Comment by fleddr | Hacker News Reader

Comment by fleddr | Hacker News Reader

"During my exploration in Europe, I saw plenty of travelers and photographers lugging huge camera bags stuffed with multiple prime and zoom lenses. These folks would set down their bags and fiddle with their cameras, changing lenses, etc.

While they were juggling, I was shooting.

Less is more."

There's nothing wrong with a minimalist approach, but the above comparison is bullshit.

I've been photographing and traveling for 2 decades. If in recent years you still find people with a bag full of lenses, overwhelmingly this is to cover a giant focal range. Thus, when they switch a lens, this is to cover a dramatically different focal length. A wide angle for a landscape, a telezoom for a distant bird. Maybe even macro.

The point being, they're able to make shots that you're simply unable to make at all with your fixed 50mm lens no matter your creativity. Which is a choice, but it most certainly is not "more".

The minimalism claimed here is snobbery instead. You go against gear heads yet crave a Leica. The ultimate snob camera system. You claim speed is important ("I kept shooting") and then admire a camera that is slow by design. You claim weight is important, yet don't use your smartphone. It's one contradiction after the other.

To make the stereotype complete, I'll fill in the blanks. You're principally against auto-focus as it ruins the art. You make prints from your own photos and frame them with a white border 5 inches thick, to magnify the "minimalism".

Guests will think your intentionally blurry grainy B&W photo of unclear subject or meaning is from Ikea, luckily an explanation will follow about the laborious process to achieve this minimalism, whilst in the background the teenage son types into his AI prompt:

"Beautiful landscape with trees but actually sharp and not noisy, not in style of dad, without borders, full rich color, more is more"

I shot with only an rx1 (full frame, fixed 35mm prime) for years.

Now I carry around a huge sony mirrorless with a big heavy 24-70 g master zoom.

One camera, one lens is fine - until you want to actually exert compositional control. You can't beat 70mm+ for portraits. You can get 75% there with one camera, one lens, but sometimes you gotta dive deeper.

(Also his setup is bigger/heavier/lower quality than the rx1/rx1r, even within the "one camera one lens" masochist arena.)

To be clear, I pass no judgement on any setup. At all. Use a smartphone. A single lens. A bag full of them. You do you.

I specifically objected to the weird comparison the author makes, the sense of superiority, the self-contradicting arguments.

There definitely is a tendency for hobby photographers to amass gear to the point where it gets in the way of taking photos (and then ditch most of it when they get older and wiser).

That said, yeah - the article is half good advice, half snobbery. There is some merit to learning the technique using a stable toolkit, but you don't need to spend $6,000 on a "status symbol" camera and you certainly don't need to only shoot black-and-white.

Absolutely gear heads exist. I also agree with the idea that purposeful constraint can be fun. I have a 40 year old manual focus lens myself, just to fool around. Chose your own style and gear, do what you want.

The only thing I object to is to declare a sense of superiority by dunking on somebody with a different approach. Even more so when the "rational" arguments are completely opposite to one's own behavior.

I'm well aware that my response comes across as salty, but the well runs deep. I've been involved in online photo communities since they existed (and also run one myself). This guy ticks all the boxes of a particular stereotype I've come across since the very beginning: a gatekeeper-like imposter artist.

They'll take their "minimalist" camera, go on a walk, and randomly come across a bare tree with a raven sitting on it. They'll take the shot, go home and then try to backdate a deeper meaning. As if there was some grand idea behind it all along. An artistic vision executed. Something cliche like "when winter sets in" or "life has no ups without lows". Next they sign it with "Leo Leica - photography", which suggests a business, but there isn't any.

They'll have "award-winning" on their profile but fail to mention it was the daily random award from freephotocontexts.wordpress.com.

It's all pretense, fakery, copycats.

That's enough salt for today. I can write books full of bullshitting photographers.

> While they were juggling, I was shooting. Less is more.

Why not just bring a phone then? Why a dedicated camera?

Because it wasn't minimalism he was after.

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