Too much?

[Chester PB]

AP sometimes published pictures of sport or wildlife that appear to have been taken at exactly the right moment, and usually praises the photographer for 'getting the shot'. Yet the same magazine reviews camera bodies that will allow the photographer to take hundreds of images in 'machine gun mode' (sometimes known as 'spay and pray') over a few seconds and then select one frame that will be the one praised as 'getting the shot'. Last week's issue had an article about taking pictures of garden birds that uses a technique like this, plus the Olympus camera body used allows the capture of some images before the shutter release is fully depressed by continuously taking shots and storing them in a memory 'buffer'.

Perhaps today the skill is knowing how to set up the camera body to do this, rather than pressing the shutter release at the right moment (and, of course, having the funds to buy a camera body that has these facilities). Is this photography as many of us would define it, or merely the latest development in extracting a single frame from a very high quality video recording?

[nimbus]

May 26, 2024 9:14:34 GMT Kath said:

I take as many shots as I need to get what I want. Sometimes that's one, sometimes it's more. My hugely expensive book of Magnum contact sheets shows that the good and great hardly ever got their famous works in one shot. I am not sure I like the implied snobbery that you can only be a good photographer if you only take minimal shots. What happened to 'exploring your subject'? Admittedly I take fewer shots now than I did when I first started. I spend a bit more time looking through the viewfinder before pressing the shutter button but still. Each to their own, eh?

There's exploring the subject and exploring the subject. Shooting a large number of identical shots is one thing, another is taking a large number of shots from varying angles with varying compositions.

[zx9]

My dad's old Rollie Automat came with some period books, the usual focal press style user guides plus a couple of Rollei year books some of the pictures of athletes and jumping skiers are amazing. I can see how you would compose a reclining nude with a TLR but some of the sports shots can only have been taken by someone with a very good knowledge of the particular sport and when and where the peak action would happen.

[zx9]

May 26, 2024 13:49:18 GMT peterob said:

May 26, 2024 9:14:34 GMT Kath said:

I take as many shots as I need to get what I want. Sometimes that's one, sometimes it's more. My hugely expensive book of Magnum contact sheets shows that the good and great hardly ever got their famous works in one shot. I am not sure I like the implied snobbery that you can only be a good photographer if you only take minimal shots. What happened to 'exploring your subject'? Admittedly I take fewer shots now than I did when I first started. I spend a bit more time looking through the viewfinder before pressing the shutter button but still. Each to their own, eh?

I do think there is a difference between taking more than one shot, exploring subject or whatever, and taking multiple shots of essentially the same thing.  When using a long lens I do tend to take 2 shots, using a double tap, because it goes some way to stop me letting the lens drop at the same time I first press the shutter release,  which is a nasty habit I have. I'll tend to set a 3 or 5 fps "backup" which makes me think about the second tap. It is a fail if the camera itself makes more than one exposure in burst mode. I can't beat 7 fps or faster.  If the subject is moving very quickly then burst mode can help take away the distraction of timing the shutter release while at the same time panning and focussing but the results are pot-luck on focus and composition. 

When I was into motor sport photography I was using a EOS 1D mk2 and a 300mm + 1.4x converter, often on high speed continuous more in the hope that the AF would get its act together for at least one frame. That was when the 1D mk3 had just come out so it was still close to the best available, I have a feeling that my EOS M6 mk2 would stand a good chance of getting things right more of the time.

[Chester PB]

I recently purchased a second hand book of railway photographs, published in the 1970s, featuring the work of a skilled photographer who had been active from the late 1920s until the late 1950s. In the introduction he wrote about his early work when he had a camera body that used 5x4 inch sheet film, and all he could carry for a day was 5 or 6 pieces in film holders. Later he used a smaller camera that probably used 120 film, and he could have one film in the camera and a couple more in his pocket (so perhaps 36 shots). He commented on the later popularity of 'miniature' 35 mm cameras, and the ability to carry enough films for 'over 100' shots.  

I would love to know what he might say about the ability to take thousand of shots in a day, but end up with no more really good ones than he would have managed. 

[zou]

If he was that good he could have loads of keepers.

[MJB]

In all probability he would have utilised the tools at his disposal and used them to good effect, just like sporting heroes of yesteryear would have used all the technology and science available nowadays, and penitent men no longer have the need to wear hair shirts and self-flagelate with birch twigs.

[spinno]

May 26, 2024 17:44:58 GMT MJB said:

In all probability he would have utilised the tools at his disposal and used them to good effect, just like sporting heroes of yesteryear would have used all the technology and science available nowadays, and penitent men no longer have the need to wear hair shirts and self-flagelate with birch twigs.

I used to quite enjoy that...

[JohnY]

One of our number seems to get lots of cricketing shots complete with ball in the frame using a D200 and vintage 400mm manual Nikkor. A Z8 running at a fast frame rate with even a modest 180-600 just makes the job easier. i.e less skilful.

[El Sid]

I used to photograph a friend's local cricket team - not unusual to get home with 600+ shots but that at least was over a game that lasted several hours...

[spinno]

May 28, 2024 12:14:43 GMT El Sid said:

I used to photograph a friend's local cricket team - not unusual to get home with 600+ shots but that at least was over a game that lasted several hours...

Sounds about right...
Imagine a 40 over a side game that's 480 deliveries to monitor plus other interesting shots (shut up you heathens)

[stevewmh]

Shooting events kind of racks up the shutter count before you know it. The Staines 10k marathon had over 800 runners and the aim was to get a shot of all of 'em. Ended up about 850 shots. Other events can be anything between one and 7 hundred depending on what's going on.
A typical day shooting wildlife is usually 20 or 30 pics, most of them get binned, though the walk is good

[dorsetmike]

When I was shooting the Bournemouth air shows I would hold the button down for nost of each flypast or manoeuvre so usually got over 1000 per day, took me over a week to sort through to save the best.

[andytake2]

The only time I ever really had high numbers of shots was when I used to bracket (3 shots) or the occasional wildlife shot that needed to be fast - that really was spray and pray.
Other than that, it always seemed a way to do a damn site more work in lightroom searching for stuff to keep.

[donerundlecams]

A friend of mine is shooting the Olympics now with several Sony cameras capable of shooting at 20+ fps and I can't even imagine how many shots he has taken   .  

Heck, even I went on a binge, albeit after not taking any snaps for between 7 -9 days due to a bout of Covid.  I went out this past Sunday evening (masked) to a blues jam and, betwixt, 8pm - 12:30am, proceeded to take somewhere between 550-700 snaps  .  I know that I have 140 left to cull and have deleted, at least, 450-500 (-/+) snaps ...  Speaking of bingeing(sp?), last night I was trying to cull some snaps all whilst, my sister, her wife and I were binge watching a UK telly series called "Paranoid" and suffice I culled, but, around 100 

Cheers,
Jack