Digital Photography: Making Prints Take a Backseat

Digital photography has taken over the shooting market by leaps and bounds in more recent years. Although I have spent all my photography career working with digital cameras, I still appreciate the feel and look of a printed photo.

I feel with the considerable growth in digital pictures, people have started to lose the meaning behind each photo. During the early days of photography, it was an expensive luxury. Each shot had to be meticulously planned and it had to mean something. You only got one shot. (Pun intended)

However, as cameras have evolved with the times the mindset of, “spray and pray” has become much more popular. I know for my work now, I get approximately 10 good photos for every 100 I take. Then only about two of them actually get to see the light of day by being printed in The Rocket.

Conversely, every picture that gets printed means so much to me. It is a clear definition of my work and what I love to do. 

I feel having the tangible product is much more meaningful because you can keep it forever. Yes the pictures saved to our phones can be there for as long as we want them to be, but who hasn’t made scarifies for storage? I have and now those small snippets of my life are gone.

As more pictures are just shared to social media and forever lost to the dissonance of the digital universe, we need to remember what our meaningful moments are. I will always be able to thank my mom for all my baby books full of pictures of me. I may not fully appreciate the boxes of albums just yet, but when I have a family and kids of my own, I’ll be able to show them how silly their father looked in his plaid and bowl cut. I guess this is a memory I’m glad that I only remember from pictures.