Re: FN-FORUM: Photoshop - 5 min job anyone?

date posted 21st June 2006 11:39

I did a four year apprenticship as a scanner retoucher, when a pc
couldn't even open a hi-res image file. The scitex workstations ran
from a 'whisper' cabinet each that was 6 foot by 4 foot, they had to
be kept in an airconditioned room with a raised floor and back up was
to huge magnetic tape spools.

In those days a retouching workstation and scanner cost in excess of
100k and the high wages for operating it were justified by the
equipment cost. Shortly after I finished my apprenticeship (late 1989)
the first photoshop / mac combinations burst on to the scene. In a
short while Photshop reigned supreme, even though the Mac's it ran on
just didn't have the processing power to do the job properly, corners
started to be cut and so started the decline in quality.

Over the next few years you could still earn a decent wage as a
photoshop retoucher, but now everyone with an image editing
application thinks they are a retoucher and no one seems to care about
quality any more. When ever I walk into a news agents and see the
quality of even the front cover work on many magazines it really makes
my blood boil, but at the end of the day we're living in a world where
'good enough quality' is what people strive for, not excellence.

This is true of so many things now, of course coding and programming
are the same. I am competing against 'professional scanning companies'
producing poor quality scans from sub 2k pieces of equipment, the
quality is appaling but their pricing can seem attractive. Their
customers seem to think the quality is good enough, untill they see my
work of course then they realise it's not : )

Now I've really put a downer on myself for the whole day DOH!

Paul

Creative Digital Alliance
Tel: 0700 596 4491
http://www.digitisation.com

On 21 Jun 2006 11:09:38 -0000, Andrew Wilson [EMAIL REMOVED] wrote:
>
> >.t was all masking film and airbrushes, if my memory serves me
> right...
>
> and I don't think you got that for =A37.00 an hour either - even 30 years=
ago!
>
> A
>
> -----Original Message-----
> From: [EMAIL REMOVED] [EMAIL REMOVED] Behalf Of martyn
> feather
> Sent: 21 June 2006 11:41
> To: FN-FORUM / [EMAIL REMOVED]
> Subject: Re: FN-FORUM: Photoshop - 5 min job anyone?
>
>
>
> Sorry!!! Is this still 2006? or have we somehow gone back in time?
>
> What year was the going rate =A37.00 per hour? I don't think Photoshop ex=
isted
> then, it was all masking film and airbrushes, if my memory serves me
> right...
>
>