Comments on: Is Photo Manipulation Bad For Photography?

By: C. Palmieri

C. Palmieri — Thu, 29 Oct 2009 18:30:41 +0000

Who’s to say that the images he (ed freeman) makes isn’t his truth. This is how he sees the world in front of him. He is simply showing us-who don’t see things the way he does-his reality. Hence the saying “the artist’s vision.”It isn’t a lie. To him surfing might look as magical and unreal as we see in his images. Sometimes its best we set aside our logic/critical thinking, take a step back, and let our imagination flow. “Imagination is more important than knowledge. For knowledge is limited to all we now know and understand, while imagination embraces the entire world, and all there ever will be to know and understand.” – Albert Einstein

By: October always kills me « Central Illinois Photoblog

October always kills me « Central Illinois Photoblog — Mon, 05 Oct 2009 13:37:51 +0000

[...] and purveyour of the fine blog A Photo Editor, always tries to mess with my brain. He wrote a short article for the Photography Issue of Outside magazine that just came out – and he really, really makes one think about truth in photography. The [...]

By: Laurent

Laurent — Sat, 03 Oct 2009 11:42:01 +0000

Agree with Christopher-
Think there is a difference in pushing contrast and existing colors and adding colors and manipulating the image with colors and objects not initially present.
In traditional photography the film type, printing,lighting ect will change the images final look and that will belong to the eye of the beholder. Take James Natchwey in war photographer as he pushes the contrast on his serbian photographs in the film War Photographer .. the photography is real and present but the angle and choice of printing and contrast is his personal vision-who is to judge as it certainly was not as dark as it was when he shot it…but what is clear he would not add something that was not there.

Reg raw images the choice of lens, camera, aperture ect will create a different raw so again real vs not real is not relevant until foreign colors/objects are added.

So i support the ability to push the contrast and present color ( wether during shooting or post ( for final print or digital output )as long as the actually subject is not manipulated and then called real.

Photography is a means of expression and storytelling…question is where the story is real or not… not the depth of present color or contrast .

By: Christopher Bush

Christopher Bush — Sat, 26 Sep 2009 04:18:16 +0000

I also think it’s important to reject the idea that all photographic controls distort reality. In a sense, it’s true, but there is a huge and fundamental difference between aspects of a photo that are variable and subjective by the nature of the medium, and those that are actual distortions of a photo’s content. Like, adjusting contrast to make a pleasing print, versus cloning out a pimple. i would never do the latter.

By: Christopher Bush

Christopher Bush — Sat, 26 Sep 2009 04:10:48 +0000

My feeling is that altering the content of a photo would destroy the whole excitement and attraction that I have to photography in the first place. And since I only shoot people, I would feel very rude altering their image.

By: cellardoor

cellardoor — Wed, 23 Sep 2009 05:47:38 +0000

We all know nothing is real, reality is built upon perception. Photography or art in general is simply a means of communicating existence. Once a thought leaves the mind it becomes objectified, so in a way to create anything is in fact a form of manipulating it. The truth is there is nothing pure, everything is slanted or biased to a certain degree. It’s just human nature. The art of being able to understand creation or the critique as it is commonly referred to is the only way to subjectively debate the boundaries of acceptability in the art world. The same applies for the world of photography and journalism, it can be applied to many other fields and applications as well. Knowing is one thing, understanding is another. Excellent article Rob, thank you. More like this in the future?

By: Bob

Bob — Tue, 22 Sep 2009 17:33:23 +0000

Coming in a bit late here…

Good piece, Rob. Thank you.

Digital is NOT photography!
Digital has evolved into it’s own separate medium. Digital may use lenses and cameras similar to photography, but just as cinema evolved out of photography digital too is now it’s own medium.

http://www.newsweek.com/id/73349
http://www.imx.nl/photo/Analysis/Analysis/page106.html

On an emotional level, the psyche will often reject changes in culture/technology if they develop too fast. I don’t believe the popularity of reality based (simple, seemingly unsophisticated) images, art, culture is coincidental to the development of digital. More the (pendulum) swing of the psyche.

By: Susan Kolbe

Susan Kolbe — Tue, 22 Sep 2009 17:19:27 +0000

@Laragene, There’s what happened. Then there’s what I said happened and what you said happened. Be it the experience, or the telling of if in words or pictures, perception is in the mind of beholder.

By: ronnie pettit

ronnie pettit — Tue, 22 Sep 2009 15:27:56 +0000

i love these “no right answer” discussions.
i do sort of live under a rock so it may be common knowledge, but i heard a public radio interview with a guy that has developed software that sniffs out manipulated photographs. i wonder if that is what the future holds for those submitting work for publication?

all the distraction and diversion creates the un-focus for people like me, nobody’s out in nowhere-ville to seek our niches to devour.

everyone has a motive. no inventor is successful without first a motive for creation. in the mid 80’s my photo proff humiliated me in front of a class when i submitted a lousy unlit protrait for critique. he demanded that i write in my journal 10 times. “photography is about light.”
photography is about light. photography is about light photography is about lightphotographyisaboutlight….

25 or so years later i can sometimes be heard, as i contemplate a landscape, or portrait…saying out loud….”photography is about light.”

By: Frank Reid

Frank Reid — Mon, 21 Sep 2009 15:43:39 +0000

I had to chuckle when I read this piece as it reflects the same arguments made during the 1940’s, ’50’s and ’60’s. I started about then and quickly found that modifying the black and white negative or photo was very common indeed. Although it wasn’t discussed openly, most photographers simply did whatever was necessary to produce the picture needed. This was mostly for newspapers but a lot for magazines, too. Nothing has changed and, of course, nothing will change just because another generation has discovered this practice. I’m of the modify-it school and my daughter in Minnesota is of the don’t-modify-anything crowd. If the photo shows a politician or celebrity with a tree branch in the background appearing to go up his or her nose it should be left that way, she would say. I would rather present people at their best. Just my six cents (sixth sense) worth.

By: Laragene

Laragene — Mon, 21 Sep 2009 14:05:08 +0000

@Jacques, I love the way you describe this. Wonder where the illusion begins and ends.

By: Jacques

Jacques — Mon, 21 Sep 2009 07:56:13 +0000

@Laragene,

Very interesting answer from you; thanks for sharing.

My perception and your perception of the same place and time may not be the same, based on our own internal filters and colouring of experiences.

The way I see it on a higher level, is that everything is basically an illusion, a hologram, of what not is. This outwardly hologram is shaped by us internally, and we do so based on how we see our selves and how we feel about ourselves. An analogy for this is when one look into a mirror and see messy hair. When we wish to straighten our hair, we do not comb the mirror, we comb our own hair and then the mirror will reflect this change. So too with moments (holographic projections from within us), when we see or experience something we do not like, we only need to change something within ourselves with this outer hologram to change too.

A photo taken of such a moment only reflects a part of the illusion as it was at that moment, so when we look at photos, we look at snap-shots of illusions. So when someone manipulates a photo, the illusion is merely changed with another illusion. Of course, what is important, is that we incorrectly choose to be affected by illusions, and this is why we need to be very weary of such untruths. Here is a short compilation of people touching on this matter:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aYyFmllA29M

By: Sully

Sully — Mon, 21 Sep 2009 04:31:20 +0000

I believe that it matters more on how the photo (or photo manipulation) is presented.

If you use it the intention of representing truth then it becomes nothing more than propaganda.
If the purpose is to illustrate (concept) an idea without the intention of presenting truth (reality) then it is a creative expression or interpretation.
What needs to be asked is…Is the intent reality or concept? Then at what point should we stop correcting reality? Does it stop at smoothing skin tone or should it stop at making a figure more trim?

Either way it is a personal question that each Photographer, Art Director, Art Buyer or Retoucher must ask them self. At what point do we stop at in presenting truth.
-sorry to wax philosophically
-Sully

By: dining room furnitur

dining room furnitur — Mon, 21 Sep 2009 02:03:35 +0000

Photography is an art and art as a whole does not display reality. Photographers are not really accountable for the public’s belief but they must be responsible enough to justify it.

By: Daniel

Daniel — Sun, 20 Sep 2009 23:10:57 +0000

It looks as if many of the fans here,that adhere to post production manipulation need to classify their work differently.This way consumers and artist will not be confused with their purist brethren.I believe this is Rob”s point.
A new class for these photographer painters who are enhancing-changing-adding-deleting-etc,,,Should be “PHOTO-PAINTERS”.They are something other than photographers,yet fall short of being painters.
Photo-Painters are neither male,or female.Asexual in creativity.They swing both ways when needed.
Remember the Hippies?How about the Yuppies?But,who were the ones between the two?They are a lost group and not to be remembered.Tweeners, always are.
Well,the “Photo-Painters”, would be the Tweeners of our era.Their glory and success will always be associated with a group of software photoshop techies who impregnated these tweenie photographers with little weenie light that they could not find for themselves.
Now,lets not forget that the “Tweener Photo-Painter” has nothing to be ashamed of.They should be proud of their shared work.After all,when was the last time you found a group of 50 something odd CS4 PS personel software guru”s adopting frustrated field photographers?
One other note.I would beg to see Mr.Feldman”s,Bloom,Art Wolfie,Peter Lik”s disclosures of how he created his “Photo-Paintings”.You say,”Disclosures?”Yes!They are required for any fine art photograph.Why?Because,history is replete with tweeners that just don”t quite belong and need policing.
Please remember,sharing is nice!

By: The Art of Manipulation « A Morton Photog

The Art of Manipulation « A Morton Photog — Sun, 20 Sep 2009 22:33:57 +0000

[...] brought this all back for me was an interesting article by Rob Haggart “Is Photo Manipulation Bad for Photography”. Haggart says that people believe photos never lie and in manipulating them we are abusing this [...]

By: CH

CH — Sun, 20 Sep 2009 21:15:49 +0000

photoshopped work is fine, just label it as that, in other words if Ed Freeman’s and others photos are a “lie” in the sense that the scene is not as they saw it, just call them photo-illustrations and move on…its not that big a deal and the public will catch up when they repeatedly see the words photo-illustration underneath what they thought was a “photograph”…eventually realizing that all that appears to be an image is not necessarily the scene as is was before the camera…its up to the photographers to be honest in calling it like it is – a photograph or a photo-illustration (or whatever terms we want to create to mean one without manipulation and one with manipulation)

so perhaps we have to quit demonizing those who manipulate images and encourage them to just tell us so

I personally want to see images that are “real” or as true to the scene as they can be but I have no problem with manipulation as long as you tell me it is

when I shoot assignments I submit images that are of the scene – they look like what I saw – and if the client, editorial or otherwise – wants to manipulate them so be it, I hate sitting on my ass in front of the computer and would rather be “out there” photographing anyway

By: Laragene

Laragene — Sun, 20 Sep 2009 20:33:10 +0000

@Jacques,
I think that we have been living with the false illusion that photos were a representation of reality for too long anyway. Perhaps our perception is due for an upgrade. Published books on historical events, written accounts of events surely faced the same criticism. Were the personal written accounts, that were rewritten, published and then trusted as truth anymore true. It might be a good thing to let go of our reliance on media as a representation of factual information. It all goes back to integrity and defining trusted sources for factual information. Whose account of the day in the park is more “true”, the one taken with the photograph, the one painted by Seurat, the one we capture in our heart colored by our perception of the day in the moment or the written account of the author. Perhaps the only real truth is in the moment and it is only true to us. The view of the beautiful park from that of the family on their first picnic after a long week in the city, may be very different from the viewpoint of the homeless man who has woken from his sleep facing another day without. The picture has never been true, it has always been out of context, it is only a story told by the viewer and his experience in the moment and it is only one single frame captured in a multitude of frames that can never take in the whole experience. It is always upon the storyteller, the artist, and the photographer to represent his or her idea in a single frame or collection of words, sounds or color and line. Though there is not a replica of the whole reality, there is an opportunity to reflect on oneself through the story of another.

By: PDN Yeah Right

PDN Yeah Right — Sun, 20 Sep 2009 00:32:53 +0000

@rob g, I think PDN has an obligation to take a lead role in this discussion.

PDN’s lead role is promoting products featured within PDN and/or raving about their flavor of the month?

I would not look to PDN for any sort of leadership or guidance.

By: rob g

rob g — Sat, 19 Sep 2009 20:15:14 +0000

Great post Rob, and i think you know which side of this debate i fall on. Much as i admire the beautiful visual quality to ed freeman’s surfing images, composite work such as this, is clearly photo- illustration in my mind. I was in New York this past week, and after having read your post, i started to notice the constant scene of tourists taking pictures of the Empire State Building. Why? Other than for their own personal collection, i think people do this to show as evidence to their friends back home “hey, look where i was!” Photography at it’s core has an integrity intrinsically linked to the ‘truth’. That is why it’s such a powerful and TRUSTED media. We can create photoshopped composite images, but lets call them what they are from the outset; photo- illustrations, whilst maintaining the integrity of original photography at the same time. I personally believe respected bodies such as PDN really dropped the ball earlier this year by making Ed Freeman’s images a marquee piece for their annual, while neglecting to label them as such, or judge them in a specifically separate category. I think PDN has an obligation to take a lead role in this discussion.

By: Brad Trent

Brad Trent — Sat, 19 Sep 2009 14:34:06 +0000

So on the same day that you ask if photo manipulation is bad for photography, I went to the Avedon show at ICP and given the number of his montages that were featured in the exhibit….

http://cyanatrendland.com/wp-content/uploads/2009/05/avedon-fashion-7.jpg

I hafta ask…is this bad for photography? I mean, it’s not ‘real’ and it’s totally manipulated……

It’s already been pointed out, but I’m so over this subject. I have a problem if you’re removing the third guy to the left of Stalin, or if you retouch a pair of ugly-ass shoes onto OJ’s feet, but for all the rest I say have at it and Photoshop away!

By: Fotografo Matrimonio

Fotografo Matrimonio — Sat, 19 Sep 2009 13:30:38 +0000

Usually there are two religions about this topic.

Well I believe that photography is not reality and that photo manipulation is not bad… BUT used in editorial photography photo manipulation could be dangerous becausea lot of people still believe that photography = reality… So it’s important to use it with warning.

By: Michael O'Leary

Michael O'Leary — Sat, 19 Sep 2009 13:24:19 +0000

I like the thought of entering a new age of photography with both fiction and non-fiction. Certainly credible news organizations like The Times need to be careful to keep their photo credibility, however it would be a shame if photog’s weren’t able to enhance their images. I think of painting skies blue along the same lines of using a vivid film stock instead of a neutral stock. We may begin to see more of this happening in the camera before the data is written to the file if we don’t allow them some freedom’s. Additionally, law enforcement uses some software to prove the legitimacy of the unaltered images they use in court of crime scene’s and such. I forget the name of the software.

-Michael Patrick O’Leary [fiction-photographer]

By: Mark M

Mark M — Sat, 19 Sep 2009 07:47:49 +0000

It’s interesting to watch somebody in a gallery or museum first approach a photo-realistic painting they’ve never seen. They stare at it, get close, kind of squint and then inevitably the first thing they ask is, “is this a painting or a photo?” Why do they care? Regardless of its pedigree, it’s obviously art, not journalism. They care because they view and react to the two media very differently. And this gets to what I read as one of the main points of this article, which is more or less being ignored in the comments: photography creates expectations in the viewer (whether or not it’s in a journalistic context) that there is a connection with reality – that you can look at a photo and say, ‘this REALLY happened.’ Sometimes the scene is so removed from our everyday life that we are astounded – like blue whales swimming, or people literally wasting away from starvation, or war. Sometimes it’s just a little detail that connects us to the scene – Roland Barthes’ punctum. When artists take works and presents them as photographs they are depending on the viewer to connect with the work as if what’s in the frame is what was before the camera. If Ed Freeman were a photorealistic painter and presented his images exactly as they are but as paintings, the viewer would be very impressed with his technical skills and that’s probably all, but by presenting them as photographs the viewer looks in astonishment at the world before them, that these things happen and this man captured it. And it’s a deception, the success of which depends on the attitude of the audience toward photography.

I hate to be basically paraphrasing the article everyone here just read, but I am really surprised that the comments are all latching on to the distinction between how we label and use photography and missing the deeper problem that effects the entire medium.

For instance in answer to BCD’s question, “what is so wrong with NOT manipulating the image, with telling the truth as it happened? ” The answer is that they can’t find a marketplace among the manipulated ones, not in galleries, not in magazines, not even on Flickr. Go out and take some real photos of surfers and put them on the desk of an editor next to Ed Freeman’s. Freeman’s gets picked up — the truth as it happened is just not exciting as fiction.

The people ready to cast all not-journalistic photography into the same bucket other artistic media should stop and ask why photography has become so ubiquitous. Why would we rather see photos from a court scene rather than the sketch artist’s work? Why is painting of underwater life not as fascinating as a photo? Why do advertisers use photos to manipulate our desires instead of drawings? Photography is different than art and those differences are the reason it is so powerful. As the ease of manipulation erodes those differences, we lose so much makes photographs interesting.

By: Just visiting

Just visiting — Sat, 19 Sep 2009 02:46:51 +0000

@Brad Wenner,

I took a look at your online portfolio. All of your images are staged, produced and enhanced.

I don’t think you have a dog in this fight.

There is an incredible world out there that is exquisite in its own right. If you can get it on film (or digital) without manipulating the image later, why not get it without faking it.

By: Ben Madden

Ben Madden — Sat, 19 Sep 2009 02:42:21 +0000

“When people see an amazing photograph for the first time they usually ask, “is it real?” The answer should be yes.”

That is such a good point. People do ask exactly that.

By: Trudy

Trudy — Sat, 19 Sep 2009 02:18:41 +0000

@c.d.embrey, I didn’t suggest that photographs for reporting are art as I specifically stated “certainly photographs for the purpose of evidence and photojournalism would want to steer clear of artistic changes/editing…” in my original post. Portraits were only an example I used when discussing the idea of “fiction/non-fiction photography.” I just think it is interesting that no other art is be expected to be reality’s “mirror” except photography. I am speaking of the entire form of photography, not individual portraits or any other genre within it.

By: BCD

BCD — Fri, 18 Sep 2009 23:50:33 +0000

How about this: if it is editorial then you limit yourself to burning, dodging, and color correction.

Hell on my first NGS assignment, my illustrations editor gave me grief for using a polarizing filter on a 400mm lens to darken a sky.

Editorial you have to adhere to the truth. No other way.

If it is illustration or advertising, it is fine to make changes or retouch.

For magazine work: what is so wrong with NOT manipulating the image, with telling the truth as it happened? Are people so tied up in the “production” of the image and of photoshopping everything to death in an attempt to make the image perfect that in the process you lose any resemblance to reality.

I bet you half or more of the people reading this forum could not properly expose a roll of Kodachrome and get it right. Do you know how to use a hand-held meter? Do you really know how to judge and interpret a scene so that you have a know exactly how it is going to look without chimping? If all you have ever shot is digital, of course you think everything is up for grabs and it is ok to make a few changes, clone something over this or that, change the smile or liquify a face a bit.

What the hell ever happened to the craft of photography?

Editorial is NOT ADVERTISING. Even though advertisers are trying to push content, a story is a story, not product placement and not the place to change out skies, add a zebra to landscape or clean-up a streetscape.

By: c.d.embrey

c.d.embrey — Fri, 18 Sep 2009 23:35:31 +0000

@Trudy, Portraits may be an art form, but reportage photos should not be art — just reality.

BTW not all portraits are an art form, just look at you drivers license!

By: c.d.embrey

c.d.embrey — Fri, 18 Sep 2009 23:28:40 +0000

@Brad Wenner, Why is it arbitrary? If something is “reportage” it should show reality. Where you place the subject in the frame has psychological implications. And shooting someone in backlight is different than them squinting because they are looking into the sun — but both are real.

Back in the 1970s Campbell Soups got caught putting marbles in the soup bowls for TV commercials. The marbles made it appear that there were more vegetables in the soup. The Feds said you can’t do that and made laws to protect the public.