Photographer
Henry Tjernlund
Posts: 587
Koppel, Pennsylvania, US
I have seen some Photoshopped (and other computer graphic altered) images being criticized as crossing the line. I can understant purist opinions. Im certain that I have some of my own. But, doesnt art change? When the airbrush first came out, it was considered by many purist to be a gimmic and not a real art tool. Now there are well established airbrush artisits with magazines and books devoted to their work. Is not digital manipulation the new airbrush. I mean, why should the advantage of a well established photographer that has a truck full of lighting equipment and access to exotic locations that much different than the advantage of a skill Photoshop user or greenscreen/cgi artist?
Henry
Photographer
Jeff Fiore
Posts: 9225
Brooklyn, New York, US
Henry Tjernlund wrote:
I have seen some Photoshopped (and other computer graphic altered) images being criticized as crossing the line. I can understant purist opinions. Im certain that I have some of my own. But, doesnt art change? When the airbrush first came out, it was considered by many purist to be a gimmic and not a real art tool. Now there are well established airbrush artisits with magazines and books devoted to their work. Is not digital manipulation the new airbrush. I mean, why should the advantage of a well established photographer that has a truck full of lighting equipment and access to exotic locations that much different than the advantage of a skill Photoshop user or greenscreen/cgi artist?
Henry Anyone that complains that photo-manipulation is not photography, I usually point them to Jerry Uelsmann http://www.uelsmann.com/. His photos are very heavily manipulated and are still considered photos - why? because he does all his photo-manipulations in the darkroom. He is a darkroom master and his work is truly amazing once you realize it is all done in the darkroom.
Anytime there is change, you will always get the diehard purists that are resistant to change. That's ok, everyone is entitled to work the way they want. To me photoshop is just a tool to achieve what I want from a photo. When I did my own darkroom work, it took me hours and a lot of trial & error (and not to mention waste) to get the results I wanted. Just because it now only takes me a few minutes with photoshop doesn't make it less valid.
I remember when cut & paste meant just that. I'm sure when the graphics art industry went through the digital revolution years ago, there was the purists who resisted. Because this was an indutry change, if the purists resisted, they would be out of work. As the Borg said "resistance is futile".
The great thing about photography is that you have your choices of medium - film, digital, cyanotypes, pinhole, Holga and if you want glass plates with home-made emulsion - it is all good. You also have your choice of formats also. Unlike the graphic arts industry, photography is a creative medium and basically anything goes. In this case "resistance in NOT futile". You shoot what you want and how you want it an you don't have to answer to anyone.
Now, things change if you shoot for clients (you know.. for money), you have to deliver what the client wants and in the format they want.
I do whatever I want on a photo to achieve "my vision". Some photos are straight out of the camera. Just because I shoot digital doesn't mean the old rules still don't apply, I still believe in getting it right in the camera and not depend on Photoshop to "pull it out". Other photos have degrees of Photoshop manipulations intended to make the photo match my vision.
The short answer, I am NOT a purist. Yes, I do Chromakey (greenscreen) also. I refuse to be limited.
Photographer
Brian Diaz
Posts: 65617
Danbury, Connecticut, US
I care about what the final product looks like.
I don't care about how you got there.
(Okay, sometimes I'm impressed by an especially cool technique, but it usually doesn't affect how I look at a piece of art.)
Photographer
Faded Beauty
Posts: 3
Orlando, Florida, US
I think that to do well in photoshop it still important to have a strong foundation in traditional photography. If you don't have a good image (lighting, composition, focus, etc) to begin with it will be all that much harder to get a good result with it in photoshop. It is also very easy to abuse and overuse photoshop and end up with total cheesy images. It is also easy to rely too much on photoshop and get sloppy with shooting your original image.
The only time I think that purists would be somewhat justified is in photojournalism and maybe nature photography. But with any digital photography it seems rare that the absolute optimal image is going to come right out of the camera without at least a tiny bit of color tweaking, levels, and sharpening.
Really I think it should come down to if the image is good or not. If it is a good image who cares if it was shot exactly that way, altered in a darkroom, or edited in photoshop. But in the end I think the photoshop user is going to end up with the optimal result with the least amount of wasted time.
Photographer
D. Brian Nelson
Posts: 5477
Rapid City, South Dakota, US
Gene Nocon, arguably the best darkroom B&W printer in the world, heavily manipulates his own photographs in PS, ending up with painterly images. His personal work is influenced by Modigliani, while his commercial work replicates still lifes with wine bottles (with recognizable labels).
He recently used one of my erotic image negatives as the basis for the line manipulation. The result is a wonderful print.
He calls his work "fauxtography." The tradition-busting part is that the photograph I made remains mine, but the resulting manipulated image he made is his. He could give me credit if he wanted, and perhaps I could require it because of his "sampling," but if I signed it, it would be fraud.
PhotoShop is a perfectly legitimate art tool because everything is a perfectly legitimate art tool.
But the question was about whether heavily manipulated digital images remain photography.
OK, "photography" means "light writing." Up to the exposure of the film or chip, we're clearly doing "photography."
Unlike the darkroom, however, Photoshop doesn't use light (photons and waves). I think there's a need for a different word for results of precesses that do not involve light.
Just like painters were pretty happy to see the "photography" label so folks could clearly distinguish the two, I'd be happy to see PS manipulations clearly separated from darkroom manipulations to stop the devaluation of my craft.
-Don
Photographer
La Seine by the Hudson
Posts: 8587
New York, New York, US
I think we have to establish two seperate issues. A lot of (sometimes great) digital art done in photoshop or through other digital means can definitely be great visual art, but that doesn't mean it's photography.
Photography is an artform unto itself. I'm talking about the technique, yes, but I'm also talking about the difference between the creativity of a photographer and the creativity of a graphic designer or painter or other 2 dimensional artist that begins with an essentially blank canvas and begins to fill it. Two different working methods. Two totally different ways of seeing. Shouldn't be surprising in the slightest that the outcome is often quite different. This is not a comparatively qualitative assessment in the slightest.
Some people might prefer the art of one genre more than the other, just as some people are more drawn to photographic art than paintings on canvas or vice versa. That doesn't mean that photoshop manipulation isn't "legitimate art." But a lot of it I would honestly have to say is definitely not "photography" either.
Photographer
Reign Studios
Posts: 63
Dallas, Texas, US
D. Brian & Marco hit the nail on the head. There is a difference between the photograph and the graphic art, and sometime the line does get crossed between the two.
I have seen so called photographers shoot with the camera in the AUTO mode purposely because they know they are going to manipulate the image in PS. I think that is the difference, if a photograph was taken strictly for that purpose, no technique involved it's digital art, not photography.
Photographer
Vegas Alien
Posts: 1747
Armington, Illinois, US
Photography means, literally, "painting (or drawing) with light". As pixels have values of light (only when perceived with the human eye, otherwise they're just numbers), it's still part of the process. The camera is simply a tool, as are the different types of image manipulation software. As others have noted, the final image is all that matters, whether it is achieved straight out of a camera or enhanced further after the capture. If someone uses paint or embroidery over a photographic image, it may no longer be part of a traditional photographic process, but does not negate the image's value as an artistic body. Those who criticize works because they are not "straight" are describing something about themselves and not really speaking to the work in focus. It is their own preconditioned beliefs which account for their negative emotions to the work, and, thankfully, their own values do not affect the quality of the image. As Henry correctly stated, we each have access to different tools and skill sets. The images that come from what we each have available should not be criticized according to their means, but only at their end. Purists are usually grumpy and boring people, so don't pay much attention to them. 
Photographer
Kevin Connery
Posts: 17824
El Segundo, California, US
Brian Diaz wrote:
I care about what the final product looks like.
I don't care about how you got there. That's essentially my view. A 'bad' photo that has been manipulated to look 'good' counts as 'good'; a 'bad' photo that has been manipulated to look 'worse' counts as pretty sucky--by my standards. Even a 'good' photo that's been manipulated and the final results look 'bad' get the 'bad' label.
Now, Marco's comment about "Photography is an artform unto itself" IS a valid one--but even it can fool a viewer. A lot of what we perceive as straight photography has been manipulated manually to enhance shadows, highlights, remove blemishes, trash, powerlines, change colors, replace backgrounds, etc., as well as make substantially more elaborate changes...while still looking like "straight photographs". In that light, the process is a mix of photography ("captured art") and "created art", independent of the setup for the shot itself.
(Photographs that seem to be trying to look like straight photographs, but which have obvious manipulation tend to trigger a 'bad' response from me, far more so than something which isn't pretending to be a straight photo.)
Interesting times....
Photographer
D. Brian Nelson
Posts: 5477
Rapid City, South Dakota, US
I still think this is about words. No one disputes that art produced by PS is any less art.
Some painters use photographs as the basis for their paintings. Some graphic artists use photographs as the basis for their graphic artwork. But neither the paintings nor the graphic art are "photographs" once they've gone through the translation process.
Someone needs to coin a new word for art images that are no longer photographs.
-Don
Photographer
Envy - Art
Posts: 3319
Kansas City, Missouri, US
D. Brian Nelson wrote:
I still think this is about words. No one disputes that art produced by PS is any less art.
Some painters use photographs as the basis for their paintings. Some graphic artists use photographs as the basis for their graphic artwork. But neither the paintings nor the graphic art are "photographs" once they've gone through the translation process.
Someone needs to coin a new word for art images that are no longer photographs.
-Don Hmmm...actually you might have just done this. I think "art images" is a great "word"....any other ideas? I have been thinking of this myself.
Photographer
Ivan123
Posts: 1037
Arlington, Virginia, US
I think the posts so far have missed an important point. This is not like a discussion of the relative merits of, say, oil painting vs. watercolor.
First, just to get this straight, most of the posts have been talking about photography as an "art" and it can be that. A lot isn't. Sometimes photography is intended to convey information, or sell something and might also be art or not. But, some photography is intended as art and some makes it. If the point is advertizing or whatever, then I think the attitude that the final product is all that counts is valid. Who cares? It is just an image, you can paint it or PS it.
As an art form, in the past at least, that is pre-digital, photography WAS different. Sure, darkrooms allowed a lot of manipulation. (I used to do a lot myself but don't much anymore because people just assume I hit a few keys in PS, so why bother?) But the image was OF something, some real THING. Art should, among other things, raise questions. I am too lazy to look it up, but I remember this famous photo of dress making dummies, and a glove is lying on the floor. So if that scene were done with oil or watercolor, it might raise questions, such as, why did the artist include that glove? What were the artists intentions? These same questions might be raised by the photograph but additional questions are also raised, like how did that glove get there? Whose glove IS that? Did the photographer mean to include that glove or only notice it later while making the print? These questions, the last in particular, would never occur to the viewer of an oil painting. In the photo, it is a real glove. In an oil painting, everyone knows it might be a real glove, but the intention of inclusion is very different in the two media.
So "traditional" photography is able to raise fundamentally different questions than any other art form. With the advent of computer manipulation, people who do not have the skill to become oil painters can make complex graphic images and raise the same types of questions that oil painters can raise without having to work so hard or smell so bad. But by disconnecting the image from any actual thing, they are no longer able to raise the TYPES of questions that photography originally raised. The glove will be PSed out, or maybe it was added in. We won't ever know. And eventually we will stop wondering whose glove that was.
Photographer
Picture This
Posts: 1776
Albuquerque, New Mexico, US
Brian Diaz wrote:
I care about what the final product looks like.
I don't care about how you got there. That's it in a nutshell. Both photography and graphic arts are 'applied arts', and both are subjective to the individual creator's whims and to differing interpretations by their critics.
"Purists" boast they are superior because they use strict techniques to manipulate their photographs, but the reality is they still manipulate them to suit their tastes. They are photographers with a graphic artist inside. They vehemently deny this, but as soon as they change the original they give up all claim to being 'pure'.
Graphic artists can apply their talent to photographs, but they can not claim to be purists either. They need photographs to work on or they are just another illustrator. 
Ansel Adams, well known as a master photographer of landscapes, would often spend a great deal of time in the darkroom dodging and burning his negs to create the final images he is so famous for. Was he a photographer or a graphic artist?
I say he was both, and damned good at both; photography AND graphic art.
We all like to think of photographers as those who create an image using only a camera and some film, but the great majority of those results are further manipulated in the darkroom. Are they still photographs in the "pure" sense if they have been deliberately underexposed, overexposed, zoned, changed, enhanced, manipulated, dodged, burned, cropped, sandwiched, shifted, solarized, filtered, or had any number of other "traditional" changes done to them? Photoshop is simply the new darkroom without the chemicals and clothes pins.
The 2 fields overlap to such a great degree it is difficult to really separate them. I would argue that Photoshopping an image to enhance it is only one of the many tools available to alter the original work, same as dodging or burning in certain tonal values, highlights, or shadows, removing elements or adding things in that weren't in the original scene.
When a photographer adds lighting, filters, film choices, shutter speeds, lens choices, angles of view, etc., they are already beginning the process of altering the scene to suit their vision. The fundamental principals of design are still the same for both fields: alignment, balance, color, contrast, emphasis, movement, pattern, proportion, proximity, repetition, rhythm, texture, unity, and white space. Both diciplines can be used to create images separately, but more often than not both are incorporated together to create the end result, namely (and hopefully) a good image - one that is better than the original.
If you look at the application in print, for example, most advertising photographs and a great number of glamour and industrial pics have had extensive manipulation done to them. Whether by "old" airbrush artists or "new" Photoshop artists - the result is the same.
It doesn't take away from someone's photographic skill to manipulate their work in the darkroom, and it shouldn't take away for them to use Photoshop either.
Photographer
Picture This
Posts: 1776
Albuquerque, New Mexico, US
Ivan123 wrote:
So "traditional" photography is able to raise fundamentally different questions than any other art form. With the advent of computer manipulation, people who do not have the skill to become oil painters can make complex graphic images and raise the same types of questions that oil painters can raise without having to work so hard or smell so bad. But by disconnecting the image from any actual thing, they are no longer able to raise the TYPES of questions that photography originally raised. The glove will be PSed out, or maybe it was added in. We won't ever know. And eventually we will stop wondering whose glove that was. Fundamentally, art is still art. And where that glove came from will still be pondered by art critics.
Not everyone will ask, of course, because not everyone views it as art.
But to include or not include an element in a finished work is still fundamental, whether it is a painting, a photograph, or a combination of the 2.
Photographer
Ivan123
Posts: 1037
Arlington, Virginia, US
Picture This wrote:
Fundamentally, art is still art. And where that glove came from will still be pondered by art critics. You miss my point. Any statement of the form, X = X is a true statement, I have to agree. But I was arguing that photography is, or was, fundamentally different from other graphic or reprentational arts, whether painting or scupture or whatever, because it fundamentally, through a physical process, reflects or records some actual THING that actually existed for at least that moment the shutter was released. So, if that thing was a smile, that person was smiling for at least 1/60 of a second or so. European art for a couple of centuries after the renaissance often focused on heroic scenes from ancient mythology. No one viewing the painting thought that any such scene with Greek gods actually took place. A photograph was of something that was of this world. The veiwer knows this. Thus, the two media can raise different types of questions. PS is thus making "photography" more like painting in this regard.
Photographer
D. Brian Nelson
Posts: 5477
Rapid City, South Dakota, US
Ivan123 wrote:
But I was arguing that photography ... reflects or records some actual THING that actually existed for at least that moment the shutter was released. The rest was interesting, but I'd like to comment on just this part. If the photograph is of something that exists and would exist without the photographer's intervention, then the question of differences is though-provoking.
But if the thing that exists, exists only because the photographer made it exist specifically for the photograph, then the photograph is completely a product of his imagination, and is not substantively different from the heroic scupture or other artwork that is a product of the artist's mind.
This divides photography into two distinct forms:
a) Visual records of things that exist; and,
b) Visual creations from the mind of the artist/photographer.
Though those things are distinct, there will be arguable grey areas, i.e. if something existed, but the point-of-view of the photographer is one of imagination and commentary, does the resulting image fall into category a) or b)?
-Don
Photographer
Picture This
Posts: 1776
Albuquerque, New Mexico, US
Ivan123 wrote:
You miss my point. Any statement of the form, X = X is a true statement, I have to agree. But I was arguing that photography is, or was, fundamentally different from other graphic or reprentational arts, whether painting or scupture or whatever, because it fundamentally, through a physical process, reflects or records some actual THING that actually existed for at least that moment the shutter was released. So, if that thing was a smile, that person was smiling for at least 1/60 of a second or so. European art for a couple of centuries after the renaissance often focused on heroic scenes from ancient mythology. No one viewing the painting thought that any such scene with Greek gods actually took place. A photograph was of something that was of this world. The veiwer knows this. Thus, the two media can raise different types of questions. PS is thus making "photography" more like painting in this regard. I see your point but I don't agree with it.
For one thing, many artists don't acknowledge photography as ART because it usually IS a direct representation of reality rather than an interpretation of reality. In other words, photography merely records reality rather than creating an artistic vision of it. I don't agree with that either, but my point is art is in the eye of the beholder, not prescribed by some technique or discipline. Technical drawings are art, but lack artistry. Advertising photography lacks artistic motivation (usually), but can qualify as art if done well. Categorizing art is difficult, and I see no reason to further split hairs between "pure" photography as art and Photoshop-enhanced photography as art.
I can find many examples of photography, done "in camera", that are so altered from reality it makes you wonder if they are in fact of this world.
Ps CAN make some photographs more like paintings, no doubt. But that doesn't mean anything.
What matters is the final image. Either it is art, or it's not. And that depends on who is looking at it, not how it was made.
Photographer
Picture This
Posts: 1776
Albuquerque, New Mexico, US
D. Brian Nelson wrote:
The rest was interesting, but I'd like to comment on just this part. If the photograph is of something that exists and would exist without the photographer's intervention, then the question of differences is though-provoking.
But if the thing that exists, exists only because the photographer made it exist specifically for the photograph, then the photograph is completely a product of his imagination, and is not substantively different from the heroic scupture or other artwork that is a product of the artist's mind.
This divides photography into two distinct forms:
a) Visual records of things that exist; and,
b) Visual creations from the mind of the artist/photographer.
Though those things are distinct, there will be arguable grey areas, i.e. if something existed, but the point-of-view of the photographer is one of imagination and commentary, does the resulting image fall into category a) or b)?
-Don Exactly!
It falls overlappingly (is that a word?, lol) into both. Joel Peter Witkin comes readily to mind...
Photographer
Ivan123
Posts: 1037
Arlington, Virginia, US
D. Brian Nelson wrote:
This divides photography into two distinct forms:
a) Visual records of things that exist; and,
b) Visual creations from the mind of the artist/photographer.
-Don This is a good point and something that I have worried about. I too see the two types of photography as distinct in important ways. Some fashion shoots, for example, collect artifacts from all over, arranges them in a certain way, just for the sake of the camera. Then the camera records that moment. It is true that all that existed for a moment, but it existed for the camera.
I recently saw a show in which the photographer made little models of scenes with cowboys and cattle and then photographed them as though they were life size. They obviously were not real, but the appeal was that they were sort of on the border between realistic and hokey, fake. So he achieved an effect through photography that he could not have achieved with oil paint because the veiwer KNEW they were of little toys. There was a show here in DC years ago in which a woman arranged hundreds of pieces of colored paper and then photographed them with careful control of focus to achieve certain effects. There, the "art" was the photograph, not the pieces of paper, but I claimed that what she did she could have done with watercolor as well as Cibachrome.
So clearly grey areas. But even so, I think the fundamental distinction remains between photography (at least the old school) and all other forms of representational art and that distinction is weakening.
And just because there are grey areas, doesn't mean that rules aren't useful for arranging thought. We say some distinction is as clear as day and night, but we have dusk and dawn and evening and twilight all that.
Photographer
East Coast Visual Media
Posts: 690
Altamonte Springs, Florida, US
There is no right or wrong in art, and If I enhance an image on photoshop I won't lose sleep at night because I corrected the levels on a shot! And I still strive to make the original image the best possible, but shooting in Auto is kinda taking the skill out of it! But hats off to those who make a great final product with it on if that's your level of knowledge.
Photographer
LS Studios Photography
Posts: 54
RESEDA, California, US
Being new to the photography world and coming from being an illustrator I have a vision when I'm taking my shots. Sometimes I see the photo at it's competion photoshop and all before the shot is even taken. Although I don't use it on all or even half of my photos. It's like they say "Life is stranger then fiction." The feelings that transpire through the photo are already there. Photoshop is just handy to bring in some other visuals to enhance the feeling but the message or story is already there in the photo. Although when a photo is so digitally enhanced that is looks like a videogame is it still a photo or is it more of a computer graphic? In Star Wars Attack of the clones, the actors lost thier demension and became "flat" like a video game. I think at that time you loose the the feelings and it becomes a digital graphic. The absence of the soul of the subject, the model, an animal, even the sky makes it a man made work of art like a drawing. The depth of the subject marks the difference between paintings and photos. One's eye's are the passage way to the soul. Man can not create that.
Photographer
Ivan123
Posts: 1037
Arlington, Virginia, US
Picture This wrote:
I see your point but I don't agree with it.
---edit---
Ps CAN make some photographs more like paintings, no doubt. But that doesn't mean anything.
What matters is the final image. Either it is art, or it's not. And that depends on who is looking at it, not how it was made. Clearly you don't agree but here is a thought experiment to make my point: You are arguing that the final image is all that counts, not how you got there. So go to the Sistine Chapel, look up and you will see God animating Adam by touching his fingertip. Cool painting. Now imagine that a very similar photograph, perhaps manipulated in the darkroom a bit but artistically equivalent, purported to show the same thing. The effect on the viewer would be identical? If you don't like that example, then compare sketches of the Loch Ness monster or Bigfoot to photographs of same, or sketches of alien visitors to photographs of same. Even if the images are artistically equivalent, good or bad, they have a different effect on most viewers (you excepted, apparently) because the medium of photography purports to represent, perhaps in an interpreted, "artistic" way, some real thing. Now, exactly what those different reaction might be will vary from person to person. For example, when I see a sketch of bigfoot, I might say "Nice sketch" and when I see a photo I say "Ah! A fake!" or I might say, "My God! Bigfoot is REAL!" Whichever, it will be different, I might also say "Nice photograph" but I won't JUST be saying that. There will be a difference. And I think that a lot of people, my guess is a majority of people will have SOME difference in reaction to the image based on whether the image is a "photograph," that is a light drawing, or some other representational medium.
Photographer
Picture This
Posts: 1776
Albuquerque, New Mexico, US
Ivan123 wrote:
Clearly you don't agree but here is a thought experiment to make my point: You are arguing that the final image is all that counts, not how you got there. So go to the Sistine Chapel, look up and you will see God animating Adam by touching his fingertip. Cool painting. Now imagine that a very similar photograph, perhaps manipulated in the darkroom a bit but artistically equivalent, purported to show the same thing. The effect on the viewer would be identical? If you don't like that example, then compare sketches of the Loch Ness monster or Bigfoot to photographs of same, or sketches of alien visitors to photographs of same. Even if the images are artistically equivalent, good or bad, they have a different effect on most viewers (you excepted, apparently) because the medium of photography purports to represent, perhaps in an interpreted, "artistic" way, some real thing. Now, exactly what those different reaction might be will vary from person to person. For example, when I see a sketch of bigfoot, I might say "Nice sketch" and when I see a photo I say "Ah! A fake!" or I might say, "My God! Bigfoot is REAL!" Whichever, it will be different, I might also say "Nice photograph" but I won't JUST be saying that. There will be a difference. And I think that a lot of people, my guess is a majority of people will have SOME difference in reaction to the image based on whether the image is a "photograph," that is a light drawing, or some other representational medium. Lol... I see the distinction and point you're trying to make. My reaction is the same... it depends on the subject and the execution. Some of the greatest artists are recognized as having created realistic impressions of actual people. Are they artists or illustrators? And just because it exists in a photograph doesn't mean I believe it is real, or intended to be believed as real. I look upon a photographic image and marvel at it's conception and execution as well as ponder it's subject. But I know all too well the things people have done in camera or in the darkroom and I rarely assume it is "pure" reality.
All I'm saying is some of the best photographs purported to be "art" have been altered. Either in the darkroom, or through some other means. Are they still merely photographs?
If they have been altered in some way, this places them into the realm of graphic art. Just because they don't "appear" to be altered or "appear" painted or "appear" manipulated doesn't preclude that from having been done to them.
Of course, this is all just my opinion, and as I said different people view art differently. An artistic photo to you may be a dud in my estimation, and a fabulous photoshop job might be absolute fakery to you.
Somewhere in the middle, I suspect we will agree there is art in both disciplines, and art involving both disciplines - and trash from both too. But only the final image will reveal which it is.
Photographer
JenniferMaria
Posts: 1780
Miami Beach, Florida, US
D. Brian Nelson wrote:
But if the thing that exists, exists only because the photographer made it exist specifically for the photograph, then the photograph is completely a product of his imagination, and is not substantively different from the heroic scupture or other artwork that is a product of the artist's mind.
This divides photography into two distinct forms:
a) Visual records of things that exist; and,
b) Visual creations from the mind of the artist/photographer.
Though those things are distinct, there will be arguable grey areas, i.e. if something existed, but the point-of-view of the photographer is one of imagination and commentary, does the resulting image fall into category a) or b)?
-Don Don,
I think that these two categories are very influential on the types of reactions we'll receive from later posts on this thread.
-Jennifer Maria
Photographer
Henry Tjernlund
Posts: 587
Koppel, Pennsylvania, US
Thanks everyone for your comments. Sorry for causing somewhat of an argument.
I guess I was considering the issue from a MM context. I am working up to post to the Critique forms asking for feedback on my profile. I have seen other people criticized for too much Photoshop. I certainly photoshop. Either because I cant afford all the resources that it takes to make the image I want, or because it is not practically possible to make what I want. Plus I only have a part of one lifetime left to develop the skills and acquire the resources. So I resort to PS and other tool to bridge that gap.
Henry
Photographer
Kevin Connery
Posts: 17824
El Segundo, California, US
D. Brian Nelson wrote:
But if the thing that exists, exists only because the photographer made it exist specifically for the photograph, then the photograph is completely a product of his imagination, and is not substantively different from the heroic scupture or other artwork that is a product of the artist's mind. As you note, angle of view can make things fuzzy, but so can color, depth of field and shutter speed.
Black and white? Created, in that the scene isn't visible as such to most viewers.
Consider an image of a scene with a cluttered background; how would it look with low DoF vs high DoF? Both were "created", and neither is a pure representation of a thing that exists.
Shutter speed? Consider a high-traffic intersection during the day: how would the resulting image look if shot at 1/1000th of a second or at 1000 seconds? The 1/1000th may be close to 'reality' as most viewers would think they saw it, but the 1000 second exposure would elminate almost all the moving vehicles, pedestrians, etc.--that 'thing' didn't exist.
Even in journalistic work, with no retouching-class modifications, photography is very much dependent on the choices made by the photographer.
Henry Tjernlund wrote:
I have seen other people criticized for too much Photoshop. In most cases, "too much Photoshop" is inaccurate. It's usually not enough "good" Photoshop, or too much "bad" Photoshop. The majority of images on magazine covers have "more" Photoshop/photoediting done than images on MM...but that work typically doesn't look edited. Is it "too much", or "done poorly"?
Photographer
Henry Tjernlund
Posts: 587
Koppel, Pennsylvania, US
Kevin Connery wrote:
Shutter speed? Consider a high-traffic intersection during the day: how would the resulting image look if shot at 1/1000th of a second or at 1000 seconds? The 1/1000th may be close to 'reality' as most viewers would think they saw it, but the 1000 second exposure would elminate almost all the moving vehicles, pedestrians, etc.--that 'thing' didn't exist. I read something about this very issue. The 1000 second exposure of traffic exists every bit as much as the 1/1000 second one. And if our vision worked that way, then that is precisely what we would see. It in not impossible for vision to theoretically work that way. Just because human vision doesnt, does not mean that something else's vision could work that way.
But, I understand your point and dont completely disagree with it.
Anyway, I am working toward being able to create virtual backgrounds and props for photography that would take more mony than many photographers have to construct. But I am a sci-fi/fantasy fan and that is what I like. *shrug*
Photographer
commart
Posts: 6078
Hagerstown, Maryland, US
Some of the fundamental tenets or ideas, reverse engineered, that I use to understand photograph (and photographers) as a viewer are these:
1. "Response Photography" vs. "Constructed Photography"--tourists and combat photographers alike understand the first concept; anyone who has ever worked in film or theater understands the latter. I wouldn't call the division pure but nonetheless large.
2. The terms "Photograph", "Photo-Illustration", and "Illustration" presume there is something to the idea of a photograph, which has in fact subsumed the actual existence of traditionally printed photographs: most of what we're looking at exists through a magnetic-chemical-electric interchange on computer monitors (and most of what we print, we now print with inks rather than through the management of silver salts and dyes).
At Zoetrope.com, Francis Ford Coppola's "virtual film studio", I have generally commented on "photographs" where the virtual print represented with veracity an exposure that remained dominant and primary within it. That has changed some as photographers incorporate more and more "filters" partially into the development of their presentations or work on seamless composites. One may follow that hybrid "photo-Illustration" for a while (or refuse to call Man Ray a photographer), but as the "idea of the photograph" disappears under layers of alteration, the basis for criticism is no longer photography culture, history, or even technology and needs must be expanded to include contemporary art and illustration in terms of both invention and manufacturing.
3. Design vs. Story. These are another two nonexclusive but nonetheless large dimensions or streams down which photographers (and other artists) travel. This can get complicated right quick, especially if you relate other polarities to it (e.g., technicians vs. poets; composer mathematicians vs. troubador songwriters; lol and etc.). Nonetheless, I think the discriminator exists, and you know after a while who's going to do the nude study involving pure (no person, no personality) "form and shadow" and who's going to do the nudie pic with the college babe with the wanton look, and then, like Bitesnich, who'se going to shoot the nude as a feat of natural engineering with a dollop of expression (and possibly not even that), or, like Liebovitz, the nude as belonging to a person-as-character in the world's longest parade of iconic personalities.
Photographer
Rawson
Posts: 444
Massapequa Park, New York, US
i once knew a photographer who said photoshop was the devil, but i never really understood why he was shooting digital rather then film.
Photographer
LongWindFPV Visuals
Posts: 7052
Las Vegas, Nevada, US
Henry Tjernlund wrote:
I have seen some Photoshopped (and other computer graphic altered) images being criticized as crossing the line. I can understant purist opinions. Im certain that I have some of my own. But, doesnt art change? When the airbrush first came out, it was considered by many purist to be a gimmic and not a real art tool. Now there are well established airbrush artisits with magazines and books devoted to their work. Is not digital manipulation the new airbrush. I mean, why should the advantage of a well established photographer that has a truck full of lighting equipment and access to exotic locations that much different than the advantage of a skill Photoshop user or greenscreen/cgi artist?
Henry Common sense. Here is what our common sense tells us, which may, or may not be backed by some additional reading, or studying.
1) When a photographer creates a picture and publishes it. It should bear the copyright symbol in the traditional places. Bottom or upper left or right.
2) When photographer discovers the same image being used illegally on some commercial website with the copyright stamp cropped out, the instinctive reaction is to begin planting copyright stamps in the middle of the image, across the subject to make it harder to crop out.
3) When a good quality image has the potential to be turned into something beyond a traditional photograph, use whatever ability you can muster and tool you can afford to turn it into an art piece. Mastering PhotoShop in the process?...can only improve your marketability.
When you come onto forums like these and you have some wise ass spouting his/her mouth the following...
1) Images are too manipulated
2) I think it's tacky to have a copyright mark across the image
3) You totally blew it with the effects. I don't like it.
What they are saying is counter to what your common sense is telling you. What they are truly saying is, if you remove the political correctness, is...
1) Damn, I wish I knew how to manipulate images like you do.
2) Damn, your copyright mark is distracting me during my masturbating session with your photographed model (or, damn, now I can't crop and post your image(s) in my Indonesian Mail Order bride website)
3) Maaaaan, if I only knew how to do the effects you do with my pictures, I'd make some serious money. Well, there ain't no way, I'm gonna let you get ahead of me.
Summary: Whenever someone speaks in a way that counters common sense, then you know that mutthafukka has some ulterior motive, which is ultimately designed to either screw you, or hold you back. How do they do this? By attempting to social engineer people into thinking that what you are doing, or producing is not anything that has any merit, or value.
Model
Zaika
Posts: 66
South San Francisco, California, US
Joe K. Perez wrote:
Summary: Whenever someone speaks in a way that counters common sense, then you know that mutthafukka has some ulterior motive, which is ultimately designed to either screw you, or hold you back. How do they do this? By attempting to social engineer people into thinking that what you are doing, or producing is not anything that has any merit, or value. Very nice Joe, I think you could be both a great photographer and a writer. Joe K. Perez is an advocate of artful-minded people.
To the OP, I very much agree that all people have different techniques and to achieve those, they have their methods and ways to do so (whether it is photoshop, or network connections). Art is a very vague concept, some people might see art in a broken pieces of glass on the ground, and for others art would be a painting job on the ceiling of the museum. Some people don't even consider photography art, which I disagree with, but that is a whole another issue.
Photographer
La Seine by the Hudson
Posts: 8587
New York, New York, US
In response to the string of posts discussing the impact of Photoshop of the future of the perceived "veracity" of photography, I remember back in the 90s during the OJ trial, Wired magazine ran an intentionally obviously heavily doctored photo of OJ on the cover along with the copy "Reality Is Dead." There's been a lot of debate about this. Somehow I think most of us are taking it in stride. The only real issue I would see would be the propagation of doctored photos for the sake of true propaganda, or the doctoring of evidence photographs. What I mean to say is I think the public is beginning to philosophically make a distinction between "the thing itself" and "the image" (photographic or not-really-exactly-photographic).
Besides, photoillustration is not "new." It's just re-energized and resurgent with a much more powerful tool. I've never been fond of photoillustration at any point in its history and I'm not more fond of it in general now, but, well, art is art, and some art is good and some art is bad and some we like and some we don't and......
Photographer
The Art of CIP
Posts: 1074
Long Beach, California, US
Brian Diaz wrote:
I care about what the final product looks like.
I don't care about how you got there.
(Okay, sometimes I'm impressed by an especially cool technique, but it usually doesn't affect how I look at a piece of art.) I second that motion.. All in favor say "AYE"!!!!!
Photographer
dadikongbaduy
Posts: 16
Manila, Arkansas, US
i guess 'purists' are happy just using cameras for photography.
but they are not the only photographers.
many photographers are not satisfied with their pictures and they have to enhance/manipulate it in the darkroom/digital darkroom.
if you are using digital darkroom, it may not be 'photography' anymore but may call it 'digital photography'.
Photographer
A. H A M I L T O N
Posts: 325
Coventry, England, United Kingdom
Henry Tjernlund wrote:
I have seen some Photoshopped (and other computer graphic altered) images being criticized as crossing the line. Based on your original opinion I have very, very rarely seen anyone do this in the context that this thread has gone.
I won't get into the art/non-art disucssion because I couldn't possibly care less. However, on a modeling site when most of the photographers here are or aspire to be fashion/test/portfolio/glamour photographers, those that criticize images as being too heavily photoshopped aren't generally saying that it isn't art because of that...they're saying it's too heavily photoshopped to meet the industry standards of the industry we assume you want to be in.
Especially if you're a test/portfolio development photographer, you CAN cross the line because what agents and casting professionals want to see is the model, not your photoshop skills. If you're shooting purely for the sake of making artwork or shooting and then editing something to fill a clients artistic vision, knock yourself out, no one cares...or at worse, not enough care to matter.
Photographer
Kevin Connery
Posts: 17824
El Segundo, California, US
Joe K. Perez wrote:
When you come onto forums like these and you have some wise ass spouting his/her mouth the following...
[snipped]
3) You totally blew it with the effects. I don't like it.
What they are saying is counter to what your common sense is telling you. What they are truly saying is, if you remove the political correctness, is...
[snipped]
3) Maaaaan, if I only knew how to do the effects you do with my pictures, I'd make some serious money. Well, there ain't no way, I'm gonna let you get ahead of me.
Summary: Whenever someone speaks in a way that counters common sense, then you know that mutthafukka has some ulterior motive, which is ultimately designed to either screw you, or hold you back. How do they do this? By attempting to social engineer people into thinking that what you are doing, or producing is not anything that has any merit, or value. And sometimes, "You totally blew it with the effects." means just that; the effects ruined an otherwise good, bad, or indifferent image. By asserting that all such comments are sour grapes and/or done to screw or hold back the recipient, you're pretty much dismissing those who can see issues that were overlooked by the artist as being negative rather than being positive.
Examples:
Whites of eyes or teeth that glow in the dark--that are brighter than the 255 8-bit maximum. Some photographers do that without realizing the artificiality. (Some might be doing it for artistic effect, though that's apparently much less common.)
Blurring effects with crisp delineation between the blurred areas and the unblurred areas. (Novice "skin cleanup" techniques.) Sometimes this is done intentionally; most commonly it's doing unknowingly.
Dull, flat, over contrasty images, motion-blurred, out of focus images, extreme saturation (high or low), color casts, blown-out highlights, blocked up shadows, etc.--all of those can be legitimate artistic choices. Should any commentary on those issues always be assumed to be negative social engineering?
Photographer
D. Brian Nelson
Posts: 5477
Rapid City, South Dakota, US
Kevin Connery wrote:
Even in journalistic work, with no retouching-class modifications, photography is very much dependent on the choices made by the photographer. Yes, but....
What if the choices are how much to zoom and whether to touch-on "auto everything?"
Of all of the zillions of choices that photographers can make, almost all of them are relegated to whoever wrote the software for the auto-everything cameras.
What you said puts folks like Walker Evans and Brassai back into the realm of artists, because while they photograph what exists, they interpreted show it through their own eyes. Photographers of what exists are able to powerfully interpret by perspectives, DOF and other choices too numerous to list.
But very few do. Those that do are photographers - those thas don't are snapshooters.
Yet every one that first creates the subject for the photograph, then photographs it, is an artist. Might be bad art, but it's clearly intentional creation of something - a necessary condition of art.
-Don
Photoshopping? Whatever. It's not strictly photography (light writing) but there's nothing evil about it. As with any tool, it can be used clumsily. So what?
Photographer
Kevin Connery
Posts: 17824
El Segundo, California, US
D. Brian Nelson wrote:
What you said puts folks like Walker Evans and Brassai back into the realm of artists, because while they photograph what exists, they interpreted show it through their own eyes. Photographers of what exists are able to powerfully interpret by perspectives, DOF and other choices too numerous to list. I hadn't meant to imply they were ever out of that realm.
D. Brian Nelson wrote:
But very few do. Those that do are photographers - those thas don't are snapshooters. It seems like more of a continuum between the two rather than only each one, but I agree in general.
D. Brian Nelson wrote:
Yet every one that first creates the subject for the photograph, then photographs it, is an artist. Might be bad art, but it's clearly intentional creation of something - a necessary condition of art. Erm, the parents of a child who then photographs the child? (OK, OK, I'm being quibbly. )
Photographer
digital cowboy
Posts: 147
Broken Arrow, Oklahoma, US
You been here for four hour now.
Too much talking. Not enough photography and PS.
You go home now.
There was a documentary on a man who painted with cow dung. Some people considered it art... I think it was crap on a canvass... no maybe if he took a photo of it and PS'd it a bit...
-=Jeff=-
Photographer
Master Image Photograph
Posts: 458
Rancho Santa Margarita, California, US
Jeff Fiore wrote:
Anyone that complains that photo-manipulation is not photography, I usually point them to Jerry Uelsmann http://www.uelsmann.com/. His photos are very heavily manipulated and are still considered photos - why? because he does all his photo-manipulations in the darkroom. He is a darkroom master and his work is truly amazing once you realize it is all done in the darkroom.
Anytime there is change, you will always get the diehard purists that are resistant to change. That's ok, everyone is entitled to work the way they want. To me photoshop is just a tool to achieve what I want from a photo. When I did my own darkroom work, it took me hours and a lot of trial & error (and not to mention waste) to get the results I wanted. Just because it now only takes me a few minutes with photoshop doesn't make it less valid.
I remember when cut & paste meant just that. I'm sure when the graphics art industry went through the digital revolution years ago, there was the purists who resisted. Because this was an indutry change, if the purists resisted, they would be out of work. As the Borg said "resistance is futile".
The great thing about photography is that you have your choices of medium - film, digital, cyanotypes, pinhole, Holga and if you want glass plates with home-made emulsion - it is all good. You also have your choice of formats also. Unlike the graphic arts industry, photography is a creative medium and basically anything goes. In this case "resistance in NOT futile". You shoot what you want and how you want it an you don't have to answer to anyone.
Now, things change if you shoot for clients (you know.. for money), you have to deliver what the client wants and in the format they want.
I do whatever I want on a photo to achieve "my vision". Some photos are straight out of the camera. Just because I shoot digital doesn't mean the old rules still don't apply, I still believe in getting it right in the camera and not depend on Photoshop to "pull it out". Other photos have degrees of Photoshop manipulations intended to make the photo match my vision.
The short answer, I am NOT a purist. Yes, I do Chromakey (greenscreen) also. I refuse to be limited. I love anything artistic and creative...I wish I had this man's creative mind- love the work.
IS my image too over the top? what painter or artist does it remind you of?
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