, then I am morally obliged to look down at you.) The headphones part I can understand; dropping money on a good pair of cans or in-ear phones can set you back, and I can see why people are reluctant to part with their money over them. After all, it’s “only music”. Space, on the other hand, is rather cheap. If you’re ripping your music in at 128 kbps to save space that’s distilled crazy; I bought my 1Tb external hard drive 2 years ago for £80. That could hold tens of thousands of high bit rate tracks. Nowadays, you could probably pick something similar and smaller than that brute for half the price. If your portable music player is a bit more restricted in terms of memory, just convert and downsample your higher bit rate tracks. Piece of cake.

For the record, if I’m ripping music from a CD (rare these days for me) or downloading it (much more likely), I consider 320 kbps to be good, 256 kbps to be acceptable, 192 the bare minimum. FLAC is a bit of a luxury that I don’t really see the point of, since I can barely discern the difference between 320 kbps MP3′s and lossless audio. I don’t care if you swear blind you can distinguish the apparently enormous difference, I simply can’t. I, like many people, was a bit overhyped and swept up by the prospect of lossless audio, but in many settings I think it is unnecessary and a space hog.

The reason I’m making this post, just to go off on a tangent for a second, is because today I had a realisation. Last fortnight I was distraught because I thought I’d blown one of my headphone speakers. Big deal, you say. Well, yes, it kind of is when you’ve dropped £130 on them and have listened to hundreds of hours of music through them. You get accustomed  to hearing music a certain way and I freaking love my cans. Anyway, I normally listen to music via my iPod or laptop, but today I decided to plug them into my amp for the first time and spin some records through them. Holy mother of jesus. I know vinyl is a great way to listen to music, I’ve been giving my speakers a thorough going over and the quality is devastatingly good, but there is nothing quite like slipping a pair of headphones over your ears and just immersing yourself in the music. Honestly, music has never, ever sounded so good in my opinion, especially sweetened by the comforting realisation I wasn’t going to have to send mine out for repair. Sitting here now, going back over what I’ve just heard through iTunes instead (some Memory Tapes, M83 and SVIIB), it sounds like crap. Not really crap, but there’s a huge difference. It’s the same plugging my laptop/iPod into my amp -> speakers; the DAC (digital to audio converter) in both is terrible. Bass is distorted so badly at times it’s just not worth listening to. The separation of the tones, the dynamic range, all of it feels so much more expansive and flawless on wax. My headphones are pretty expressive in the bass department, and being able to push them to the limit bass wise whilst also holding on to the trebles was joyous; Massive Attack’s “Teardrop” is the perfect single to test this out. That sonorous, head-rattling bassline married with the more delicate female vocals is a difficult one to get right and by god it sounded good.

I get the general feeling that it is somewhat unorthodox for someone my age to own a hifi system/turntable these days. Because obviously records are worse quality than digital, amirite? Not in my humble opinion. Just because something has been phased out doesn’t mean that it wasn’t good in the first place. Vinyl was a mainstay in the music industry for a long time, and as such it had a lot of technical experience under its belt to make it sound as good as possible. Digital is good, but can only sound as the DAC can handle; you have a shit soundcard in your PC and you’re not getting the quality, regardless of bit rate, sample rate or the price of your headphones/speakers. Call me a hipster, call me anti-mainstream, whatever, this for me is the most enjoyable way of listening to music. It has fantastic quality right out of the box with no fannying around with DAC’s  and a unique sound that digital doesn’t have (in the same ways photographic film is different to digital). The clicks and crackles simply become part of the experience or can’t be heard over the music most of the time, and I kinda like them. It is also quite satisfying to look at my shelf of records and pick something up physically to play it. Not to mention the album art being given a glorious square foot of space to look sexy on.

I don’t have the best turntable, or the best amp, or the best headphones or whatever else, music is what you make of it. If you enjoy listening to low bit rate music on cheap headphones/speakers, then what’s the point in spending additional money? Me, I want to find ways of extracting all the little details within music and making it sound as good as I can. Am I willing to go full audiophile and spend thousands of pounds on gear? Heck no; there are ways of making music sound great to your ears without having to melt a hole through your wallet. I can lust, and so I will, over the gear that some people possess, but for the time being I am more than happy with what I have since what I’ve got going now is better than I’ve ever experienced before.

Music. Serious business yo.

For the curious, my setup is as so:

• Pioneer PL-516 (turntable) with an Ortofon cartridge (don’t remember the exact model)
• Kenwood KA660D (integrated amp)
• Bang & Olufsen Beovox 3800 (speakers (12″ woofers!!1!))
• Fiio E7 DAC (shit better come soon)
• Beyerdynamic DT990 Pro (headphones)

I’m looking into getting a graphic equaliser as well, when I have more money And preferably a better DAC, the E7 probably wont cut it for long with me, it’s just a stop gap. *looks longingly at a Cambridge Audio DACmagic*

What is a genre? A genre is a construct, a label that we create to assign particular musical styles to. We create genres so we can separate music, so that we might differentiate between different musical styles, so we can identify the kinds of music that we like and search within those parameters. For instance, I like ambient music. If I wanted to find more music of this kind, all I need to do is search for “ambient music” and I can find related artists and albums. Genres are groupings of music that have certain similarities in their sounds.

Let’s take dubstep for instance, because that’s pretty topical; we have a 140 bpm melody underlain by a half-speed bassline. Pretty simple, and that’s what much of the genre revolves around. Of course, we have typical sound components that make dubstep what it is, eg, wobble bass, and although that’s not a defining feature of the genre it is something readily identifiable. If we hear some wobble bass, we can go “oh, that sounds like dubstep!”. It’s pretty safe to call dubstep (brostep) a genre though; it has a distinctive sound quality and particularly, pertinent characteristics that make it what it is. I’m not so certain we can do that with pop.

What is pop? Pop is a trend, it is a flexible, continually shifting collection of music that reflects the popularity of particular music styles at a given time. We can see this is true immediately by simply looking at the back catalogue of this “genre”; Sinatra sounds nothing like the Beatles, who sound nothing like Michael Jackson who sounds nothing like Paul Simon and so on. The huge amount of variability and diversity within the pop sound is astounding, with the stuff in the charts nowadays sounding nothing like the stuff from 50 years ago.

I know what you’re thinking. “Aha! But technology has changed and music is made and distributed differently” and so on. All of those counter-arguments are correct, of course pop is going to sound different today than it did x years ago given the changes in the consumption and distribution of music, and the creation of it too. In reality, however, these things have nothing to do with the question at hand. Can we really call pop music a genre under our current definition given how vastly different the music of today is compared to the past? Given how pop music is governed by what is popular at the time, by whatever music is swilling around in the pop underground, how is it fair to call this a genre?

I don’t know, I thought it would be an interesting question to pose. I know and appreciate the fact that genres evolve over time, but pop has no truly defining characteristics other than the fact that it is a bastardisation of many, many other genres.

The thought behind this question was that people are using the term “photography” and “photographer” too loosely nowadays, that people who do not have a great deal of experience with cameras or are just dabbling are calling themselves “photographers”. Perhaps this has an element of truth to it; those people who only have the mildest of interest, who for them photography is only a passing fad, are labelling themselves unfairly. That being said, that is not my personal opinion. As most readers know, and for which I have been chastised before, I give fellow young, teenage photographers a pretty hard rap for many reasons. For once, I am actually going to stick up for them, or should I say “us”, and say that I believe that these terms are correctly applied.

Why the sudden turnaround? Well, it you continue to read on then your bloodlust for my rants over teenage photographers will be satisfied, but at this point I believe that the terms are used right. First, however, a quick yet relevant tangent. We are now firmly in the domain of the digital revolution, and photography has been one of the core elements of this upheaval. It has evolved from the costly and time consuming process of developing film to an instantaneous and virtually free process at the hands of digital. More people than ever before are now involved photographically; it’s true that most people are not creatively or artistically involved, but these people still take photographs. The old days where photography was primitive and costly (and dangerous, even) are now gone, where only a select, elite few could call themselves photographers, now many people can. The word has evolved along with the process over the last 150 years, but fundamentally it means exactly the same now as it did at its inception; anyone who picks up a camera and takes a photograph is performing the act of photography, it’s that simple. We must call them photographers, for that is what they are. It doesn’t matter whether or not you are a professional, enthusiast, amateur, or just some guy taking snapshots with family and/or friends, if you are using a camera and taking photographs, that makes you a photographer.

So, we have established that to call someone who uses a camera, at any point and for whatever purpose, is a photographer. This being said, however, it does not mean that I necessarily agree that the terms are used properly. Technically, of course, this is correct as we have said. Whether or not they are calling themselves “photographers” properly is something completely different. So, just to be more confusing, I’m going to say no, they are not using these terms properly (U-turn and incoming rant detected). Simply owning a Holga or Diana doesn’t really make you a photographer, it makes you a douche that has jumped onto the popularity bandwagon, because owning a trendy piece of plastic that shoots film is “fashionable”. Picking up your point and shoot camera and telling people that you are “really getting into photography” and “takin loadzzzz of photos” doesn’t make you a photographer either. But this then poses an interesting question; where do you draw the line? At what point do you move over from mere mortal to photographer? It is at this precise point that things become diffuse and hazy, that the clear becomes murky, and whatever argument I had becomes largely subjective and irrelevant.

I’m going to argue it from the traditional standpoint and say that if you are not involved professionally, that is, if photography is not your primary source of income, if it is not actually your job to take photographs, then you are not a photographer. There, I said it. What’s that I hear you cry? “Then what do we call the millions of others who are not professionally involved?” Well then, just to keep things simple and clear cut, we should call them photographers too. You see, the word and its derivatives have come to occupy several different definitions despite meaning the same thing. A photographer is someone who takes photographs (this can be anyone), or someone who is a photographer (this can only be those who are involved professionally). So, to summarise, you are not a photographer unless it’s your job, you are simply a photographer because you take photos. Geddit? It’s ok if you don’t; my mind is wandering and I haven’t been spectacularly clear).

Once again I leave behind a satisfyingly large and confusing mess in my wake. I don’t do this deliberately, but you have to understand that that’s the way it is in my mind. People use it incorrectly in both senses, insofar that they are not photographers subjectively (for whatever personal reason; uncreative, unskilled etc.) nor professionally (do not have a career in photography), even if they are literally (they take photos, ergo, they are (briefly?) photographers).

Enjoy decoding all of that while I kick back with a glass of wine and watch the sunset.

This much is apparent in Camera Lucida, a book that proposes to try and pin photography down, try to assign sets of values and give it significance. When I picked it up to read, I knew I was potentially in for a good one, but I didn’t realise how empathetic I would become whilst reading it. You see Barthes’s book is just as much about life and death as it is about photography; the entire second half is a hair’s breadth away from being a memorial to his mother, to whom he was grieving for at the time of writing. For me, whilst reading, my grandmother died and the book took on a somewhat deeper significance.

I am almost certain that I have the two very last photographs of her alive, and although I knew at the time her condition was terminal, I didn’t know it would be just 24 hours after their creation that she would pass away. Those images haven’t been developed yet; I’m not even sure I want to look at them when they arrive even though I know I will. In the past week or so, I have dwelled on this topic a lot in my mind, trying to work out where I’m at with photography.

I think about photography rather a lot, and sometimes I do question why I continue shooting, what the point of it is. I realise now that it is art, there is no point. I don’t have to create a photograph, and if I do create one it probably wont ever serve a purpose. Why then do we take photographs? I think it is because they are very useful in a plethora of applications; journalism, science etc. But why do laypeople like myself take images? I think the reason is two-fold:

1. To be expressive and creative, to release a little bit of emotion through your work.

2. To remember.

Barthes puts across the point of photographs proving almost without a shadow of doubt that the subject once existed at a specific point in space and time when the image was taken. I think it is foolish, however, to call a photograph a “memory”. Memories are things retained by living creatures, cameras are machines – remembering machines – and the photographs they produce are simply, how do I put it? Evidence. Validation. If anything was ever in doubt, we can call upon images to provide proof of something. Once a person dies, the memories that they carried with them are irrefutably lost forever, but the photographs they took in life may remain to retain some of those sights and feelings of that person now gone. As Barthes himself puts it;

“The effect it produces upon me is not to restore what is abolished, but to attest that what I see has indeed existed.”

This seems like a very cold way to approach photography, but at it’s heart that is all it is. The camera is a mechanical device; cameras do not discriminate, they are unbiased and uncaring. They are merely the thing we use to take images; making images is an entirely different proposition.

There are three other things involved in what truly makes an image; the Subject, the Photographer (Operator) and the viewer (Spectator). It is the human influence in photography that makes it so special, so beautiful. The human subject provides, on a rare occasion if the photographer is lucky enough to capture it, an insight into their lives, they exude an “air” about themselves, an intangible quality that cannot be described, only known and understood. It is as much about personality and character as it is about their very soul.  Barthes was angry and sad that none of the images of his mother when she was alive and younger really showed her as he remembered. He saw her, in the literal sense, and knew it was her from her images, but couldn’t connect. Afterall, photographs are not really people, only ghosts, remnants of a living organism, their image caught forever.

Until he found the “Winter Garden Photograph”.

Here, Barthes constructs his entire understanding of photography. While not necessarily able to recognise his mother based on physical appearance, he could tell by her “air”, that mysterious quality that we all possess, and the way she held herself that it was her, and that he had “found” her, so to speak.

This is all getting quite heavy isn’t it? Are you keeping up, or should I reiterate and be a little clearer?

Barthes found his mother in that image. Not like the way he had found her in all the other images, they were just photographs, they didn’t retain her essence, that “air”. It’s extremely difficult to put this across, so if you haven’t got it, I’m going to assume you have and move on.

Let’s rewind back the first half of the book, back before he begins talking about his mother. How is it that he approaches photography then? He breaks photographs down to their fundamental level, their characteristics. He believes that there are two aspects to any photograph, but they don’t have to contain both. These are the studium and the punctum.

The studium is the study. A good example would be a photograph of an old house. If we knew when the house was built, we would be able to look at the house and the materials used to create it and say that, back then when the image was taken, they used x,y,z materials to build their houses in such-a-such style. The study is social, cultural and historical. The studium is present in all images, and on it’s own it can make good images, but it requires something else to make the image great or special.

That something is the punctum. It means break or puncture, and that is what it does. It breaks or disturbs the peace of the studium, it stabs at you and you are attracted towards it. Barthes describes it normally as a little detail, perhaps something odd within the image (although not necessarily), but something that stands out for you, something that you remember the image by. He uses examples of jewellery, rings and necklaces catching his eye.

I disagree not with his idea of the punctum, because I do think there are aspects of images that draw us in, that catch us unawares and attract us to an aspect of an image, but the details he calls the punctum are wrong in my mind. He calls little details the punctum, and I suppose this is relevant for him, but what about other things? Certain facial or bodily expressions? An arresting gaze?

While Barthes’s non-photographer (Operator) approach is somewhat refreshing, I have difficulty stomaching a large chunk of what Barthes puts forward as the bulk of his argument. He claims that only an amateur photographer is capable of taking images that capture a person’s very soul, their “air”, since amateurs do not try to deliberately, therefore because professionals try to hard they can’t take images that are truly candid and that express the very essence of someone.

From the standpoint of the photographer, this is somewhat offensive. For a start, Barthes isn’t even a photographer, and all his assumptions about photography are being based on his one experience. At the time of the book’s creation, there was an outcry from the photographic community about the light it put photographers in. But it highlighted something about photography that is perhaps even truer today than it was then: anyone can take a photograph. The is one of the greatest advantages of the medium, but also its greatest failing. Photography allows anyone and everyone to take images now, but the result is that for those that want to make use of photography for its creative potential their own worth is diluted, and many can remain unnoticed. The staggering number of photographers worldwide proves it is the most attractive artform, since little perceived effort is required compared to most other forms of art (drawing or writing &c). Yet what gets forgotten by Barthes is that the greatest photographs of all time have been taken by professionals, not amateurs. Personal, intimate images taken by amateurs of their family and friends have deep significance to the photographer and the relevant people, especially under the circumstances where a person passes away. This is why the image was so powerful to him, and also why it caused him to draw the conclusions that he did. Do I agree with them? Not all, but that’s ok, because I don’t have to. Barthes is speaking his personal opinion, there is no right and wrong, true or false. Barthes isn’t asking us to agree with him, only to hear what he has to say, which is the way it should be. Photography is subjective, nobody is right or wrong, and everyone has an opinion.

Ok, time to get back on track and start talking about where I’m going with all this.

I am of the belief that good photographers have minds that work in a particular way, assessing scenes and seeing potential images around them develop and unfold, they have a knack. Practising photography only gets you up to a point in my mind; you can be extremely technically competent, but that doesn’t mean you have that necessary mindset to capture great images. That’s what it takes to move yourself away from being an amateur photographer for me. You must be able to not only understand how your equipment works and the technical aspect of capturing images, but also have that creative or artistic spark. Amateur photographers do, on occasion, strike lucky and capture something special by accident. I’m not saying that amateur photographers don’t try, because it’s very clear that they do, but many amateur photographers lack the skills and that certain mindset to advance any further photographically. It’s a very sticky business that I think I’m going to have to cover in a new post at some point (public outcry).

I’d like to believe I have some photographic talent. Not everyone will agree with this statement, but even if they don’t it doesn’t matter. I don’t like to create photographs with the express purpose of satisfying another individual, I have never cared whether someone likes my images or not, my images are my own. The fact that over the years people have enjoyed them is merely an additional bonus. I realise now that the only reason I continue making photographs is to satisfy my own desire to take photographs. It’s that simple. Photography is an expression, as escape. I want to make this point very firm, even though I have voiced it before it has never been clearer to me.

Photography is a personal medium, the people around you may very well be inspired and in admiration of your work, it may even have some relevance to them and be emotionally significant, but nobody, nobody is more important than you, the photographer, to your own images. The Spectator is someone who has appeared after the fact, looking for that “air” in these fragments of time you’ve captured, like Barthes was.

I’ve run out of steam. There’s more that I could say, maybe even should say, but I wont. I’ve made my points clear I think. Like all my posts, this has once again tapered off rapidly.

I made a few minor errors in the video that I should probably correct (stage fright);

-Later Hasselblad 200 series cameras DO NOT take the same C/CF/CFi lenses as the 500 series cameras (not sure if I made this clear). This is due to the fact that the 500 series use Compur leaf shutters inside the lenses, while the 200 cameras make use of a focal plane shutter. I believe the 2000 series are compatible with the CF lenses though.

-AFAIK, later Hasselblad 500 series cameras are fully backwards compatible with all C lenses.

-I made a slight hiccup when talking about the interchangeable screens; option to swap out the screens came with the 500C/M, the descendant of my 500C.

-IT’S CALLED A DARK SLIDE! The word just decided to just float out of my brain.

-You can determine the age of a Hasselblad camera by reading off the first two letters of the serial number. You can check out how that works here.

I’m not saying that the only way is Hasselblad; I took a long time to look around medium format options (I start to mention this at the end of the video but ran out of time), and the problem I did come up with is that it can be very difficult to single out significant advantages between systems. In some respects I did buy the Hassy down to kudos, but I know I’d have regretted buying anything else. I was sorely tempted by both the Bronica SQ-A and the Rollei 6001, but I thought that the build was better than the SQ-A and cheaper to fix/upgrade than the very expensive Rollei’s.

I hope this was mildly informative, and more entertaining than a block of text

I’ve been getting pretty tired of writing out these huge, impersonal spiels on WordPress, mostly because they are so time consuming. Most of my posts now average 1000 words and more, and it’s difficult for me to find the time now to not only write them but go back and spell and grammar check them. It’s also a pain in the arse to go back and error check in these text boxes at the best of times, let alone when you have dense walls of text to read through. So I’m more than happy to make the change to a vlog or at the very least a semi-vlog with combined video and text. Anyone has any ideas/preference/ideas for future posts let me know! I know there probably aren’t that many subscribers (if any) but I’m interested in your opinions.

Right, now we’ve got that over with, let’s get down to it. I’ve expressed my thoughts before on how I listen to, let’s call it less mainstream, music in the ambient/electronic/IDM genres. Now, I’m actually pretty easy going when it comes to music, I’ll give pretty much anything a listen except rap, R’n'B and heavy metal, it’s just that I listen to these genres of music the most because I love them the most. Yes, I can listen to pop and reggae and rock, but I can’t enjoy them and listen for long periods. As I’ve said before, I find the use (maybe overuse?) of vocals grating and irritating, since everything seems to be the same. What are the three things that lyrics raise the most? Love, sex, drugs. You can scarcely move anywhere in the pop music genre without being bombarded with unimaginative lyrics that all talk about the same old shit that has been repeated time and again without fail.

Now listen, I’m not at all questioning at this point the skills of the artists in question. Undoubtedly there are some artists out there who are genuinely talented at singing (but who’s to tell what is autotuned these days?), and I suppose it’s not always their fault if they get saddled with a piss-poor songwriter, but it’s still a pretty sad state of affairs. Why is there no variety? Why is there so little out there that is a little off the wall? The reason is probably to do with the fact that pop music is created for the express purpose of delivering itself to the masses, and if there is a tried and tested approach to making this style of music then why bother changing, right? Go back to the 90′s there was so much variety in the charts what with the rave culture being in full swing; we saw electronic and trance make it’s way onto the radio and sit right up there alongside its Brit Pop companions (we just need to look at Chicane’s work as evidence of that). Nobody will ever remember the Noughties for bringing anything interesting to the music industry, apart from piles of artists that made their way into the charts to never been seen again, amid the pile of other uninteresting and unimaginative drivel produced in those 10 years. What do we see now? Just plain old boring pop with some rap thrown in for good measure. It’s so predictable, we can guess who’s going to turn up in the top 40 and you’d probably be right most of the time; Lady GaGa (propelled via her obsessive fanbase), Katy Perry (via her “sex appeal”), Rihanna (see Katy Perry), I could go on. Yes, I think Rihanna and Adele and a few others are actually reasonable singers and probably are justified on the charts. Others not so much.

We are all looking for something different in the music we listen to, it’s true. I am often chastised by my friends for not knowing the lyrics to a song or not recognising something which is apparently wildly popular, or indeed mocked for listening to ambient because there are no words or there is not fundamental melody. This has prompted me to the conclusion that pop music may well be the product of trying to fit in, to create a common denominator between people. Listen to pop music? Me too! Let’s talk about it/listen to some together. It kinda feels like if you don’t listen to pop then you don’t listen to anything, or that’s how it feels to me. Some people will disagree; my sister tells me she doesn’t listen to pop music to fit in, she says she listens because it’s catchy and you want to go out and listen to something if someone starts singing some unknown lyrics somewhere. I find this interesting indeed. The catchiness is probably due to the repetitiveness of the lyrics, especially within the chorus. Look at any of the lyrics of a song in the charts and you’ll find that lines are heavily repeated several times (upto 5 or 6 times from what I can see). The lines themselves may indeed have some sort of “deeper meaning” or significance, but their inherent simplicity as part of the whole means the song becomes catchy. Rebecca Black’s infamous “Friday” is probably the perfect example of this.

Here’s an interesting thought; which record labels do you think are currently imploding due to piracy? Mainstream or indie? If you guessed mainstream, you’d be right. Big players like EMI and Universal are shitting themselves over the losses they are making because of piracy; nobody gives enough of a shit to actually pay for pop music. Turn however to the genres that I listen to and they are doing just fine. Yes, ambient is a niché genre, but we have a tight-knit community who appreciate the work of the artists. Ambient artists go to much extra trouble to try and produce the music of the absolute highest quality and to the highest possible standards by creating CD’s and Vinyls for their fans to experience the full effect of the music they have labouriously created. Just thought I’d put that out there. This isn’t me trying to be smug or condescending, it’s me pointing out hard facts. Ambient artists spend lots of time putting even singles and EP’s out, there is not concern about time or their fans. Pop music caters to their fans so much, we need to be fed new things all the time to be satisfied. Pop moves too quickly, and if you dither you get left behind.

Perhaps then, pop’s inherent flaws are due to the way it works. The necessity to churn out lots of music for fear of getting left behind drives artists to stick with what they know will work rather than going out on a limb or push the boundaries. Indeed, it is the desire of many of us, secretly, that we will one day become successful and famous, even if this is only fleeting. Very few of us will ever be able to climb to the top of the food chain, and fewer still will be able to keep themselves there. The strength of the fanbase then is probably the key. Those who are able to keep themselves going for the longest probably have the most dedicated fans that will continue to buy/download their work as long as it is being produced. Sometimes this obsessive fanbase is enough to propel said artist into the charts time and again; GaGa comes to mind here. There’s no question her fans are dedicated, but they are perhaps a little too dedicated.

Of course, arguments about music have probably been going on for as long as music has existed, which is rather a long time. There isn’t going to be a sudden uprising or a radical shift within pop music any-time soon from what I can see, and there is almost no point trying to staunch the incessant torrent of just-average music. On the other hand, I’m allowed to say whatever the hell I think about the music industry, and I personally think it’s in a pretty sad state of affairs at the moment. Some people, many people, are going to disagree with my comments, but it doesn’t matter. We’re all allowed to have an opinion, and there’s mine. If you read through all of that, I’m sure you’ll agree there are probably gaping holes within my argument, but that’s fine.