s p o n s o r e d l i n k s

Free Ebooks: The Textbook of Digital Photography

Not long ago the course title "Digital Photography" implied a course on Photoshop. As digital cameras have become increasingly popular, the introductory course has also gone digital so you are now introduced to photography using a digital camera. As this new era of digital photography matures, it won’t be long before the "digital" in "digital photography" becomes redundant. It will be assumed, because that is the way almost all photography will be done. One of the primary reasons for this rapid movement from film to digital imaging is that photography is embedded in a world that has gone digital. To take full advantage of the digital world in which we live, photographs also need to be digital. For awhile, capturing images on film and then scanning them into a digital format was a solution. However, this process is expensive and time consuming. Digital cameras remove those impediments and capture images that are already in a universally recognizable digital format that makes them easy to display and share. You can insert digital photographs into word processing documents or PowerPoint presentations, print them on almost any material, send them by e-mail, integrate them into slide shows to be played on the TV, post them on a Web site where anyone in the world can see them—even have them laser-etched into glass or granite. A digital camera, a computer, and a high-speed Internet connection make each of us a member of an ever-expanding network or community of photographers and viewers.

Just as digital images make it easy to integrate photos into many of the other things we do, digital technology makes it easy to add cameras to other devices. One of the current trends is to embed cameras into cell phones and other mobile devices. With just a push of a few buttons, you can snap a picture and immediately e-mail it or post it on a Web site. It won’t be long before there are digital cameras everywhere, all the time. What impact this will have on our photography remains to be seen, but if history is any indicator, people will soon be discovering practical, creative, and even artistic ways to use these new tools.

Changes in technology always open new opportunities and present approaches that change the way images look and are used. For example, the introduction of the 35mm Leica in the 1930s was a revolutionary change that made it easier to capture fast-moving action. Images became more spontaneous and fluid, a far cry from the more formally posed images required by much larger and more awkward cameras. Smaller cameras allowed photographers to discretely capture life on the street and people in motion, without modifying the flow of action by his or her simple presence. Reality could be captured unchanged and unposed. With cameras built into almost all cell phones in the near future, an even larger impact is possible.

Although it’s both the immediacy and flexibility of digital photography that has made it so popular, there is one aspect that is rarely mentioned. This is the new freedom it gives you to explore creative photography. In the 1870s when William Henry Jackson carried 20 x 24 glass plate negatives around the West on a mule, you can bet he hesitated before he took a photograph. He had to set up a darkroom, coat a glass plate, expose the image, develop the negative and then take down and repack all of the gear. We may not be carrying window-sized glass plates, but you and I also hesitate before taking a picture. We’re always doing a mental calculation "is it worth it?" Subconsciously we’re running down a checklist of costs, times, effort, and so on. During that "decisive moment," the image is often lost or we fail to try new things. We lose the opportunity for creative growth and choose to stay with the familiar that has delivered for us in the past. Surprisingly, Jackson had one big advantage we’ve lost over the last century. If an image didn’t turn out, or if he was out of glass plates, he could just scrape the emulsion off a previously exposed negative, recoat the plate, and try again. Digital photography not only eliminates that nagging "is it worth it?" question, it also returns us to that era of endlessly reusable film (and we don’t need a mule to carry it). Hand the camera to the kids, take weird and unusual angles, shoot without looking through the viewfinder, and ignore all previously held conceptions about how to take photographs. You may be surprised at the photos you get if you exploit this new era of uninhibited shooting.

Digital cameras are only a few years old, and we are only at the dawn of this new era. Where it will lead no one really knows, but it’s exciting to play a part in this dramatically changing world. As you begin to explore the field, you will be awash in technical jargon. Most of it can be safely ignored. To show how some things never change, here is what Jacob Deschin, the photographic editor of the New York Times, wrote in 1952 about the earlier era when the Leica revolutionized photography:

"When 35mm was in full flower in this country–in the miniature’s golden Thirties–photographers in the new medium became "experts" overnight, full of tall talk about small grain and big enlargements. They had to, in self defence, for in those early days of the miniature it seemed important to be technically hep, at least in conversation. Never mind the pictures! In spite of much hokum, much good came to the surface, survived the babel and exerted an influence that has since benefitted all photography."

Chapter 1 Digital Cameras & Images