image manipulation in photograpy

[paulr]

"People will eventually be browsing old publications for Genuine Pre-Photoshop images."

sure, just like some people are into wet plate images, salted paper prints, daguerrotypes, or any other historical process. people will always be around who appreciate the old ways, just as people are always around who crave things that are new.

It will stop feeling like a turf war or a religious war after the last of the pre-photoshop generation is dead. Just like with all the older processes. Thank god we don't have to listen to any old guys calling us pussies for not using wet plates anymore!

if you want to use a wet plate, go wild, use it. if you want to use a cell phone cam, it's there for the taking. just don't think anyone is waiting up at night curious about some fringe group's opinion of what is and what isn't real photography.

[Steve J Murray]

"Can only say one thing about these wildlife images. They are some of the few, the very few, B&W images of wildlife that I have seen that I like. They look as if they were done because he wanted to do them rather than "because B&W film is all I have".

I have to agree with Dan Smith that Brandt's images certainly have a large amount of "wow factor," which you really have to admire. You have to have a really great image to start with. He adds to these images certain dramatic elements to create an even more eye popping effect. I'd love to see these up close even though I still feel some of his choices in expression are a bit heavy handed.

Yeah paulr, too bad these discussions always become so polemic. I'm still wondering innocently how far folks go with the special effects as they create their masterpieces. Can you achieve a huge wow factor without adding special borders or distressing the negatives or greatly exaggerating pictorial elements?

I've thought about doing some of this stuff with portraits and not so much with nature shots, but maybe I need to expand my vision, get more of that wow factor going.

[Mark_3632]

You don't use wet plates!!!! You pussy.

[John_4185]

paulr Thank god we don't have to listen to any old guys calling us pussies for not using wet plates anymore!

pussie

[paulr]

yeah, ok.

should have seen that coming

[paulr]

"maybe I need to expand my vision, get more of that wow factor going."

you can join the folks that have been getting that wow factor for over a decade now, without photoshop, and without wow images-- just print HUUUUUUUUUUGE!

[John_4185]

You can use a camera in more then one way....to record things accurately, or as the foundation for artistic expression.

You can use a camera as a hammer, too, or an ashtray, a small planting pot, a stash; an SLR can be a difficult vanity mirror and with a whistle mounted on the front board, a view camera can play a tune: these are few of my favorite things.

Forgive me - Under the influence Shots magazine before coffee.

[Ted Harris]

As a short aside here .... we have a Congregational Church in town that is one of the landmarks folks are proud of. It is a typical photogenic New England church complete with clock tower. It is also complete with the normal complement of power and utility lines. Last month, as part of my preparation for Christmas Art Fairs around New England I took an image I had made of the church some years ago and painstakingly removed all the power lines. I then made the image into a greeting card that has been selling like crazy. I smile when people say it is the best picture they have ever seen of the church, knowing it is because they picture it in their mind sans the power lines but have never seen it reproduced that way (unless they have seen pre 1920 or so images of it).

[Steve J Murray]

For me the issue is not removing power lines or manhole covers or making subtle additions that the viewer is not aware of as being an alteration. It is the intentional inclusion of obvious elements in the photo that were NOT part of the original scene in order to dramatize and increase the visual impact (wow factor) of the image, such as superimposing old polaroid borders on the image, or spreading around a bunch of gaussian blur and selectively sharpening other features, or adding clouds from another image, for instance.

I know this is a very grey area to define, and maybe it can't be. My thought was that the more we add extra elements to the image, the more we are creating something called "photographic art " and moving away from an actual photograph. I'm not condemning the practice at all, just making a distinction. I do find there is for me a little bit of a let-down when I was thinking of the image as a photograph and come to find there are so many alterations that it looks more like a painting, digital or not.

Just a side note: when I peruse through photo.net its obvious many of the most popular images are just that: heavily altered images bordering on cartoonish. People seem to eat this stuff up.

Whew. That's all folks.

[steve_782]

"There appears to be a soft Gaussian blur on most of the image except for the heads of both rhinos, and the shoulder of the farther rhino."

You could do exactly the same thing in the darkroom using Vaseline, tissue paper, rubber cement, varnishes, etc. Make the entire photo in focus, and then distort the image during printing - really quite easily done.

I've done much the same thing using a simple clear sheet of acetate over the top of the negative, and then applying "things" to the clear sheet. Joel Witkin does much the same thing by placing glass over the printing paper and then applying Vaseline, wet / dry tissue paper and other things on top of the glass that will distort the image; and then exposing the paper through the stuff placed on the glass.

You seem to want to single out digital manipulations as if they're so hugely different than what photographers have been doing for at least 100 years. How do you feel about Rejlander or HP Robinson? Both of whom purposely built images from numbers of individual exposures, and purposely tried to make them look like they were done with a single exposure?

I truly hate the digital dimage assumptions as they can be proven so patently false by either knowing alternative darkroom techniques; or just a little of the history of photography.

The whole "purity of photography" idea makes me laugh - there's no such thing. It's always self-defined by people who think they're continuing on, or part of, some "legacy" that they desire to identified with by association - usually one that's long gone. They pine nostalgically for the days of yore when photography was "pure" (Bwaaaa...haaaaa...), and people knew photographs told "the truth."

Remember, just use a really big view camera (the bigger the better), and ONLY make contact prints on Azo - that will assure that you're making truly great photographs - no matter how poorly seen.