Ha! I had the same experience in my art evening classes. One evening our teacher told us that we had to produce three paintings in the 2.5 hour lesson. It is challenging enough producing one in that time period. It was a fantastic learning experience in letting go. The first picture I did was OK, the second was better and the third was great - all because I'd given up thinking at that point and was just doing.
Sometimes I get the same feeling when coding, when really in the zone with the magical feeling of flow.
On the other hand, I took a few semesters of elective photography courses in high school, and there’s a certain essential amount of time it takes to make a good photo print and run it through all the chemicals. It can’t really be compressed down shorter than about 35–40 minutes for the whole process with only limited ability to parallelize the work while maintaining quality, which makes it tough to make more than 1 or possibly 2 good prints in 1 class period.
All of the students I knew who focused on making 1 good print every day ended up learning more and making better images than the students who constantly tried to rush.
Apples to oranges. Painting is a purely creative process with style being valued over correctness. While there is artistic decision during manual film development, there is definitely a wrong way to develop a print. If you rush the chemical process, it will end up bad. Film is more like baking in that regard while painting is stove top cooking.
I guess my point is: the important thing to learn here (in my opinion) is that regular deliberate practice with focused attention is helpful, not that people should try to rush out as much sloppy work in as short a time as possible.
Even the highest quantity of practice is not necessarily essential. My impression is that its spacing out over time is even more crucial.
I have a 3.5 year old, and I’ve been watching him learn all sorts of skills (learning to understand and use language, walk, run, jump, ride a balance bike, solve logic puzzles, build with construction toys, draw, ...), and it’s amazing the kinds of leaps he will make in balance, coordination, speed, understanding, etc. at some specific skill over the course of 3 or 4 months, even if we only practice the skill for 20 minutes once every few weeks.
Somehow the brain is churning on it in the background, and there are sudden leaps in ability which can’t be obviously explained based on direct practice time.
The art of a good film photograph isn't printing lots of pieces it's taking 10 shots, and choosing to print two of them.
There are parts you can't rush, there are clear steps to taking clear photos, well exposed photos.
Being able to look at the negative, and know if it turned out well is the shill you learn.
The students who focused on one good print had a lot of prep work. Getting the final step right (for software, shipping and deploying to production) isn't something we should rush.
Learning all the steps which lead up to that final one well makes a tremendous difference
Is this maybe then analogous to the essential and accidental complexity premise that Fred Brooks put forwards?
It may be that in painting the cost of accidental complexity can be reduced greatly but in photography due to necessary post-processing there is less on an opportunity.
That doesn't mean there isn't an opportunity here. Being neither a photographer or painter I am most likely not the best person to comment however!
Sometimes I get the same feeling when coding, when really in the zone with the magical feeling of flow.