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What's more complicated - cars or photography?

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pcunnin

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I spoke to a gentleman a few months ago who claimed that "photography is more difficult and complicated than restoring an old car". He was into restoring cars, and claimed that cars were fairly simple machines, and that all the effort and intricacies that went into photography, including postprocessing, were far more complicated than cars.

Is it true?

Sometimes, the more I learn about photography I find that a lot of stuff I learned before was "fudging it" and that going more deeply into it really draws out the intricacies in the knowledge and know-how of it.

Thoughts?
 
I've been deep into both hobbies since I was a teenager. Restoring/work on cars is 'easier' in the sense that it's less intellectually challenging, but it's significantly harder physical work. It's also a lot more difficult to get started with. Additionally, if you get into painting cars, it's truly an art that takes a lot time to master.

Photography, meanwhile, is more technically complicated, but much easier to get started with. And much, much, MUCH, cheaper.
 
spanner eating devices of torture.
 
(nt)
 
Cars are harder because if you mess something serious up with them you can get killed or kill someone else.
 
Sure you can fudge it, wing it, slap it together. You can also study it, develop it, perfect it, understand the nuances, understand the art of it, understand the science if it.

"It" can refer to anything.

Plus you have to overlay what sort of thing your brain in naturally capable of doing.

So it's not that photography is more complicated than cars in an absolute sense. It just happens to be the case for that one particular person.
 
A 'great' photograph is much more subjective. There are hundreds of cars, of the same make and model, out there to compare with. So making a judgement is much easier given something to compare with. (Caveat - I'm not talking about hot rods). On the other hand each of us has an opinion on what makes a 'great' image.
 
pcunnin said:
I spoke to a gentleman a few months ago who claimed that "photography is more difficult and complicated than restoring an old car". He was into restoring cars, and claimed that cars were fairly simple machines, and that all the effort and intricacies that went into photography, including postprocessing, were far more complicated than cars.

Is it true?
Click to expand...
Not necessarily. What is more difficult depends on your skills.
pcunnin said:
Sometimes, the more I learn about photography I find that a lot of stuff I learned before was "fudging it" and that going more deeply into it really draws out the intricacies in the knowledge and know-how of it.

Thoughts?
Click to expand...
 
It depends. Photography in some ways is as complicated as you want it to be. Snapshots in a full auto mode are not complicated - whether or not they look any good depends on the compositional skills of the photographer and their good luck or planning in finding a good subject.

But... and at the risk of turning it into one of "those threads"...

My daughter got the latest iPhone. She has never tried developing photography skills, but while using it for the first time took a photo of the lounge room, with a very brightly lit window opposite. The exposure was perfect. Any dedicated camera I've used, if in auto mode, would have blown the window highlights and underexposed the room (as my phone did taking the same shot and my wife's older phone did even worse). I could have emulated that iPhone shot (with better resolution) but it would have taken the skills I have developed over years, maybe setting up a tripod and doing HDR, and lots of post processing.

So, technology and software can enhance or - to a limited extent - replace photography skills. You can't necessarily do that with cars (you can build new ones with robots, but we are probably far away from using them to do up an old car).
 
New Day Rising said:
It depends. Photography in some ways is as complicated as you want it to be. Snapshots in a full auto mode are not complicated - whether or not they look any good depends on the compositional skills of the photographer and their good luck or planning in finding a good subject.

But... and at the risk of turning it into one of "those threads"...

My daughter got the latest iPhone. She has never tried developing photography skills, but while using it for the first time took a photo of the lounge room, with a very brightly lit window opposite. The exposure was perfect. Any dedicated camera I've used, if in auto mode, would have blown the window highlights and underexposed the room (as my phone did taking the same shot and my wife's older phone did even worse). I could have emulated that iPhone shot (with better resolution) but it would have taken the skills I have developed over years, maybe setting up a tripod and doing HDR, and lots of post processing.

So, technology and software can enhance or - to a limited extent - replace photography skills. You can't necessarily do that with cars (you can build new ones with robots, but we are probably far away from using them to do up an old car).
Click to expand...
Software can do photography but software cannot restore old cars.
 
What is simple or complicated depends on how your brain works.

For example, aged 12 , the guy that was at the top of my class could not do his shoe laces up.

For whatever reason he found that task to be complicated.

Fast forward 40 years and he fixed the caotic transport system of one of Italy's largest towns.

Now, I would find that just a little bit too difficult to do.
 
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New Day Rising said:
It depends. Photography in some ways is as complicated as you want it to be. Snapshots in a full auto mode are not complicated - whether or not they look any good depends on the compositional skills of the photographer and their good luck or planning in finding a good subject.

But... and at the risk of turning it into one of "those threads"...

My daughter got the latest iPhone. She has never tried developing photography skills, but while using it for the first time took a photo of the lounge room, with a very brightly lit window opposite. The exposure was perfect. Any dedicated camera I've used, if in auto mode, would have blown the window highlights and underexposed the room (as my phone did taking the same shot and my wife's older phone did even worse). I could have emulated that iPhone shot (with better resolution) but it would have taken the skills I have developed over years, maybe setting up a tripod and doing HDR, and lots of post processing.

So, technology and software can enhance or - to a limited extent - replace photography skills. You can't necessarily do that with cars (you can build new ones with robots, but we are probably far away from using them to do up an old car).
Click to expand...
Dedicated cameras are falling further and further behind phones.

I can only imagine the shock of someone like your daughter who might one day decide to pick up a dedicated camera for the first time, thinking it will be a big improvement over a smartphone, only to find it shoots worse images OOC.

For many people, that would be the first and last time they ever pick up a dedicated camera.
 
Seen any youtube videos of 20-somethings looking up online how to change a tire? I don't think cameras or cars are the problem.
 
New Day Rising said:
pcunnin said:
I spoke to a gentleman a few months ago who claimed that "photography is more difficult and complicated than restoring an old car".
Click to expand...
My daughter got the latest iPhone. She has never tried developing photography skills, but while using it for the first time took a photo of the lounge room, with a very brightly lit window opposite. The exposure was perfect. Any dedicated camera I've used, if in auto mode, would have blown the window highlights and underexposed the room (as my phone did taking the same shot and my wife's older phone did even worse). I could have emulated that iPhone shot (with better resolution) but it would have taken the skills I have developed over years, maybe setting up a tripod and doing HDR, and lots of post processing.
Click to expand...
Taking a photo with an iPhone is in no way akin to restoring an old car ... but it is akin to driving a car to the supermarket down the street. You can do either successfully without knowing anything about the underlying principles and mechanisms that got you there.
 
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Neither because you arnt actually building anything from raw materials :-) with a car your only pulling something apart that's already been made. photography your only pushing the shutter button.

Don
 
Donald B said:
Neither because you arnt actually building anything from raw materials :-) with a car your only pulling something apart that's already been made. photography your only pushing the shutter button.

Don
Click to expand...
A lot of people can pull things apart, fixing them and putting them back together is another matter.

As for photography, if pressing the shutter button was it, I would think everybody could be a photographer.

Not in the sense of beign able to take a photo but a good photo...
 
FrancoD said:
Donald B said:
Neither because you arnt actually building anything from raw materials :-) with a car your only pulling something apart that's already been made. photography your only pushing the shutter button.

Don
Click to expand...
A lot of people can pull things apart, fixing them and putting them back together is another matter.

As for photography, if pressing the shutter button was it, I would think everybody could be a photographer.

Not in the sense of beign able to take a photo but a good photo...
Click to expand...
You are underestimating what it takes to put together a car and overestimating what it takes to take a good photograph.
 
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