I somehow came across an article by Connor McClure where he talked about how far too many people blindly use VSCO filters to process their photographs and call it a day. What he said about VSCO is true (and is something I strongly believe in myself) — they are a convenience, and not much more than trends; and trends pass on. McClure says it best: “They are trendsetters, and I don’t believe in latching too tightly on to trends.”

In addition to filters in general (not to target VSCO, whose filters I use rarely, but do use nonetheless) there is another misdirection I feel we ought to address in today’s photography scene: mindless obsession over sharpness.

We do it because we can

One rather convincing argument is that photographers did not obsess over sharpness in earlier days simply because they could not. Most digital afficionados state this as a suggestions that classic photographers would, if given the toold of today, spend a lot of time at 400% zoom.

I beg to differ: the fact that they did not obsess over sharpness — even if only because they could not — and yet we love their photographs more because of their composition, thoughtfulness and sheer art as opposed to their crushed blacks is proof enough that sharpness is a benefit, not a need.

Trompe l’oeil

I used my own photograph as an example above (because, why not?) Whether you liked that photograph or not is besides the point; opinions vary — you may love it or you may hate it. But a lot of people who have seen this photograph have loved it. And most of them were not friends or family.

That said, I should point out that the photograph is well-focused but by no means sharp when viewed at 400% zoom or 100% or whatever other level you may please. It’s a good photograph (if I may say so) because it arouses in its viewer a certain good feeling, which I would attribute mainly to composition and light. This is the purpose of a photograph, or it is to me anyway: to convey an emotion, preferably the same one I felt when I stood there. A photograph is not a representation of a moment in time, nor (rather basely) a capture of a moment in time, but (once again, to me,) a photograph is a conveyer of strong emotions. And sharpness has little say here.

I’m always amused by the ideas that certain people have about technique, which translate into an immoderate taste for the sharpness of the image… [they are] as far away from the real issues as other generations of photographers were when they obscured their subjects in soft focus effects.

— Henri Cartier–Bresson

Art is hard, technicality is easy

There is another reason why people dwell on such things as sharpness and looks and so on: ease. It is far easier to look at, measure and improve upon sharpening your photograph than it is to point at an artistic folly or simply to work towards improving one’s art, towards capturing emotions better.

That is to say, learning, for example, how to properly expose a photograph — which is at the heart of making a picture — is much, much harder than simply propping a tripod, shooting with a remote trigger, and playing with the structure/sharpness slider.

The essence of photography has never changed since its beginnings, and sharpness has never been an essence of photography; it is merely a derivable want, not a need. And in any case if your photography made or broken mainly on the basis of sharpness, you’re doing something terribly wrong.

Fleeting, or long lasting?

One thing that troubles me is that even HCB equated this obsession over sharpness to a trend (soft focus) and it has not changed till this day. It appears sharpness is something that grips every new generation of photographers.

One stop on 500px and I see a mind-numbing sack of photoshopped images screaming perfection in nearly every technical manner you can think of. But I almost never feel like lingering over those photographs, let alone see them a second time. By contrast, I have found a lot of emotionally moving and inspiring photographs on the much criticised Flickr.

The photograph immediately above is another one I made and is a fine example of how we waste time over unnecessary things: look closely to the top-left and you will notice oil spots courtesy of my D600. I never clean them up unless they have been splattered unfortunately across my main subject in a way that obstructs a view of my photograph (think, watermarks). I almost always leave the spots in. They make the picture raw, reminding me of the mechanism which captured this feeling I see before me.

My photographs are neither technically perfect, nor photoshopped. (I have nothing against minimal brushing up in Photoshop, say dodging and burning). But they are a realisation of my vision, and I suppose you could say  there is an aesthetic sense to it. I don’t desire anything more out of them, certainly not razor-sharpness when zoomed in at a bunch of pixels, which is almost never how anyone really sees a photograph.

So, alongside blind use of filters as the final word in post-processing, we photographers also need to stop using sharpness as a benchmark of how good a photograph is. True, sharpness indicates how steady you held your camera or how good a glass is, and makes your photo look good; but unless you’re shooting for a billboard or magazine advertisement or without the intent of making a fine art photograph, I doubt good looks is why you got into photography in the first place.

Sharpness is just another burden we drop on ourselves. I don’t think anybody ever got into or stayed with photography for the sake of sharpness. And I doubt anybody ever will.

Cover image by Lorenzo Basile.

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