Why HDR is like Jesus, in a bad way

I grew up a Christian. I went to church, I was baptized, my mother and father both still practice on a pretty consistent basis. And one of the things that I learned in my younger years is that no one, except for Jesus is perfect. It makes sense I suppose. If we were all perfect there would be no need for me to update this blog. My pictures would be perfect, and the traffic that it brings me and my website would not be needed. The unemployment rate would skyrocket. Since so many industries would collapse including educational, war, security and the ones that would still be around would have such limited job space and so many people who are perfect for the job. It goes without saying that the world would crumble.

Before I continue on with my point there are a few more thoughts I need to make. So sit back for a moment. Unbeknown to people outside of the photography realm (and possibly too well known within it) this huge resurgence of film and Toy Camera's is largely due to the perfection of photography. Everything has become so complacent. You throw your camera on auto-focus. Set it to aperture priority and if you don't like the shot, you look back at the screen and shoot again. Did a color come out incorrectly? Well rather than looking at the surrounding light and adjusting your position, exposure, or flash we can just say screw it and wait until we go home and open up photoshop. This isn't to sound like I am above it all, because I am no stranger to post processing. Just that I still make a consorted effort to avoid having to do more work later on.

So the toy camera comes in a destroys all of that. Providing zero functionality and real world usage other than hipster photo contests. Again, I am not above it. I own and use a Holga on a semi-regular basis.

But it would be nice to find a happy medium right?

HDR does not agree with the above statement. It goes above and beyond the perfect camera and processing. Software such as Photomatix makes every pixel the correct exposure. Everything is theoretically perfect within what the camera captured. So where is the skill involved. One of my favorite books "Understand Exposure" by Bryan Peterson mentions many ways that you can go about creating a fantastic image by using the inherit faults of a camera. For instance, did you know that even the best digital and film cameras can only see and read about 3 stops of light at any given time? While the human eye can see around 7? A camera will automatically only be half as good as what your eye can see. Unless you can overcome those challenges using real methods.

So what does all this rambling have to do with how HDR is like Jesus in a bad way? It's too perfect. People are people because of their faults. It causes us to love and cry and feel emotion. A photo is no different. If HDR was the standard, you could never see a beautiful silhouette imposed on a sunset. You would never have the ability to give your images a mood with something as simple as shadow. And Black & White images? Forget about it. How could you see the emotion of a portrait if the subjects eyes had no depth to them and the tears disappeared against the soft peach color of the cheeks. Because the shadows and highlights that create water aren't perfect.

It feels strange to say, and I'm sure there are a lot of people out there who will disagree with me and say that photography is an art and is open to interpretation. That's fine and dandy. But they're wrong. :)