The Frontier bows out

So I hear from Fotohub that the Frontier printers will not be used from next week onwards. So I have to make prints on the Noritsu machines. Bad news for portrait photography. I am contemplating buying the Epson 3850 so that I can make glossy prints in house.

People are using digital photography to push down the price of photographic work, pointing to the lack or film, processing and scanning. But the amount of time spent on buying and learning new equipment and software constantly is a challenge. Every time there is a new camera, computer, software upgrade, there is a cost and a learning curve. With the constant upgrades, the truth is that film is cheaper and more stable because it was a known quantity for a longer period of time.

The potential of the new digital equipment is very good, arguably much better than film scanned. But the learning curve to master the new equipment means that it will take time before a photographer actually can harness the full potential of the new equipment.

There is a lot of debate on whether the standard of photography has dropped or improved with the digital era. And in general, I think that a lot more people have gotten into photography because they do not have to pay for film and there is instant gratification of seeing things on the monitor. But the truth is good photography is undervalued nowadays. I hear that some of the older and more experienced photographers cannot command the prices they used to. The younger photographers shoot with really simple technique for large ad agencies who are trying to keep the price down. They depend on sweatshop photoshop artists to create the images. So 'Where is the love?'.