There are a lot of people that paint from photographs. It’s a little odd because they inadvertently capture some of the way of abstractions in seeing that a camera creates. For example: the tonal range, the cyan blue which isn’t quite the range of blues in nature, depth of field, etc…There is quite a difference from paintings that are a product of two human eyes and a real time confrontation with a 3D subject. For example, a landscape painters will quickly realize how quickly the sun moves and the nature of the light changes when you are trying to catch it on a big canvas…Monet would revisit a spot for many days, painting for an hour, then pulling out another canvas for the next hour.

Some artists like Gerhart Richter took a more post modern approach to their paintings of photographs and made obvious the source of their painting. There is a certain self referential quality that makes it seem more at home.

A lot of painters who use photos as a source are almost telling a “lie” by portraying their photo as the actual place…Sometimes a photography is better suited to just being a photograph, than being translated into a painting.

BUT, there is a certain character and prose that a film-based print has that was developed in the darkroom that simply cannot be overlooked or ignored, nor outdone by anything digital

I do agree 100% with a comment above, “don’t let the medium become the message.”, what resources you have at your disposal and what you chose to create an image should not be, nor ever be, the focus, what matters most is content, visual impact and appeal and purpose with a dash of passion mixed in

focus on the subject and let the resulting frames speak for themselves!

No, it is not the most cost-effective way of making art, but for now, and for me, it is what I am comfortable with. I know that the 4×5 will capture a large(20 square inches) slice of the world and I know that I pull a little of the beauty of the world from those negatives.

I think someone has already said this, but my medium just a tool of expression. The fact that I’m dropping a McDonald’s value meal on each shutter-release just makes each picture more important, and I hope, more sacred. It’s not that digital snaps can’t capture beauty, or wonder or the sublime aspects of light, but that I haven’t found the skills to use it that way. Kudos to those who have, could I borrow a couple hundred?

I can do this now because of the relative cheapness of digital photos(it is cheap to experiment) and the ease of editing. In terms of quality, for me, digital processing has produced far better photos because I neither had the time, temperament or funds to personally use a darkroom.

I’ve been to several exhibitions lately with chemistry b&w prints. They often have a kind of quality that I like.

Chemistry-based technologies won’t go away. Look at the music industry: digital synths came along in the early 80’s but you still find lots of Korgs, Moogs and Prophets in use. In fact, some bands have made a niche for themselves puruing analog synth technologies.

Lots and lots of people do digital photography, but some will retrograde into film after beginning with digital, especially in art and portrait photography.

You can’t blame inks, cameras, chemicals, paper, processors, printers, etc (if you are using quality products) for poor results when it’s a lack of skills that are to blame.

Expertise in the wet darkroom does not translate to instant expertise in the digital age, and the opposite is true. These are two completely different skill sets. I know because I have worked with both. Like anything worth doing, you have to do it a while before you get the hang of it, understand the intricacies and the tools, the right tools to use, etc.

Nothing worth doing (or done well) is easy.

I recently printed up a color portfolio, for which I had the option of using a high quality HP printer or a color darkroom. I chose the darkroom. I wasn’t sure I’d made the right choice until I watched the first 16 x 20 glossy exhibition print roll out of the processor. It was Beautiful!

You mention editioning. The logic of editioning is convoluted, even in reference to darkroom work. But at least in the darkroom it meant something. What is the point of editioning when each print is simply the push of a button? It’s a completely artificial construct imposed by the market. Which is fine, but let’s at least acknowledge it.