Computers waste your time [Archive]

kshapero

07-09-2009, 08:52

SolaresLarrave

07-09-2009, 08:58

Agree with you wholeheartedly. I could be doing something else instead of typing this note to agree with you about computers being the money-pits of time.

But then, heck, I'm having some mild, harmless fun... :)

Chriscrawfordphoto

07-09-2009, 08:58

No different than the time one 'wastes' in the darkroom. Really, these kind of anti-digital screeds are just silly.

Tuolumne

07-09-2009, 08:59

Compare how long it would take to do something in a dark room with how long it takes to do it in Photoshop. If Photoshop takes longer, then use a different editor. If not, keep on trukin'. I only use PS for very limited things. Most of the time I use Picasa. I couldn't do even my simple color photo editing in an analog dark room; so infinite time in a dark room vs. limited time on a computer makes me infinitely more productive with my computer.

/T

Jodorowsky

07-09-2009, 09:01

Maybe Jay Maisal should have stuck with it for a bit longer before issuing soundbites. I find getting sucked into the Internet for hours on end annoying and depressing, but Photoshopping is a creative act. Which version was he using?

mabelsound

07-09-2009, 09:10

bmattock

07-09-2009, 09:10

Computers are how I make my living. So Jay can bite me.

kshapero

07-09-2009, 09:26

Really just like to hear how folks use or not use post processing software. Not meant to be anti anything.

bhop73

07-09-2009, 09:35

I've been using Photoshop professionally for around 13 years, so I know my way around it pretty well. Scanning and digital editing/printing saves me tons of time compared to the old darkroom days.

oscroft

07-09-2009, 09:38

I think however you do your photography it's the same. Whether you prefer pixels or wet stuff (or both), if you love it and you're dedicated you'll "waste" as much time as you can spare. Waste away, I say :)

kxl

07-09-2009, 09:44

1) Time on computers pays the mortgage and other bills, and finances travel and other "nice to haves."

2) Photoshop (for me) takes less than 30 seconds per image, so it does not take up a lot of time.

3) Cruising the internet -- now THAT takes up a lot of time, which mostly ends up being wasted time.

Lilserenity

07-09-2009, 09:49

It's horses for courses, for some people 'lightroom' (whatever you use, Photoshop, PaintShop Pro, Aperture, Lightroom, pbrush.exe ;)) is a sucker of time, for some the darkroom is a sucker of time, and others both are.

Photography takes time to mature sometimes whether you do it digitally or on analogue or a hybrid process. Art isn't rushed, it might be quick but never rushed whatever way you go about it.

I work largely in the darkroom for B&W and only shoot film, and I don't enjoy Photoshop as much as the darkroom but that's not a fact or an objective truth, it's just my own way (due to the fact I work on a PC 5 days a week and in the evenings apart from some RFF browsing.)

Just enjoy whatever you do and to hell with anybody who tells you that you are wrong, whatever you prefer :)

Dave Wilkinson

07-09-2009, 10:00

While recovering from my heart attack I've spent way too much time staring at this thing!....I'm getting a lot stronger, and shall soon be pushing it into the background, and getting out and about a lot more!. I've noticed the few regulars who seem to be hanging around here 24/7....don't know how they find time to shoot any pictures - LOL!, and as for the poor guys that make a living at them.....:eek:.....but it's better ( just! ) than not being able to make a living!. I don't have photoshop, but use 'Paintshop Pro', and after pratting about with curves and levels, and other such nonsense, I usually find that the 'Smart photo fix' does as well - with one click!, anyway...that's Dave's daily rant over! :D

bmattock

07-09-2009, 10:22

Really just like to hear how folks use or not use post processing software. Not meant to be anti anything.

Let's think about that for a second. Title was "Computers waste your time" and your premise was that you agreed with Jay Maisal's statement to that effect.

Let me put my answer another way. Computers may waste your time; they don't waste mine - they pay my bills. If you dislike computers so much, that is certainly your right, but I suggest you get offline and stay there.

You may say that you're not trying to be "anti anything," but I can't think of many other ways to take it. And let's face it, as film slips into obscurity, many who love it are beginning to go a bit bonkers. Anything some film-centric people can do to try to 'save' film by denigrating digital technology is fair game. It begins to have a whiff of the desperate to it.

I love film, but I've moved on. If you can't, fine - your choice. But drop the anti-digital crap, please. It's thinly disguised and really rather boring now.

amateriat

07-09-2009, 10:23

Chris101

07-09-2009, 10:41

Computers are how I make my living. So Jay can bite me.
I make my living standing up doing wet chemistry (I'm a labrat.) So Jay can bite Bill.

photogdave

07-09-2009, 10:44

People are so reactionary here these days. He's more or less saying the age-old axiom: "get it right at the time of exposure".

Dave Wilkinson

07-09-2009, 10:55

Hey, hey, hey...! Is this not the same Jay Maisel who was extolling the joys of the then-new Nikon D1, trash-talking film, which was suddenly so "back-then", and glowing about how marvy working on a computer with PS was?

No?

His evil doppelganger, maybe?

So maybe it's "HCB Syndrome" for him now? Just pop out those memory cards and have someone else do the "dirty work?"

Maybe it's time for him to hang it up for a bit and, say, learn to play guitar...like George Lucas did. (Lucas, of course, came out of retirement, and back to the field...and look what happened. :mad:)

- Barrett fair enough! - have you read some of the earlier articles by our good friend Roger (Hicks), one book ( I am a fan, and have three! ) is a compendium of his weekly articles in 'Amatuer Photographer' and has him stating his decision not to have a digital camera, and decrying the foolishness of regularly hanging around on internet forums!. That was two or three years ago, since then - from his notes etc., there have been two or three DSLR's and in the past year has gone from a M8 to a M8/2!, and when not travelling - he's a daily contributer to this august forum!. It's easy to tell that a lot of us around here ( myself included, at times! ) change our minds as often as we change our socks!
Dave.

emraphoto

07-09-2009, 11:05

i make my mortgage payments via email assignment info>research assignment particulars on internet>fire up digital camera>dump to laptop>ftp>cheque in the mail.

i don't think i can get on board with his way of thinking.

emraphoto

07-09-2009, 11:06

Let's think about that for a second. Title was "Computers waste your time" and your premise was that you agreed with Jay Maisal's statement to that effect.

Let me put my answer another way. Computers may waste your time; they don't waste mine - they pay my bills. If you dislike computers so much, that is certainly your right, but I suggest you get offline and stay there.

You may say that you're not trying to be "anti anything," but I can't think of many other ways to take it. And let's face it, as film slips into obscurity, many who love it are beginning to go a bit bonkers. Anything some film-centric people can do to try to 'save' film by denigrating digital technology is fair game. It begins to have a whiff of the desperate to it.

I love film, but I've moved on. If you can't, fine - your choice. But drop the anti-digital crap, please. It's thinly disguised and really rather boring now.

i hate to stir the pot but bill pretty much encapsulated my thoughts. now back to my hunt for a medium format rangefinder!

Chris101

07-09-2009, 11:13

People are so reactionary here these days. He's more or less saying the age-old axiom: "get it right at the time of exposure".I hope my "witty retort (not so much)" was not taken as reactionary. I use computers and I do things without them. Including photography.

No biggie. However to someone who was growing up during the run-up to the digital age, we were lead to believe that once computers became common-place that all the tedium of jobs, etc. would be done by these machines. There was a lot of talk about "what would we do with all the leisure time we would then have".

Well, the future didn't work out that way, we need to work just as hard with computers as we ever did with typewrites, copy machines, and spectrophotometers, in fact there seems to be less general leisure time now than there was in past decades, often due to computer issues. (Anyone who has spent hours on the phone with a help desk can attest to that!)

And wait a minute! Cars were supposed to fly in the future too!

ernesto

07-09-2009, 11:17

Specifically, I agree with Jay Maisal who says, while first playing in Photoshop "...there's one of the great lies of all times, that computers save time. They don't. They're time suckers. So, I'm trying not to get involved in the Photoshop."
Just a discussion piece not a screed.

Computers are just a tool.
It all depend on your skills and knowledge of the tool, to do something productive.
In order to use a tool, you first need to learn to use it.
And it takes time, but it is not a waste, if you continue to use the same tool...
E

back alley

07-09-2009, 11:22

like reading a book is a waste of time?

Dave Wilkinson

07-09-2009, 11:28

:dance:like reading a book is a waste of time?
My grannie used to say "readers are never workers!" ;) ....but I believe -"all things in moderation" :angel:

amateriat

07-09-2009, 11:31

Like Bill, these "time-wasting" contraptions pay the lion's share of the bills here as well. Yes, they can kill a lot of my time, but I'd much rather have 'em than not.

Much prefer film to digital, but I use both. Like to scan. Like Photoshop. Love my HP 8750 (to the point that I bought a second one).

I even like ranting with you guys about it. Only a bit, though. ;)

- Barrett

amateriat

07-09-2009, 11:48

Dave: everyone has the right to change his/her mind. It's just that the memory of Maisel's words glow like little embers. He was going on as if he'd struck oil in the basement of his firehouse/home/studio. Mind you, I like Maisel. I'm not picking on the guy for sport.

People are so reactionary here these days. He's more or less saying the age-old axiom: "get it right at the time of exposure".
Ironically, I feel this is a concept easier to accomplish with film than with digital capture. In fact, if you shoot RAW, that concept gets virtually torn to shreds: other than keeping your highlights under control, almost everything is "in play" until you get it in the computer. Which, in fact, is fine by me. I approach shooting digital in an almost entirely different way from shooting film, and each approach has its virtues, but neither allows shirking work. Make a half-assed effort, and that's likely what you'll wind up with visually, regardless of medium. I take it that this doesn't sit with Maisel too well anymore. You do what you feel is important. (And, yes, he's famous, and I'm not.)

- Barrett

amateriat

07-09-2009, 11:49

Computadores have been bery bery good, to me.
Throw left, mouse right, correct? ;)

- Barrett

Brian Sweeney

07-09-2009, 11:54

I guess it depends on if you are getting paid to work with the computer or not.

Writing Code pays the mortgage, bills, and some nice cameras.

mackigator

07-09-2009, 12:00

Hmmm, the time a novice wastes learning does not automatically imply that the tool is flawed.

"Never judge a philosophy by its abuse" or a computer.

Juan Valdenebro

07-09-2009, 12:26

No different than the time one 'wastes' in the darkroom. Really, these kind of anti-digital screeds are just silly.

I think computers absorb more time than we'd like to tell... Than we'd like, period.
Maybe he referred to a waste of time in terms of hours of photoshop vs. hours of shooting, not photoshop vs. darkroom... Many photographers consider they should not use photoshop, but someone else... As for darkroom work... It's usual amongst pros, at least here in Europe, even if they handle the program very well,,,

buzzardkid

07-09-2009, 14:11

Didn't somebody on here say they had a 60 seconds per photo post-processing policy? I have adopted that for the most part, and it keeps the computer in the realm of useful tool, rather than time-sucker.

Internet forums, now, that's a different story.

Using Lightroom, I hardly ever get in the 60-second-per-photo realm.:cool:

Using internet forums, I never get out of the 60-second realm.:D