Why do photographers have less artistic license?

[Marko]

Marko,

I find it ridiculous that you would attempt to blame APUG, or former members of APUG, for controversies that are taking place here on the LF forum. What happens on this forum is subject to the LF moderators. If you are not happy with the way things are going you should take it up with QT or the moderators. What happens in Vegas stays in Vegas should be the principle.

Sandy,

What I am trying to make clear is that I definitely do not blame APUG as such for what is happening here. Like I said, the direction and the philosophy of that board is entirely the prerogative of the board's owner and I respect that. That does not mean I have to like it or agree with it, quite to the contrary, so after a brief participation, I decided it was not the place I would feel comfortable at and I left.

I am, however, blaming a few of their current or former number for some confrontations that are happening as of lately here, and increasingly so. The reason I have mentioned APUG is precisely because they are bringing the same diatribes that I find commonplace there, some of them almost verbatim. In my opinion, they are trying to transplant the negative and confrontational part of the APUG's spirit as I see it here.

Please note that I say "a few of the current and former members" - that definitely does not mean "everybody" on the board, nor its owner and moderators. In fact, I have nothing but very high respect for a couple of their moderators who are regular participants here and whom I have never heard saying anything even remotely similar to the behaviour in question. What I find sad, and I stated that before too, is that the board has a real potential to be a treasure trove for traditional processes but it gets drowned out because it was set up as a reaction and an antithesis to digital rather than as just traditional photography interest group.

But in the end, it is precisely as you say - what happens in Vegas should stay in Vegas. The question is: which Vegas?

My take on the level of discourse of APUG and the LF forum is completely different from yours. APUG has a very pro-active way of ending discussions that get out of hand, in contrast to more hands off policy of moderators of the LF forum. I participate on both forums and my take on the subject is that there have been a lot more flame wars here than on APUG.

Well, yes, just as we carry a very different personal "weight", both here and there. I think someone of your standing is much less likely to have the "attitude" directed at them in the first place, which is only normal. Secondly, we necessarily do have different preferences and perspectives and that certainly influences the way we perceive some of the discussions. And finally, we each have different temperaments and therefore prefer different policies.

But mainly I just find it very bad form to blame APUG for discussions on the LF forum.

In the end, yes, you are right - it is bad form, even in the light of everything I just said. My mistake was that I tried to reason with the unreasonable and got baited in the process. Those few are now safely tucked away on my ignore list, which is what I should've done from the very beginning.

Marko

[Eric_Scott]

I'm of the opinion that most of the public does not care.

If we can find a circumstance where a nature photographer or a nature photography publication was discovered to have fudged an image and consequently lost significant income from general public appreciation of his work, then I'll have been proven wrong. I pointed out one circumstance above in which such a revelation made no such difference.

Are you referring to Art Wolfe? I do know for a fact that he now indicates in his books which images have been digitially manipulated. Why does he do this if the public doesn't give a hoot? He began doing this after the incident I mentioned. I don't know if sales of his "Migrations" book was impacted or not. If it wasn't, perhaps it's because he labels his images as David suggests.

Also I take it that the implicit contract that QT, Galen and others speak of is no contract at all but an old wives tale?

In the end I guess we'll have to agree to disagree. :-)

[tim atherton]

add in the apug members who signed up on here purely to come across and try and throw their weight around like a bunch of little brownshirt thugs, just because they didn't like what was being said here

[David_Senesac]

I'm of the opinion that most of the public does not care.

If we can find a circumstance where a nature photographer or a nature photography publication was discovered to have fudged an image and consequently lost significant income from general public appreciation of his work, then I'll have been proven wrong. ...

I don't think that is a reasonable standard to base that opinion on. I'll grant some such situations would indeed exist however lets not put the bar there. We all walk past most art that is displayed in any venue and choose only a few pieces to look at more closely for a wide variety of reasons. And some of those reasons vary from time to time. A person looking for a really striking highly saturated sunset photograph wandering through a number of booths at an art fair might walk right past almost every image on display. Then seeing something really striking zoom right in regardless of whether it looks natural or not and then consider a purchase. After that customer leaves how do any artists within that art fair evaluate that they lost that customer?

In like manner a person looking for something natural in sunset landscapes might view a number of booths with obvious unnatural contrast and saturation before seeing a more believable print that fits the style they personally prefers. After buying the print they might offer that photographer a compliment about the image while it is highly unlikely they would bother to visit all the other like category images in the fair just to personally criticize photographers in those booths. In fact most folks are likely to avoid direct criticism like that with any artists they don't know simply because it is distasteful and especially so in public.

On the other hand your opinion that a majority of the public does not care may well be true. There are certainly many that know full and well what they are looking at and simply don't give a rat's a one way or another as long as it appeals visually to them. And many of course have rather primitive philosophies about any types of art, thus see something they fancy and want it. Then there are those that might care, especially those that spend their lives mostly in urban areas, that simply tend to be rather ignorant of what is and what isn't an image of natural phenomenon. Likewise despite the considerable awakening of their awareness of how digital manipulation occurs now, many in the public are still rather ignorant about processes used by professional photographers and what they can do. So even if they didn't want an unnatural image, they wouldn't be able to tell. I certainly haven't come close to mentioning all the perspectives of public audiences.

In any case it is true that a still significant number of people will care more or less to different degrees. So despite the fact a majority might not care, enough do that the issue does bear on the photographic community to consider being more honest and up front. Not really much to ask unless someone has something to hide. One need look no further than public web forums of all sorts that post images to see it is occassionally a subject of intense discourse. ...David