What is a photograph?

melekalikimaka

Phototoxin wrote: »

I agree with animal rights here though... it looks more like a picture and less like a photograph.

Then again 'what is a photograph' is a different thread. [shoot film and avoid the argument!]

I actually prefer the original to the photoshopped version although I think it could be maybe darkened 5 notches and saturated up 5.

edit : looked at the side by side.. the middle tree looks off but I cannot place why... i think its the green beside the black whcih isnt' 'black' enough or something.

whats all this ' less a photograph more a picture' lark? is it the issue of photo manipulation?

Calina

It's been long enough, I guess, for a rehash of the war and there have been rumblings about it lately.

I'll add, before I let this into the air, that just because something was shot on film, doesn't mean an image couldn't be manipulated.

sineadw

*watches with interest*

Been pondering this myself the last while..

melekalikimaka

i agree, this attitude with photography, off hand, only cos i have had a debate before over it with him, that AH has, on flash...the 'raw image' and 'unedited' and so on... i don't quite understand it. no image every taken truely captures a moment, the moment the shutter clicks changes take place, the process of making this images more pleasing to the eye is frowned upon by many folk...for the reason its edited...

I'm film photography, manipulation of the image is expected... time in enlarger... agitation...pushing film... all are attempts to make the image betterthan it is... the there are the contrast filters...spilt grading.... dodging burning... and so on.... in a darkroom, one is nearly expected to do this to every image .... yet suddenly people start snapping with a digital camera and all this has become wrong???

Paulw

I had a discussion about this recently with a sports photographer. Obviously, since he supplies to the press, his take was that you can only do basic adjustments. But, cloning and editing (replacing parts, adding parts, etc) was outside the relm of photography.

Indeed, just because it was done on film (photo manipulation) and is much easier to do in digital photography, doesn't mean that it's photography.

I know for myself, I enjoy both photography and digital manipulation.

It certainly makes for interesting discussion and debate.

Rojo

In my opinion, all photography is manipulated and constructed. Whether it is during the process of taking a photograph or post processing, at the end of the day, it is someone's particular point of view and therefore constructed/manipulated. It's such a subjective medium that it is nearly impossible to be objective.

I think if you disagree with the above, then maybe you aren't taking the photographs and instead your camera is...

Paulw

Rojo wrote: »

In my opinion, all photography is manipulated and constructed. Whether it is during the process of taking a photograph or post processing, at the end of the day, it is someone's particular point of view and therefore constructed/manipulated. It's such a subjective medium that it is nearly impossible to be objective.

I think if you disagree with the above, then maybe you aren't taking the photographs and instead your camera is...

I disagree. You're still taking the photograph - composition, camera settings, when to press the shutter button, etc. All the camera is doing is capturing the light.

But, there's a difference between photo processing and photo manipulation, IMHO.

CabanSail

It all depends if the intention is to Record a moment or Interpret it as Art.

The camera, any camera, does not see the world as a human eye does. The eye also does not see what we think it sees either, as the human brain fills in the bits in between (apparently this is how we don't see Depth of Field like in a photograph)

melekalikimaka

CabanSail wrote: »

It all depends if the intention is to Record a moment or Interpret it as Art.

i don't see how you can ever truely record a moment... tho maybe thats another debate

Calina

Paulw wrote: »

I disagree. You're still taking the photograph - composition, camera settings, when to press the shutter button, etc. All the camera is doing is capturing the light.

But if you use your camera on fully automatic then what? You're still pressing the shutter, right?

DeVore

Coming from a world of image (not photo) manipulation before this, I kinda met myself half way when I got into photography. I have nothing against photomanipulation but its a different skill with a different "intent" in the final output.
Personally I will crop, saturate, sharpen etc quite happily. I keep note of pictures where I do more then that because I like knowing what I caught "in-camera" so to speak.

The thing most photographers dont notice (because they are coming from the world of photography) is that all manipulation needs a base image, even just a texture. Something to work with. Its not really possible to start with a white sheet and create the sort of images we see. So the photographer is looking for something else in that case. A picture with good texture or good lighting which he knows he will be able to adjust into something awesome.

I think the problem arises when people see all of this as a single art form. Its not, its at least two different art forms. Seeing the use of a computer as an "art form" is going to challenge some people but they are using a tool to create a piece of "art", whether its sub-classification should be "image" or "photo" seems to me simple semantics. I either enjoy the experience of viewing it or I dont.

The only thing I find a touch underhand are people who perform largescale heals or clones etc to sizeably alter the composition of the picture and pass it off as being captured in camera. Thats encroaching on the photographers territory and I can see why that would annoy them (us!).

Saying that post production is a new thing is simply nuts, tricks have been played with film for years before Adobe was even founded. The method has changed but its the same thing as was done in "dark rooms" of yore.

DeV.

Rojo

Paulw wrote: »

I disagree. You're still taking the photograph - composition, camera settings, when to press the shutter button, etc. All the camera is doing is capturing the light.

But, there's a difference between photo processing and photo manipulation, IMHO.

That's exactly what I'm getting at though! YOU are composing the shot and making changes to settings etc. So therefore, you are always going to be constructing the image before you. You choose what to include and exclude and therefore, it's always constructed and thus manipulated. At the end of the day, processing and manipulation are the same for me... I suppose one is perceived as more extreme than the other.

melekalikimaka wrote: »

i don't see how you can ever truely record a moment... tho maybe thats another debate

I think I was bringing that debate into this one... oopsie!

Phototoxin

whats all this ' less a photograph more a picture' lark? is it the issue of photo manipulation?

YES

It's been long enough, I guess, for a rehash of the war and there have been rumblings about it lately.

I'll add, before I let this into the air, that just because something was shot on film, doesn't mean an image couldn't be manipulated.

no but the REAL image is preseved on film. because the type of film never ever ever ever ever ever ever ever effects the actual image. Everyone knows that !! =p /sarc

I think its because we are used to seeing photos from film. Now digial stuff has 'contaminated' it so to speak. Its still in its infancy.

I'm film photography, manipulation of the image is expected... time in enlarger... agitation...pushing film... all are attempts to make the image betterthan it is... the there are the contrast filters...spilt grading.... dodging burning... and so on.... in a darkroom, one is nearly expected to do this to every image .... yet suddenly people start snapping with a digital camera and all this has become wrong???

its because these skills seem worthless when once they were valuable and now 'anyone' can 'shop and image and it looks good. I think the problem is over saturation (pun intended in retrospect as I often go ott on saturation) and the mentality is happy snap til it looks good then shop it to death. Also is it then actually photography which is the skill or digital imaging ? Before the development was part and parcel for a lot of people now it is also its own field.

...pass it off as being captured in camera.

that's the thing though. I personally have a lot of respect for my friend swampy-dave who doesnt photoshop.. not because he can't but that he's sick of photoshopped stuff. And to one extent I agree.. most of my best pictures were like that coming from the camera - weather it was the weather or ligthing or whatever OR they were done on film. So it does make me wonder.

Also people who are good at photography and not at manipulation may feel cheated as arguably less photographically skilled people output better looking images.

All I know is that if I'm ever photographing a crime scene use what they tell me and obey their reasons for it !! Some places use film so that they have the negatives and some use digital with a double backup of the data. Also digital images can be enhanced for court benefit.

DeVore

I'm going to be a bit controversial and say that if people feel like their skills with film have been outdated and that that makes them feel "cheated" because people with "arguably less photographic skills" are outputting "better" pictures, they need to suck it up and learn the new skills.

Good digital manipulation is a very complex skill in itself. Having the imagination to see what will look good with a shot and then to be able to produce that effect in Photoshop is just as tricky and skillful as learning dark-room techniques.

If people want to stick to film, thats great. Good for them (I presume they also make their own dairy products from first principles ). I admire people who say "I could do this the easy way but I decided to limit myself artificially for a challenge". A bit like that guy who only shoots (amazing!) photos with disposable cameras (wosshisname?). Thats awesome and I have a great deal of respect for the craft but nothing, *nothing* annoys me more then people who knock others to promote themselves. The digital guys are pushing the boundaries and doing some amazing things, to say its not "art" or not "skilled" is exactly like when people say "oh, photography, its just pointing a box and pushing a button". To the outsider it seems easy but its not.

The skilled practioners will rise to the top again. Those with an artistic eye for a shot PLUS the capacity to deliver any digital effect they had envisioned, with consistent quality are always going to stand above those who snap away and jam filters on bad photos in PP (not to mention those who stick to their guns (muskets?) and refuse the digital age).

DeV.

Anouilh

Suck up? Photography has left me with the lifestyle of an enclosed monk for the past year.

I posted a thread a few months ago here which was interpreted as that old chestnut,

The Film Versus Digital Debate.

In fact, I was just questioning whether film can survive in the current climate of fast and furious digital imagery.

In fact, although I use film and would like to use it more, I always have it processed by experts, including Neopan, which I could probably develop myself.

All post processing is done in digital photo editors, so the "mystique" of old techniques continues to be a closed book to me.

There is that sense, however, that a "real" photo is one printed up on paper that mimics genuine photo paper with all the nostalgia this involves.

Captured moments are just that. Snippets of reality, seen only for a split second, by one camera, that cannot ever be replicated. The philosophy of time is useful here...
all the chat about not stepping in the same river twice.

Calina

In some respects, I think the issue is that there is a fine line between digital art and digital post processing of photographs but no one really agrees on where that line actually is. Most people draw it in different places.

I second pretty much what DeV has said on this subject. It's easy to click buttons and lines in Photoshop in the same way as it's easy to press a shutter on a camera, but neither automatically imply the finished product is any good. There's a skill set required - and in Photoshop, that skill set is huge. We used to do digital post processing challenges here where someone would submit a photograph and everyone who was interested could have at it. Some people went down the digital art side, and did weird, weird stuff with the base images, some did more traditional photography post processing. Everyone came up with something different.

In principle, I think people who feel cheated about other people's talents/skills in areas where they are not so skilled/talented should not be complaining about other people's talents/skills but looking within themselves.

In a way, I don't think this is a debate about photography and digital manipulation at all; the debate was had when photography first arrived on the scene and the painters were up in arms. I think it's more a debate about the democratisation of artistic endeavour. The media are having similar fun with online media and some blogs, for example.

The world changes and develops and that's the way of it. My view is that the end product is what remains; years afterwards more people will be interested in what it looks like and not how you did it, unless of course, it's a pyramid.

Anouilh

I'm interested in your mention of the future recognition of work done today, Calina. I have over six years of work that has evolved from vague point and shoot to now quite conscious photos taken with a wider view of what is possible.

It will be interesting to see what future generations will make of the astonishing vastness of current photographic work. Will it be stored? There is an academic in Scotland whose work on value and digital storage interests me a lot:

http://erasehistory.blogspot.com/


There is a tradition of valuing conscious artistry above serendipitous image making, which is now being eroded.

Urban artists, whose work is spontaneous and open to disappearing within a short time, have become very fashionable and somehow this reflects current society.

One can make heavy weather of the film/digital debate, but it does help us think.

Anouilh

melekalikimaka wrote: »

whats all this ' less a photograph more a picture' lark?

This might help?

http://www.jmg-galleries.com/blog/2008/04/03/philosophy-of-photography-to-shoot-or-to-photograph/

M.T

I am a purist when it come to taking photographs. What I shot is my final picture.

Another way of translating that is that I have yet to grasp the concepts of Digital Dark rooming but I will get there ... :P

I think using modern tools to help display what you want others to see is OK. It has been done since photography began. It is all about what you want people to see after all. This excludes pure photo shopping. Like sticking someones head on another body type manipulation.

But you have to be above board about it. If you are doing some enhancing then there should be no shame it listing the manipulation applied. In the past in books I have read they will always list the lights, reflectors and what ever tools were used to get a final shot. That is not to say that if the shot appeared in a calender that said same information is listed but I hope my thoughts are understood.

I find going from this http://www.boards.ie/vbulletin/showpost.php?p=58411034&postcount=470

to this

http://www.boards.ie/vbulletin/showpost.php?p=58410612&postcount=467

is inspiring. Had I have taken that first shot I would have "removed from disk" using light room. Now I am keeping all photos due to those photos linked. There is hope for me yet!

melekalikimaka

Anouilh wrote: »

This might help?

http://www.jmg-galleries.com/blog/2008/04/03/philosophy-of-photography-to-shoot-or-to-photograph/

Not overly, that's not the question here, it's about the noun not the verb hehe

Anouilh

melekalikimaka wrote: »

Not overly, that's not the question here, it's about the noun not the verb hehe

I'm finding it difficult to focus on what the question actually implies.

Anouilh

melekalikimaka wrote: »

whats all this ' less a photograph more a picture' lark? is it the issue of photo manipulation?

Reality is always manipulated in a photograph.
The focus on one aspect of the scene in front of the camera above any other is the first step.

magicbastarder

Phototoxin wrote: »

Also people who are good at photography and not at manipulation may feel cheated as arguably less photographically skilled people output better looking images.

i think taps into the fact that photography and photoshoppery are related, but different skills. possession of one does not imply possession of the other - maybe people feel cheated because people with one skill are mistaken to have the other?

PixelTrawler

Maybe its because I come from a background developing websites and having used photoshop for reasons other then working with photos for the last 7 years or so but i don't have any distinction at all between this photograph or a picture business... its just a digital system of tools to use to achieve the image you want

Normally when I take a photo I know I'm going to do something with it later - not always but a lot of the time, whether its just a minor tweak or a fair bit of work...

Therefore its two sides of the same coin for me... step one use the digital hardware as in the camera, step 2 finish process with digital software....

I don't see a point in this process where i would stop and go, no this is cheating or I'm not capturing the real scene (which lets face it never really mirrors what the eye sees anyway)

I mean where do you draw the line, even setting the picture style in the camera is in essence digital manipulation of the real scene...

melekalikimaka

Solyad wrote: »

Maybe its because I come from a background developing websites and having used photoshop for reasons other then working with photos for the last 7 years or so but i don't have any distinction at all between this photograph or a picture business... its just a digital system of tools to use to achieve the image you want

Normally when I take a photo I know I'm going to do something with it later - not always but a lot of the time, whether its just a minor tweak or a fair bit of work...

Therefore its two sides of the same coin for me... step one use the digital hardware as in the camera, step 2 finish process with digital software....

I don't see a point in this process where i would stop and go, no this is cheating or I'm not capturing the real scene (which lets face it never really mirrors what the eye sees anyway)

I mean where do you draw the line, even setting the picture style in the camera is in essence digital manipulation of the real scene...

indeed, shutter priority... ap priority.... manual.... auto.... all give different results... which is the 'photograph setting and which is the picture setting? The more i think about it, the more it becomes difficult to define what in my opinion is right or wrong... we can all spot a photoshopped image...and we can all spot a tweaked image... sure we can all spot whats film and digital... once we know what we are getting shown to us.... its all gravy

Calina

melekalikimaka wrote: »

indeed, shutter priority... ap priority.... manual.... auto.... all give different results... which is the 'photograph setting and which is the picture setting? The more i think about it, the more it becomes difficult to define what in my opinion is right or wrong... we can all spot a photoshopped image...and we can all spot a tweaked image... sure we can all spot whats film and digital... once we know what we are getting shown to us.... its all gravy

This is assuming, of course, that there is really any right or wrong. It's a moral construct and for the most part, is out of place here.

Obviously for crime scene photos and newspaper, there are moral implications but...in general...

melekalikimaka

Calina wrote: »

This is assuming, of course, that there is really any right or wrong. It's a moral construct and for the most part, is out of place here.

Obviously for crime scene photos and newspaper, there are moral implications but...in general...

well theres always exceptions, a crime [photo even, may need dodging or burning to see details...

DeVore

While I love digital *everything* I hope (and expect) that film will persist in the same way that vinyl has survived the CD. I do *like* the idea of people taking the slow route and doing it all in analogue. Its not for me but I love the anacronistic element to it...

Also, there are some shots I have taken ina particular manner simply because I thought "that would look great if I blew out the whites and greyscaled the whole thing". I dunno if I would do that if I was using film. Actually, I probably wouldnt be into photography at all....

DeV.

melekalikimaka

DeVore wrote: »

Also, there are some shots I have taken ina particular manner simply because I thought "that would look great if I blew out the whites and greyscaled the whole thing". I dunno if I would do that if I was using film. Actually, I probably wouldnt be into photography at all....

DeV.

film makes you look at photography very different...not so much composition... more bout what you want to to look completed, i was a digi for years, got into film....and now i perfer it, theres something magical about it <tear runs down eyes>

XLR8

melekalikimaka wrote: »

What is a photograph?

When the shutter opens and the light hits the film or sensor... that, in my opinion, is a photograph (or captured image).

As soon as the the image is processed, whether in a dark room or in Photoshop, the image is no longer original. Indeed, even if a digital image is transferred directly to a computer, no PP work carried out, and the image is emailed to numerous people, unless each recipient has a calibrated monitor, the image will appear different to everyone.
The same applies to film. Give your negatives to different labs and you'll hardly ever get the same results.

This argument over digital v film and post processing of digital images is, in my opinion, merely sour grapes. It's the same as an engineer refusing to use a CNC machine and now that digital has surpassed film as far as quality is concerned, it's a no brainer.
I started out with film about 20 years ago but it wasn't until I switched to digital that I started to produce my best work. This was nothing to do with post processing, it was because I was able to experiment without the cost of processing.
There's nothing wrong with post production and image manipulation. As someone stated earlier in the thread, it's the end product that counts. Few people really care what steps were involved in the process, they merely like/dislike the final product... and that's what it is - a product, nothing more, nothing less and this applies to both film and digital images, regardless of what PP has been applied.

DeVore

XLR8, I agree but I would make one exception: people who photoshop pictures with Clone and such tools and basically *construct* a scene which never really existed (taking out and putting in stuff) to "improve" the composition and then pass it off as if they just took an awesome shot, those people should be punched in the face.

Removing a blemish from a face is one thing, radical restructuring is something else.

I object to that on the basis that they are using one skill to pretend to have a completely different skill or to pretend something happened which didnt. Thats dishonest.

DeV.