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A Noob's Views - Controversial??
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Pook
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markyg said:Twas indeed m8y!! Made a few attempts in Paint but not even worth looking at!!!
Look out for trial versions of PS on magazines, and also, Photoshop LE is not to be sneezed at either. That is often given away with printers etc. Ask around your friends, colleagues etc.. I bet you someone, somewhere has a copy of LE that they've never bothered to use.
As for learning how to use PS, then I can recommend the "Photoshop for Photographers" series of books by Martin Evening. Well worth a read.
No substitue for getting in there and using it tho, and using a forum like this to ask for help. The tutorial section is coming along nicely, and I expect it will continue to grow as the forum does.
I'm sorry if you thought jy reply was personal... it's not as such. I'm glad you haven't been got at by the purist mob. The fact that your opinions are your own add more credence to them. However... take the time to really learn how to use the tools you now have at hand, and you'll see that it won't help you take better photos, now disguise your bad ones... but will just add more amunition to your photographic arsenal.. so to speak.
Pook said:markyg said:Twas indeed m8y!! Made a few attempts in Paint but not even worth looking at!!!
Look out for trial versions of PS on magazines, and also, Photoshop LE is not to be sneezed at either. That is often given away with printers etc. Ask around your friends, colleagues etc.. I bet you someone, somewhere has a copy of LE that they've never bothered to use.
As for learning how to use PS, then I can recommend the "Photoshop for Photographers" series of books by Martin Evening. Well worth a read.
No substitue for getting in there and using it tho, and using a forum like this to ask for help. The tutorial section is coming along nicely, and I expect it will continue to grow as the forum does.
I'm sorry if you thought jy reply was personal... it's not as such. I'm glad you haven't been got at by the purist mob. The fact that your opinions are your own add more credence to them. However... take the time to really learn how to use the tools you now have at hand, and you'll see that it won't help you take better photos, now disguise your bad ones... but will just add more amunition to your photographic arsenal.. so to speak.
I`ll check out those books cheers for the recommendation. Here to learn so all opinions and comments welcome!!
Thanks again all!
Here we go again.
As a professional in this field I have to say that there's a massive gulf between 'enhancing' images in Photoshop and 'manipulating' them.
In my work images I am required by law to declare any manipulation other than what we call 'normal darkroom practices' - take this to mean lightening/darkening (levels or curves), dodging and burning and basic colour correction (filters etc) plus a bit of sharpening to account for the anti-aliasing bypass filters - I leave mine off in-camera and do all sharpening in Photoshop.
The File info or image name must give an indication to this.
for example, RAW images are labelled (for example):
IMG_0001R.NEF
an enhanced image will be
IMG_0001E.tif/jpg
and a manipulated image will be
IMG_0001M.tif/jpg
People have been manipulating images for as long as there have been cameras - Nadar did it as did many of his contempories. Edward Steichen did it, so did Ed Weston and Bill Brandt.
As long as it's not the purpose to decieve the viewer there's no harm done. All the photographer is doing is making the most of the tools at his disposal to create the vision he/she had when first visualising the image.
News photography is the only exception and is vigorously policed - we all remember the Washington Post/NY Times photographer who was sacked for his manipulation of an image during the Gulf War (moving a background figure to present a more balanced composition - of two images the soldier in the forground had a better expression in his second image, but a civilian in the background was looking away - he cloned one to another and was fired when it was discovered, even though all figures were present in both images).
As regards all other forms of photography, it's a free-for all the only limitation should be your imagination.
As a professional in this field I have to say that there's a massive gulf between 'enhancing' images in Photoshop and 'manipulating' them.
In my work images I am required by law to declare any manipulation other than what we call 'normal darkroom practices' - take this to mean lightening/darkening (levels or curves), dodging and burning and basic colour correction (filters etc) plus a bit of sharpening to account for the anti-aliasing bypass filters - I leave mine off in-camera and do all sharpening in Photoshop.
The File info or image name must give an indication to this.
for example, RAW images are labelled (for example):
IMG_0001R.NEF
an enhanced image will be
IMG_0001E.tif/jpg
and a manipulated image will be
IMG_0001M.tif/jpg
People have been manipulating images for as long as there have been cameras - Nadar did it as did many of his contempories. Edward Steichen did it, so did Ed Weston and Bill Brandt.
As long as it's not the purpose to decieve the viewer there's no harm done. All the photographer is doing is making the most of the tools at his disposal to create the vision he/she had when first visualising the image.
News photography is the only exception and is vigorously policed - we all remember the Washington Post/NY Times photographer who was sacked for his manipulation of an image during the Gulf War (moving a background figure to present a more balanced composition - of two images the soldier in the forground had a better expression in his second image, but a civilian in the background was looking away - he cloned one to another and was fired when it was discovered, even though all figures were present in both images).
As regards all other forms of photography, it's a free-for all the only limitation should be your imagination.
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Pook
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It's much the same for wildlife photographers now. As you said tho, manipulation is nothing new at all. It's the word "digital" that frightens people I think. Like I said in an earlier post, Ansel Adams did nothing but manipulate his images, and he gained a reputation for the ultimate realist, especially earlier on in his career when he and his contemporaries formed the f64 club and decried pictorialism.. despite this.. there is little real in his images.
Photographers in Soviet Russia were commissioned to alter the truth in political propaganda, knowing full well that people trusted photographs, so would believe whatever was printed using that medium.
No.. manipulation, as you say, is as old as photography itself... it's nothing new. I think people are worried that ANYONE could do this, but as we all know, it takes a skilled retoucher to REALLY fool people, and the average guy in the street hasn't a chance of fooling anyone other than his mates down the pub, who probably know as little as he does.
Photographers in Soviet Russia were commissioned to alter the truth in political propaganda, knowing full well that people trusted photographs, so would believe whatever was printed using that medium.
No.. manipulation, as you say, is as old as photography itself... it's nothing new. I think people are worried that ANYONE could do this, but as we all know, it takes a skilled retoucher to REALLY fool people, and the average guy in the street hasn't a chance of fooling anyone other than his mates down the pub, who probably know as little as he does.
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verosatus
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I like straight photography that showcases a photographer's skill in creating the image before it hits paper or a computer monitor. However, there's nothing wrong with altering either a film exposure or a digitally stored set of bits representing what you aimed your lens at. It's all still photography but some of it is going to be more altered, manipulated, or corrected than others.
There's an article on a glamour photographer where he speaks of not wanting to use too much Photoshop to enhance his images, so he doesn't get a fake look to the models See article. But some digital airbrusing is certainly in use with any published work of this type. This instead of taking a piece of nylon hoisery over the lens or using some other softening trick "pre" process.
The point is that when you present your work for someone else to see, it should be represented as what it is. If it's a nice photography made with film and paper, say it is. If it's a nice photograph heavily altered in Photoshop, say it is. You'll get a reaction for the job you did. No one cheated or lied.
Photography, like any art, is only going to have its tools and techniques limited by self-imposed restrictions of wanting to achive a certain goal, using specific criteria. Sometimes a painter says, "I will only use oils for this" and sometimes he says, "I will use whatever comes to mind."[/url]
There's an article on a glamour photographer where he speaks of not wanting to use too much Photoshop to enhance his images, so he doesn't get a fake look to the models See article. But some digital airbrusing is certainly in use with any published work of this type. This instead of taking a piece of nylon hoisery over the lens or using some other softening trick "pre" process.
The point is that when you present your work for someone else to see, it should be represented as what it is. If it's a nice photography made with film and paper, say it is. If it's a nice photograph heavily altered in Photoshop, say it is. You'll get a reaction for the job you did. No one cheated or lied.
Photography, like any art, is only going to have its tools and techniques limited by self-imposed restrictions of wanting to achive a certain goal, using specific criteria. Sometimes a painter says, "I will only use oils for this" and sometimes he says, "I will use whatever comes to mind."[/url]
I don't see any difference between a photograph manipulated on paper or a photograph manipulated in a computer - look at Man Ray's images - all done on 'wet' process and minipulated so much you can sometimes barely make out what it started life as.
I think some people (verosatus - that's you I'm talking to here) need to get out and look at some more photographer's work before they start harping on about this 'purist' approach - it never happened - it's a bloody myth.
Go to the museums and galleries - it's all there waiting to be seen.
I think some people (verosatus - that's you I'm talking to here) need to get out and look at some more photographer's work before they start harping on about this 'purist' approach - it never happened - it's a bloody myth.
Go to the museums and galleries - it's all there waiting to be seen.
Arkady said:
i agree 100% with what has been said above,
as for the ' straight photograph ' there is no such thing, as camera, lens, and film choice all start the ' editing ' process , and the only way to see a picture ( apart from slides i suppose , and even those are manupulated to a certain degree by the type and strength of chemicals used to process ) is to print on paper or put onto a computer monitor,
so by what ur saying these ' pure ' pictures would never see the light of day ???
i bet you dont think that autofocusing is cheating ?? or maybe you do ??
just accept images seen anywhere for what they are ment to be, images that either make you think, or dont,
i for one think this is the end of the aurgument regarding this matter, both sides have had a say, so its time more peeps concentrated on taking pics and showing em rather than talking about it
MyPix 8)
and in 2 hours i'm of to Australia for a month to take as many pictures as possible
Steep
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I think you'll both find that verosatus didn't harp, he stated his preference and also made it clear that other ways were perfectly acceptable as well, but he also said that you should let the viewer know what's been done to an image so they know what they're looking at.
I'll repeat my view as well, I'm of the opinion that you do whatever it takes to make the image you want to make say what you want it to say.
St.P
I'll repeat my view as well, I'm of the opinion that you do whatever it takes to make the image you want to make say what you want it to say.
St.P
No-one's accusing anyone of harping, but it's an often heard argument that only film and paper ('wet' process) constitutes 'proper' photography and that digital somehow isn't as 'worthy'.
It's just hackneyed and ill-educated and can be easily rectified by people opening their eyes to what's been done in the past.
I'm of the opinion that nothing is sacrosanct and all opinions are equally valid, but I just wish people would stop repeating stuff they've heard and form an opinion for themselves.
The litmus test is this: is it a good image - yes or no.
End of story since it's the image, not how it was arrived at that's important.
Do you think this is a new argument?
Dageurrotype versus calotype versus ambrotype versus wet collodion, it's all been said before - oh and photography versus painting? That one rages on still!
Let's leave it at this: do you take photos or do you make them?
It's just hackneyed and ill-educated and can be easily rectified by people opening their eyes to what's been done in the past.
I'm of the opinion that nothing is sacrosanct and all opinions are equally valid, but I just wish people would stop repeating stuff they've heard and form an opinion for themselves.
The litmus test is this: is it a good image - yes or no.
End of story since it's the image, not how it was arrived at that's important.
Do you think this is a new argument?
Dageurrotype versus calotype versus ambrotype versus wet collodion, it's all been said before - oh and photography versus painting? That one rages on still!
Let's leave it at this: do you take photos or do you make them?
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Pook
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Arkady said:
That pretty much sums it up, yes.
Why state whether it's a wet process image, or digital? Why make a distinction? Personally, I never put any details with my work at all. People who give you a list of aperture, shutter speed, lens used etc are just too obsessed with equipment. I can't even REMEMBER what I used.. does it matter? If I wanted to take teh same shot again, the numbers would be different anyway, so why bother writing them down, or downloading them?
It's all about the image... how you got there is completely irrelevant.
As a late entrant to this thread I'd like to add my 2 cents...
I think there are two ways to present an image/photograph - honestly or dishonestly. Honestly means it's been developed and processed either in a darkroom or with software to obtain an image that's not meant to deceive. That can mean that a photograph can be heavily manipulated, or not, just as long as no-one's in any doubt about what's been done. Dishonestly is when an image has been manipulated and presented as not having been.
I think there are two ways to present an image/photograph - honestly or dishonestly. Honestly means it's been developed and processed either in a darkroom or with software to obtain an image that's not meant to deceive. That can mean that a photograph can be heavily manipulated, or not, just as long as no-one's in any doubt about what's been done. Dishonestly is when an image has been manipulated and presented as not having been.
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Steve
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Adrian said:
Either way its still an image though and one that has been captured, edited and made to be the best it can to follow the photographer's vision? Ther is no dishonesty there, just niavity.
CT
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LOL. I haven't read all the thread so forgive me if I'm repeating anything. These 'purist' arguments make me smile. Ansell Adams the American landscape photographer, who conceived the zone metering system to try to achieve perfection in his work, was as pedantic as it gets, but he still spent many many hours dodging, burning and manipulating various areas of his prints in the darkroom to achieve the results he wanted. The man is quite rightly revered as a landscape artist, but I'd bet my last cent that if he was still around today he'd be using Photoshop and loving it. Beethoven and Bach, I'm quite certain, would have a modern synthesiser, recognizing at once their potential for creativity.
Photoshop, PSP etc, are quite simply digital darkrooms, which now give the photographer a creative freedom he could never have dreamed of just a relatively few years ago. Whether you love or hate their work, there's no doubting that Cartier-Bresson, David Bailey and others possessed an ability given to few of us in being able to choose that 'decisive' moment and having the 'eye' to see the shot. I long ago reconciled myself to the fact that I don't have it, so I'll take all the help I can get.
It's the print we look at in the end, and many of those have hitherto owed as much to manipulation on the enlarger baseboard or in the developing tray, as they have to the photographer's choices at the time of capture. If you have a digital camera and you aren't getting to grips with one of the better photo editing packages, you are severely restricted in your ability to produce good work. You should certainly strive to produce the best pictures you can from your camera, but to consider them a finished work at that stage with the tools now at your disposal denies you a great deal of the creatvity and control now available, which is why you went digital inthe first place.
Photoshop, PSP etc, are quite simply digital darkrooms, which now give the photographer a creative freedom he could never have dreamed of just a relatively few years ago. Whether you love or hate their work, there's no doubting that Cartier-Bresson, David Bailey and others possessed an ability given to few of us in being able to choose that 'decisive' moment and having the 'eye' to see the shot. I long ago reconciled myself to the fact that I don't have it, so I'll take all the help I can get.
It's the print we look at in the end, and many of those have hitherto owed as much to manipulation on the enlarger baseboard or in the developing tray, as they have to the photographer's choices at the time of capture. If you have a digital camera and you aren't getting to grips with one of the better photo editing packages, you are severely restricted in your ability to produce good work. You should certainly strive to produce the best pictures you can from your camera, but to consider them a finished work at that stage with the tools now at your disposal denies you a great deal of the creatvity and control now available, which is why you went digital inthe first place.
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Pook
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Adrian said:
I disagree. I often shoot the model in the studio, and then add a previously shot background. Why is this cheating? It's actually more difficult! I have to re-create whatever lighting was present at the time of shooting the background, and get everything to match.
I do this because it's cheaper than getting the model to travel to the location, which is often remote, or difficult to access. I would also have to pay to get the make-up artist and stylist there too. It's a financial reasonong, nothing more.
Is THIS cheating?
Just one of many of the images currently on my website that are a digital composite.
If if is cheating in your mind.. what for? It's just a girl lying on a bench... why would I bother to shoot her seperately from the background unless I had no choice? It's not deceiving anyone... it's not like I have tried to lie about shooting a captive animal in the wild or anything. Furthermore, what I've done there requires more skill than shooting it straight... not only in Photoshop, but in camera as well, as it requires a huge understanding of lighting for me to accurately re-create the lighting in the studio that EXACTLY matches the available light in the background. In what way would it be MORE skillful to just have her there at the time, and get her to lie on the bench? Don't you think if I had that option I would have done so? I promise you it would have been FIFTY times easier.
Cheating? Oh I think not.
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I've found this a fascinating thread and have been keeping an eye on it as it's grown.
When I first started digital photography I was loathe to alter the picture in any way because I felt it reflected badly on my picture taking - if I needed to alter it then I was taking poor pictures, and all that. It didn't take me long to discover that PSP and the other photo tools really can help make even good pictures (not that I take very many of them, lol) that little bit better. I don't know the half of what PSP can do, and I'm certainly not in Pook's league, but I like having PSP and I wouldn't be scared of trying it out on photos, even just for fun.
When I first started digital photography I was loathe to alter the picture in any way because I felt it reflected badly on my picture taking - if I needed to alter it then I was taking poor pictures, and all that. It didn't take me long to discover that PSP and the other photo tools really can help make even good pictures (not that I take very many of them, lol) that little bit better. I don't know the half of what PSP can do, and I'm certainly not in Pook's league, but I like having PSP and I wouldn't be scared of trying it out on photos, even just for fun.
Pook said:Adrian said:
I disagree. I often shoot the model in the studio, and then add a previously shot background. Why is this cheating? It's actually more difficult! I have to re-create whatever lighting was present at the time of shooting the background, and get everything to match.
I do this because it's cheaper than getting the model to travel to the location, which is often remote, or difficult to access. I would also have to pay to get the make-up artist and stylist there too. It's a financial reasonong, nothing more.
Is THIS cheating?
Just one of many of the images currently on my website that are a digital composite.
If if is cheating in your mind.. what for? It's just a girl lying on a bench... why would I bother to shoot her seperately from the background unless I had no choice? It's not deceiving anyone... it's not like I have tried to lie about shooting a captive animal in the wild or anything. Furthermore, what I've done there requires more skill than shooting it straight... not only in Photoshop, but in camera as well, as it requires a huge understanding of lighting for me to accurately re-create the lighting in the studio that EXACTLY matches the available light in the background. In what way would it be MORE skillful to just have her there at the time, and get her to lie on the bench? Don't you think if I had that option I would have done so? I promise you it would have been FIFTY times easier.
Cheating? Oh I think not.
I think you've missed my point entirely
- You've created an image - honestly. How you did that is irrelevant but to me that's an honest studio image. To my mind, a dishonest image is where the photographer/artist deliberately sets out to misrepresent the image - a good example is your own - photographing captive animals and then claiming the shoot was done in the wild. As my post said, "a photograph can be heavily manipulated, or not, just as long as no-one's in any doubt about what's been done" and in the case of your photograph, if you hadn't told me it was a studio composite, I don't think that I would have thought it was anything but. We all see hundreds of very cleverly manipulated images every day, in print or on screen and I don't think any of them are dishonest (other than those depicting food perhaps). What I don't like to see are images that are being presented as photographs which represent a real event or moment in time, that have significant features added or removed (such as a full moon).
CT
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Pook said:
I get this a lot with my restoration stuff.
Often it's a lot easier for me to shoot a new background for a badly damaged picture, than spend hours laboriously pushing pixels around trying to restore a background which is too far gone. Damaged hands, feet etc can often be cloned from other pics to save a valued family treasure which is near to disintegration, and which would otherwise be lost. I also get asked to remove people from photos or clone people in for a variety of reasons.
I recently was asked to remove a groom from his first wedding shot of the bride and groom and place him into his more recent 2nd wedding photo, because he liked tthe suit he was wearing in the first one! :shock:
It's never easy just dropping people into backgrounds, the direction and quality of light, not to mention grain structure, has to be the same in each shot, and even then it usually involves a lot of tedious work to make the finished result believable.
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Pook
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Adrian said:I think you've missed my point entirely
Ok fair point.... and I do have a history of flying off the handle whenever this crops up. Fact is tho, there are people out there... LOTS of them, that still think that way. The fact is, things move on... we're all, almost exclusively digital now. With that comes the ability to do things that would otherwise be impossible, or at best, very troublesome. Sure, this can open up the floodgates for forgeries, and dishonest work, but when it comes to art, what's honest anyway? Ever seen a sunset as wonderful as those in a Monet painting? Nope.. me neither.. they don't exist. Do we call Monet a cheat? Do we buggery. Why are photographers who manipuilate cheats? Answer: They're not. They're just creating an image. SOmeone cited Mann Ray as an example earlier... and that pleased me, because what he did was not exactly "honest" either, nor was what Edward Weston did, and as I've said elsewhere in this thread.. Ansel Adams himself... the ultimate cheat! Still a damned fine photographer, and printer, despite the fact that all his images are more manipulated than mine are!! and THAT'S saying something.
The fact is, so long as all the hard work is done in camera, and your just joining things together, then it's hardly new.. it's called Photomontage, and it's been around as long as photography has. It's no more honest if you use pieces of paper and glue you know!
No one disputes that LYING in photo journalism and wildlife etc is wrong... of course it is.. but this has always been the case, not just now we're digital.
Art is art.. images are images.. and so long as the truth isn't important (news, reportage etc) then how honest an image is, is completely imaterial.
Too tired to spell check... just done a 12 hour day... shattered!
CT
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There was a photo on the front of one of the photo mags years ago, I think it was AP, of a silhouetted cheetah in a tree, standing over the also sihouetted body of a dead gazelle hanging from a branch. Behind the silhouette was one of those huge Moons which showed it had been shot through a very long tele lens, probably 1000mm or more. It was a very impressive and striking picture. When you actually considered the logistics of lining up that shot and the distances involved, not to mention getting the cheetah to arrive on cue with a dead gazelle, drag it into the tree and pose nicely, you wondered instantly about it's authenticity. I dismissed it as a montage, but one that had been rather well done.
The letters began of course questioning the shot, and eventually the author stated he'd nailed the gazelle up in the tree to bait the cheetah and that the shot was otherwise not manipulated in any way. I don't think he'd ever lied about the shot, he'd simply not been asked.
Was he cheating?
The letters began of course questioning the shot, and eventually the author stated he'd nailed the gazelle up in the tree to bait the cheetah and that the shot was otherwise not manipulated in any way. I don't think he'd ever lied about the shot, he'd simply not been asked.
Was he cheating?
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Pook
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CT said:
If I remember, it was lit by waving a 3 cell maglite at it mid exposure... LOL Not very scientific, I know... but after a while, you get used to knowing how much light something needs during a ling exposure. Light meters are useless past a few seconds anyway, and as that was a 10 minute exposure (yes.. Maria, the model really DID stay ROCK still for 10 minutes) it was all a matter of experience, and of course, bracketing.. shooting C41 helped as well, as slide film would have been too much of a pain. The neg was slightly thin, but perfectly scannable.
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Pook
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CT said:
Damned right... main light source.. A CANDLE... don;t come much more low-tech than THAT!
