Confessions of a Pixel Peeper
The world of photography is full of long running and tiresome debates — I think some people get into photography strictly for the debates. The problem is, like most debates in life, people tend to gravitate towards the extremes and the valid points on both sides are lost in a sea of hyperbole.
One of the oldest is this old chestnut: “Which is more important, the photographer or the equipment?” The purists trot out the same tired cliche, “Give Ansel Adams a disposable camera and he’ll take better pictures than the average photographer with the best equipment available.” Which is both true and beside the point. Obviously the photographer is the most important element of the artistic side, but just because equipment isn’t the most important, doesn’t mean that it isn’t important.
An artist will understand the limitations of his tools and work within their limits to create the best result possible, so the purists are on the right track with their Ansel analogy. But a better question to ask is why didn’t Ansel shoot with a disposable camera? It’s the job of the artist to choose the appropriate tools, because your tools will define the limitations you have to work with.
The advent of digital photography has introduced new tiresome debates. One of which is: “Which is more important, the picture that you print or the quality of the picture viewed onscreen at 100%?”
The purists proudly stick out their chests and announce “The print!” They derisively label anyone who wants to view their pictures at 100% pixel detail on their monitors as pixel peepers or measurebators. People who can’t see the forest for the trees.
I have a confession to make: I’m a pixel peeper.
Now I don’t photograph rulers or brick walls and examine them in excruciating detail, looking for the slightest problem. I don’t stay up at night worrying about vignetting in the corners at wide apertures on wide angle lenses. I don’t think sharpness is the end-all be-all characteristic of a picture. I don’t photograph color charts and worry about slight differences. I don’t obsess over noise charts. I don’t buy the top of the line of everything because I need to have the best of the best.
But here’s the thing - I almost never print out my pictures. How my images look as an 8″x10″ print isn’t how I judge quality because it’s not the main way I view my images. What matters is how it looks at on my monitor. I want to see the forest and the trees.
For family snapshots, it’s true, I don’t pixel peep. I don’t need to study the pores of my skin in a self-portrait. But for my wildlife photography, I love being able to zoom in and see fine details I’d never get to see otherwise. I love being able to take an environmental portrait where the animal is seen in the context of its world, but still be able to zoom in and study detail of the animal itself.
Medium format photographers have always understood this, it’s why they shoot in a format with a larger negative. They want to print a large landscape and have the scene rendered with fine detail, so that you can stand back and view the entire scene, step closer and revel in the fine detail, then step back again and view the entire scene.
As I hinted at above, you can take this to an extreme and become too obsessed over the details. Scan any Internet forum when a new model is introduced and you’ll see this in abundance, from the smallest digicams to the largest SLR’s. But that doesn’t mean pixels don’t matter, for those of us who want the forest and the trees.
Take the picture linked at the top of the post of an alligator at Huntington Beach State Park in South Carolina. I love being able to zoom in and see the crab that’s in the gator’s mouth, look at the details of the gator’s teeth. Even with a spotting scope you won’t see that kind of detail, it happens too quickly. But with the digital image, I can zoom out to view the entire scene and then zoom in to view the details.
So go ahead and pixel peep, revel in the details, just don’t forget to enjoy the forest as well as the trees.
Tags: American alligator, Huntington Beach State Park, reptiles, South Carolina