Why Your Gear Isn't Important

Have you even seen a magnificent race car and thought "Wow, I'll bet that builder has a great socket set"?  How about watching a quarterback win the Superbowl?  Did you ever mention to anyone how meticulously the team must have chosen his mouth guard?  Or maybe you've read a Steinbeck novel and thought how masterfully he maintained his typewriter.

Obviously, you've done none of these things, and neither has anyone else.  But photography, along with any art or profession that deals with technologically advanced tools, is quite prone to having both its members and the public at large dependent on the thought that the gear makes the result.

It does not.  It has not ever been that way, and it shall never be.

In every case, the skill of the artisan defines their worth.  Now don't get me wrong, it's necessary to have tools.  You can't take a telephoto shot without a telephoto lens.  You can't replace spark plugs without a socket set, and you can't write a novel without a writing utensil of some kind.  But to think that you must have a speech-to-text app, or a certain kind of pen, or specific software to format your layout before you can write your Great American Novel is not just a misplaced notion, it's detrimental to your being able to move forward with your work.

In the era of being able to use the Internet for instant communication, there are many crutches available for people trying to learn a craft.  Discussion groups pop up daily for every conceivable profession, hobby, and interest.  But when there tend to be instant answers, we tend to depend less on ourselves, and more on the supposed experience of others.  It's somehow easier to ask a question and depend on the random ranting of a stranger than to find out for ourselves and retain that knowledge forever.  For audio engineers, Gearslut.com is one of those crutches.  For photographers, it's Photography-On-The.Net.  Neophytes trying to gain a lifetime of knowledge and skill in one easy step, and plenty of people with a few years of their own experience ready and eager to make themselves look like professionals in front of their peers.

Almost invariably, new questions will result in an anonymous stranger saying that the new camera just purchased is junk, or that only by changing brands can true enlightenment be achieved.  Anyone who uses Brand F of lens is obviously an amateur, when Brand K is the only tool Real Professionals(TM) ever use.

So let's get this out of the way right now:  Brand Is Not Important.  For photographers, whether you use Nikon, Canon, Sony, Hasselblad, Pentax or any other brand is absolutely, completely meaningless.  That's certainly not a popular view, particularly when you see the most revered an in-demand photographers using Hasselblads almost exclusively.  But you need to remember that they select their tools for very specific needs and purposes.  When you're shooting for a billboard, maybe you need a $45,000 Hasselblad because you won't have to extrapolate pixels.  Or maybe you won't need one when you get to that level.  Maybe you'll like the way a different brand behaves in your hands.  The point is that only YOU can decide, based on your specific direction.  No one else can tell you that direction, and no one else knows your needs. 

But your needs aren't based on what you think will make you better.  They're based on what will make your job easier.  No one looks at the nails a carpenter pounded in and says "Oh, he must have had a Stanley hammer!"  So why do they say such ridiculous things when referring to a photograph or an audio recording?  It's because the Democratization of technology has caused people to think they know something, when in fact they do not.

Here's a shot I took while in Uruguay.  It was taken with a point-and-shoot Pentax Optio S6, with a crushing 6 Megapixels, before cropping.  It's just a touch under 6MP after cropping:

The End of Time

A couple of years later, I ended up selling this shot, blown up to 20 by 24 inches, for full price to a customer who still displays it. 

Let's look at another example, shot for Motorcycle Classics Magazine:

Gene Brown's Vincent HRD

This shoot was done with a Nikon D90, a seven-year old camera that shoots 12 Megapixels.  Not only was this particular shot used for a full-page spread, editor Richard Backus said that this was one of the highest-quality shoots he had ever seen.  While I'm proud of his comments, I'm not using them to tell you that I'm wonderful.  I'm using them to tell you that you can get great shots no matter what camera you're using.  Take a look at this contest for iPhone shots, and see how skillful these people are.

The masters of any craft had very little in the way of tools.  They took their time in choosing them, but sometimes were forced to use poor tools by today's standards, even if those tools may have been the best available at the time.  But often, they were some of the worst available, since that was all they could afford.  And yet, they each decided to not be limited by them.  Rather, they worked through and around those limitations.

If you do the same, you'll find yourself to be a much better artist.