CCD abuse
I'm beginning to become annoyed by digital cameras. I don't have one of my own and I don't want one, at this point. I've noticed a disturbing trend whereby many people become so fixated on taking pictures of everything that they forget to experience whatever it is they're photographing.
Case in point, last weekend in Washington Molly and I went to the Smithsonian's National Gallery of Art. It's pretty sweet and I really enjoyed it. Unfortunately, it was overrun by people armed with digital cameras frantically snapping shots of every painting in the gallery, shots of the info cards next to them, shots of themselves or their friends/family/whatever in front of the paintings, and so on. I mean, why? Seriously. Can't you Google Image Search a far better quality version of it than you can take with your camera?
Photography used to be a real art form because not everyone could go to Best Buy and snag a $30 memory stick and stuff it full of 400 72-dpi pictures of their weekend in East Podunk. I grant that, of course, there are many professionals who are very good at digital photography and do it tastefully and with good reason. There are also sometimes perfectly valid reasons for taking pictures. Like proms. Or silhouettes of me against the 4th of July fireworks. But so many pictures are taken nowadays that just suck and exist entirely for the novelty for being able to take pictures of everything that happens to you. Also, whoever decided it would be a good idea to put some horrible 0.5 megapixel device inside cellphones should be shot.
I realize that, like, most of my friends list probably thinks I'm an irritable jerk because they do this or their friends do this or whatever. Honestly, I don't really care. I just think it's silly and/or mildly annoying. We have a memory. You know, in our brains. Use it.
Case in point, last weekend in Washington Molly and I went to the Smithsonian's National Gallery of Art. It's pretty sweet and I really enjoyed it. Unfortunately, it was overrun by people armed with digital cameras frantically snapping shots of every painting in the gallery, shots of the info cards next to them, shots of themselves or their friends/family/whatever in front of the paintings, and so on. I mean, why? Seriously. Can't you Google Image Search a far better quality version of it than you can take with your camera?
Photography used to be a real art form because not everyone could go to Best Buy and snag a $30 memory stick and stuff it full of 400 72-dpi pictures of their weekend in East Podunk. I grant that, of course, there are many professionals who are very good at digital photography and do it tastefully and with good reason. There are also sometimes perfectly valid reasons for taking pictures. Like proms. Or silhouettes of me against the 4th of July fireworks. But so many pictures are taken nowadays that just suck and exist entirely for the novelty for being able to take pictures of everything that happens to you. Also, whoever decided it would be a good idea to put some horrible 0.5 megapixel device inside cellphones should be shot.
I realize that, like, most of my friends list probably thinks I'm an irritable jerk because they do this or their friends do this or whatever. Honestly, I don't really care. I just think it's silly and/or mildly annoying. We have a memory. You know, in our brains. Use it.