Did I leave anything out or was I off on anything?
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"The 5 Biggest Pitfalls of Digital Photography
jim posted in Links & Articles, Photography on April 21st, 2007

This weekend faced with a mountain of work from a few successful photography trips I started to think about the biggest pitfalls of digital photography. Sure you always hear about all the great things that digital photography affords, but seldom do you see a concentrated discussion of the pitfalls the medium presents. With out further adieu here are what I consider to be the 5 Biggest Digital Photography Pitfalls…

Honorable Mention: A Dirty Sensor
Although I have been shooting digitally full time since 2004 I’ve yet to become complacent about dealing with a dirty digital sensor. By most standards I’m rather meticulous with my gear and do everything I can to minimize dust getting on my sensor. Yet every time I’m working on an image and have to go through the routine of spotting, my blood pressure starts to rise.

It’s great to see that new approaches are being taken by camera manufacturers to deal with this, but it makes my current situation no less aggravating. For images I consider important I find it extremely bothersome that I’m losing data. The more dust on the sensor, the more I lose valuable data. When you think about it the fact that so many people are willing to accept this level of data loss is astounding. In the days of film if images came back with black spots or holes in the film in an equivalent fashion, that stock of film would be run out of the market. I suppose its a reflection of the balance that has been struck between convenience and quality.

5. Gear Envy
This isn’t completely unique to the world of digital photography, but “Gear Envy” is definitely a more common pitfall for digital photographers. Now that cameras are essentially small computers, a similar faster product release cycle to desktop computing now exists resulting in a sizable number of technology and feature developments to discuss or lust after. True to the essence of human nature, reasoning by association, photographers are prone to the thinking that great photographs come from great camera gear. As a result endless discussions take place between photographers, online and in person, about what gear they use and what gear they want to purchase. Ironically if as much time and energy were put into honing ones technical or creative skills, those with “Gear Envy” might see the improvement in their work that they’re after. After all it’s not the equipment that makes a great photo, it is the skill and vision of a photographer that makes a great photo.

4. File Organization
The virtual and physical organization required of digital photography can be an all consuming process and for most the task is an afterthought or too overwhelming to think about. The result is scattered and disorganized folders of photographs on ones hard drive or other chosen form of storage media. In extreme cases the result is the loss of photographs.

This past year software companies like Adobe and Apple have released applications, Lightroom and Aperture respectively, to tackle this problem. Realistically though the success of addressing this pitfall lies not with products produced by software companies, but the photographer. Ultimately personal discipline and consistency, just as in the days of film, is the only thing that can truly address this universal challenge.

3. Backup Paranoia
Ever have that lingering thought in your mind that maybe you didn’t lock your car, so you either walk back to check or reactivate your car alarm?

In that same vein of paranoia digital photographers have multiple ways of losing their images and can find themselves in a similar cycle of double checking. Complicating the matter is that digital media (hard drives, DVDs, etc.) can fail all too easily and unpredictably. If that weren’t enough when backing up hundreds or thousands of images the sheer quantity produces a QA dilemma. A photographer isn’t going to have enough time in his day to open every image to make sure that one or more files wasn’t corrupted in the backup process. Sure system software and DVD/CD burning software will verify the backup or duplication process, but it only takes one corrupted file to ruin a photographer’s day and embed this paranoia forever.

2. So Many Photos, So Little Time
I’ve often said that human nature predicates, no matter how well intentioned, a person is prone to impulsively act on their urges or desires until they reach a limit forced upon them.

In the world of digital photography that directly translates to shooting until you have no more room to store your images on your compact flash cards. There is just something inherently calming to a photographer knowing that they did everything they could to capture the moment. If the moment sought after wasn’t captured then it’s much easier to blame the lack of capacity versus accepting ones individual culpability of missing the opportunity. The result is taking home more images, of quality or not, that can humanely be processed, printed and shown. There are likely other reasons why we may take so many digital photos. It could be as simple as “because we can”, but the universal pitfall remains the same. Just because we can take an infinite number of photos doesn’t mean that we can process them all.

1. Over Dependence on Adobe Photoshop
I’ll go out on a limb and say that most photographers have a secret love-hate relationship with Adobe Photoshop. Photoshop creates a world of endless possibilities for photographers. Photography purists can clean up their image to accurately represent the scene they photographed and those with more of an artistic slant can transform their photo(s) into a unique creation. The problem with Photoshop is that it has quickly become a crutch for photographers to make up for their technical shortcomings. We all have areas that we need to improve upon, but more times than not when out in the field I’ll hear the commonly used phrase “I’ll just fix it in Photoshop later.”

For many Photoshop is the fast path to perfecting ones image, even if it were possible to avoid that work in the first place by learning the technical skills to do the same thing in camera. There’s no point not to take advantage of Photoshop’s functionality, but at the same time there is no reason to avoid learning how to maximize the use of your camera to avoid extra or unnecessary post-processing.

With that off my chest, now I need to get back to finding, processing and backing up my images from my last 5 or 6 photo shoots…"

Edited by Jeff on Apr 22, 2007 at 07:35 PM GMT
link to my blog entry for other comments received

Edited by jmg-galleries on Apr 24, 2007 at 11:07 PM GMT

Pretty much the way it goes. It took me a couple years to figure out all my Minolta D7i could do. I'll be ready for the 50D by the time I conquer my 20D.

How about proprietary issues? Namely between Canon and Nikon. Nikon users tend to be stuck with Nikon-made equipment such as lenses and most small flash units. That's a pitfall, in my opinion.

Funny that you've put "dependence on Photoshop" as number one. That's the first thing that came to mind when I read the title of the thread.

Is my lens sharp (front focus, back focus, at center, corners, etc)? (due to the ease of 100% view.)

You forgot the real No.1- It's a bigger money sucking black hole than desktop publishing!

Let's see ... Of all that you mentioned, the Honorable Mention rings the clearest bell. Specks didn't play a role on film, since they'd be able to affect a single frame only.

As far as the rest goes ... It all depends on what you're used to. I'm not saying My Way is The way, but things aren't as grimm in my eyes as you portray them:

#5 Gear Envy was around during film too. It's not like we didn't get L-glass untill after the D60 introduction. Rapid succession of digital bodies didn't change LLD in the slightest.

#4 It can be a problem, if you have no method in your approach. I just file all my shots chronologically. I stick to the Canon folder naming convention and just dump cards to HD, including folders. Once I burn a number of folders onto DVD as backup, that bunch of folders gets placed into a separate folder with the DVD number. It can hardly be simpler.

#3 Backup? On HD directly, burned on DVD, and on a file server with disks in RAID 1. 2 disks of 500 GB (mirrored to allow for one disk to fail without data loss) will cost around US$ 200 and give 500 gig of effective space. That's 80.000+ 10D RAW shots in my case. Or more than 2000 rolls of 36+2 film. 0.0025 cent per shot. I could loose 2 out of 3 and still have my collection.

#2 Funny thing, I've done quite a few big events, both as visitor and as photographer, but the worst I've had to do is spend about a third of the photography time in the Selection and Processing stage... But, admittedly, that ties in with #1. I'll shoot more, not because I can, but because taking a little risk isn't going to cost me film or development costs. So, shoot from the hip? Sure. Aim, fire. Missed? Try again.

#1 Photowhat I use Canon's DPP for selection and processing, IrfanView for batch resize and text embedding. If it can't be done with DPP, I can't be bothered.

But that's just me

I guess I'm ahead of the curve then?

Dust has never been a big issue for my for some reason & I have the Copper HIll kit to deal with it once enough gets on the sensor to warrant the time--only twice in 2 1/2 years for the full-blown swab method & several more for simple brushing.

All the management & software issues, I spent about 4-6 months of deliberately conquering those. File management, backup, and image volume are not a problem for me (heck, just did a car show & got the photos for one of my club up by 3 hours after I got home--5 mins *after* the first "where's the pics" post). I've mostly weaned myself off PS dependence--it's only used when needed & that's rare outside of batch-processed light sharpening.

Oh, and the gearhead talk & envy isn't digital only, go hit the Medium Format forum at photo.net--almost entriely film & still similar questions of which body or lens. Probably the common availability of 'net access now just magnifies this since we can all ask the whole world the same questions that only a handful of people had to listen to in the past.

1. is by far and away the most obvious one.

Yes, this is mean to be in all caps.

"JUST SHOOT RAW AND FIX IT IN POST." I feel like figuring out where that person lives and going to their house and shooting them. RAW and Photoshop should not be there to correct all your technical problems because you don't understand basic photographic principles.

Yes, that's right...digital photography is great and all, but really....when you're relying on Photoshop/a computer in order to get correct WB and exposures there is something plain wrong. This is one reason why photography as a profession may be going down the tubes within the next few decades. Thanks to things like USM, Levels, Color corrections, etc. any shmo can take a photo 2 stops underexposed, incorrect white balance and backfocused and still come away with a shot that could run in tomorrow's paper. Truly sad, but it's true--and happening. More and more I'm seeing "photo contributed by Blah Blah Organization" and "Courtesy of Joe Schmo" . Meaning the newspapers/magazines are paying a whole lot of nothing to get photos on their pages.

My biggest beef with digital is that it is too disposable. There is no value associated with each image taken as there is no film used so they are too easily and quickly deleted robbing future generations of a what may be a very interesting image of the time. No telling how many pictures have been deleted that may have become historical in other situations. Think of Monica hugging Bill Clinton, that would certainly have been deleted (I am sure Bill wished it had been). None the less it is now a historical photo that wouldn't be.

Then next beef about digital is that it requires active archiving. If your images are going to last through time, you have to constantly refresh the archives on the latest and greatest media. CDs and DVDs have a fairly short life, in 20 years will you even be able to find a CD or DVD player. When was the last time you saw a 5.25" floppy disk? They are not that old, good luck trying to read any data that you may have had tucked away on them.

I have taken to archiving my digital images on film, at least in 20 years I will be able to hold them up to the light and see what is there, and if there is a little scratch on it or some fungus, it only creates a little blip on the image instead of a completely unusable disk with hundreds of ruined images.

Yeah digital is great and has had the same impact on photography as the old Kodak Brownie as far as the masses. Unfortunately it is also the undoing of the professional end of the medium I fear. Well as long as I can purchase silver nitrate, gelatin and 4x5 inch window glass I guess I will be happy in the dark.

Phil

I'm not sure how those are all pitfalls. Some are perfectly normal and logical.

EB

Jonathan Knight wrote:
1. is by far and away the most obvious one.

Yes, this is mean to be in all caps.

"JUST SHOOT RAW AND FIX IT IN POST." I feel like figuring out where that person lives and going to their house and shooting them. RAW and Photoshop should not be there to correct all your technical problems because you don't understand basic photographic principles.

Yes, that's right...digital photography is great and all, but really....when you're relying on Photoshop/a computer in order to get correct WB and exposures there is something plain wrong. This is one reason why photography as a profession may be going down the tubes within the next few decades. Thanks to things like USM, Levels, Color corrections, etc. any shmo can take a photo 2 stops underexposed, incorrect white balance and backfocused and still come away with a shot that could run in tomorrow's paper. Truly sad, but it's true--and happening. More and more I'm seeing "photo contributed by Blah Blah Organization" and "Courtesy of Joe Schmo" . Meaning the newspapers/magazines are paying a whole lot of nothing to get photos on their pages.

Try shooting in a situation with flourescent light, tungsten light and natural light combined. And then try to get skin tones right... In that case you're happy that you've got settable color temperature. That has little to do with being lazy.

And while professional photography is indeed taking a severe hit by the widespread availability of digital cameras, it's not because of the things you mentioned. USM, the equivalent of levels, color corrections, contrast adjustments, pushing or pulling exposure, it can all be done with film too. In fact, Unsharp Mask saw its first use in the 1930s

Wow! Thanks to everyone that has responded. There's some great thoughts here on the topic.

Garrad as far as proprietary issues that come up in my mind it's more so the proprietary RAW formats versus the lenses. DNG aims to address this but it's not the ideal solution. Lens formats are less a pitfall of digital as much as they are a universal pain... unless you're the camera manufacturer.

jjlphoto expense is a huge pitfall. Sure gear is always expensive, but the supporting software and computer hardware takes things into the stratosphere of cost.

Phil I think you nailed the sleeper pitfall that I overlooked. Archiving is a pitfall, but changing backup formats is a perpetual problem. I'm not looking forward to the day that I have to transfer all my CD/DVDs to the next backup format.

EB I would say that each pitfall affords a potential benefit. There is a good and bad to each as with most things.

Thanks to everyone who commented. I look forward to checking in again soon when work lets up.

It may come as a surpise to some of you.........Photoshop has been around much longer than you may think. Photographers have been using Photoshop for film images since it was introduced in 1990. Before that it was..get it close..fix it in the darkroom. Post processing is part and parcel to photography since its inception (you have to develop the film (you can also adjust for shooting conditions at this stage...its called push processing)). Many of the functions in image processing software are based on what photgraphers do in the darkroom.

Of all your "pitfalls" only the dirty sensor can be attributed solely to the digital world. I've known pros that have shot 5 to 6 hundred ROLLS of film. Its easier to organize and sort on a computer than to spend hours using a loupe while bent over a light table.

Osai... I'm all too aware of how long Photoshop has been out.. I've been using it since its release. And I'm also well aware of equivalent darkroom techniques available in Photoshop that people have used in the past. My post wasn't to bash Photoshop merely that people are falling prone to using it when they may not need to out of laziness. That is quite different than what I think is being interpreted that "Photoshop is evil". I'd never say that As to the pitfalls I never claimed they were exclusive to digital photography. I put this list out there to spur discussion... thanks for taking part.

Just remember.......Photoshop doesn't kill images...people do...............

Geert you make some great points. Disorganized photographers today were just as disorganized in the hey-day of film. Sure, there's more to keeping up with copious digital ouput, but disciplined organization keeps that challenge in line.

I spend a great deal of time processing, organizing and backing up the images I shoot, much more, of course than in the "good old days" of film. My computers cost 10k instead of $1,000 for a simple Dell to e-mail and invoice on. My camera bodies went from $1,700. to $7995, and the software, oh the software. In light of all that, here's a little perspective, my biggest film year saw me spend $75K on film, about the same on processing, probably ten thousand of that was on Polaroid film, that always left me hoping I interpreted the crummy representation of my shot correctly and interpolated that accurately to my film. Let's see, that's about $750,000 that I haven't spent over the past five years on film and processing, not a bad return on the investment.

And, still left to ponder, is the absolute peace of mind when boarding that plane home from thousands of miles away, knowing that I got the shots and in many cases they're already in the client's hands. To me, moaning about the down side of digital, is like missing vinyl records and the crackling and popping that accompanied them.

JW

Interesting about how many people talk about digital being the downfall of the professional photographer. It has simply become even more democratic than ever. The fact that becoming a decent TECHNICAL photographer also means there is more NORMAL photography. But unique vision and talent is still just that.

I would say digital's biggest downfall is creating more paranoid and competative pros as it's easier to see what others are doing and the intense market saturation of photography. No longer do you have to publish a book to be seen, just upload to flickr or similar or create a custom URL.

#2 would be the constant upgrade of bodies that creates this sense of instability in investment when it comes to equipment. Sure digital is cheaper in the long run, but spending time researching new equipment is a loss of time. The sense of security in buying a really nice body and lens and knowing you'll probably get 15-20 years out of it with care is basically gone (upgrade cycles being normally every 2 to 3 years). Think about the quantity of compter trash created by digital...I guess its better than dumping chemicals in the water en masse.

#3 would be the sheer amount of cables that I now have. ITs unreal that I try to actually minimize my equipment for the sake of sanity and yet I have a cabinet full of cables, adaptors, powercords, powerstrips, ect.

#4 might be the fact that you NEED electricity to shoot therefore you need batteries and chargers. There's no option of taking your battery free digital body with you. I used to have an RB67 and a pentax K1000 (battery is just for the meter) just for that reason. You never know when you're just going to be out of juice, but you want/need to keep shooting.

All of these are obstacles that can be overcome of course. And like you said, its not like you can't clone out dustbunnies, but its one more step and a loss of info. With every medium there are ups and downs, but sometimes the downers can be a PITA, however small of an issue they really are.

And also all the downfalls I listed could probably also be seen as positives really. Just depends on your point of view.

I really liked that article, even thought I'm not a pro (by any means at all, lol). I'd just like to point out that, sure, gear envy/acquisition isn't exclusive to digital photography, but it is still one of our biggest pitfalls. It still affects digital photography/photographers, so not mentioning it would be a disservice.

I have no experience with film photography, but I would guess that archiving film is much easier and reliable than archiving digital. Physical backups of digital photos have an incredibly high failure rate and degrade very quickly (DVD-Rs degrade in a matter of years) and digital backups are rather expensive (setting up a RAID server for backup purposes can be cheap, but nowhere near as cheap as protecting a physical copy). I think that is deserving of a mention. Sometime I'd like to see photographers using digital for 15+ years go back and try to restore from their earliest and oldest backups. I think that would be very interesting.