A Manifesto

[amolitor]

I've been pondering the problem of new aesthetics, and new ways of seeing, and in general the future of photography. While I don't much like HDR, and I find the results to be often incomprehensible, it is clearly a strong candidate for truly new work. In this spirit, I offer up the following manifesto. You may not agree with it -- not all HDR need fall under this aesthetic, although equally clearly some HDR does fall under it.

Ignore this, mock it, ridicule it if you like. If there's something in it you can use, appropriate it and make it your own. It's yours, it's everyone's, to use, misuse, or discard as you see fit.

In this spirit:

​

MANIFESTO

We propose to do nothing less than to destroy light in photography. Not to literally eliminate it, but to eliminate its tyranny over the photographic image. We choose to reveal subjects, not to conceal. We choose to strip away, as far as possible, the shadows and the highlights, to nakedly reveal the structure and form of our subjects. To reveal form by placing texture against texture, color against color, tone against tone, rather than through the modeling effects of a strongly directional light.

Our ideals are the engineering drawing, the blueprint, the exploded view, the architectural plan. Ours is an era of technology, we choose to embrace the visual idioms of technology. We choose to fully reveal the structure and form of our subject, and by doing so, to fully reveal the idea of the subject, and our relationship to the subject. The form without the idea is of no interest to us.

The obliteration of light should never obliterate form, instead it should reveal and clarify form. This is no easy task. It requires careful attention to every detail, it requires a new way of seeing and thinking about imaging. It requires careful application of technology. The techniques of HDR are one way to realize this aesthetic, but there are other ways. One might also choose to reveal structure and form with many light sources, or with very long exposures, perhaps.

In all cases, the dominance of the directional light shall be crushed.

 

[Derrel]

I would truly love to mock this. I really would. Buuuut, it hits so damned close to the mark of real truth that mocking it would only make me look like a very foolish man. You have truly hit upon the unstated goal of many practitioners of the dark art of HDR-type tone mapping of images.

 

[amolitor]

I actually wrote this for my dumb blog, where I expand a little bit. I think I would hate the results of this, but I genuinely think it could be a real thing. If I was a young guy looking for an artistic voice, this is the kind of thing I'd be looking for -- and I might even DO it.

To an extent, it already exists, with the fashion/swimwear/playboy lighting model of "just stick strobes everyplace" look. I think it could be artistically interesting as an approach (although, again, I would probably hate it -- I'm old, I hate stuff, it's what I do

 

[Derrel]

I was thinking the SAME thing: that this might actually gain some of what is called "traction" in today's vernacular!!! zOMG!!!!! The mind boggles! I have not see your blog lately, but I know in the past you have mentioned "video game lighting", as well as "lighting from nowhere", and I have to say, you make very good keen observations with regard to how lighting of that type, the type of lighting seen in both video games, and in today's (often half-assed) fashion/editorial/advertising photography, has lead us to a point where the idea of old, of identifiable sources and directions of light, has been thrown out the window.

Photography died off a long time ago, in the opinion of me and many other thinkers. Today, what we really have in the main is "digital imaging". I differentiate between the two activities at an intellectual level, but in forum and everyday conversation, I often use the older term of photography when discussing "digital imaging". The new, heavily, heavily, heavily software-centric stuff we see in so many places today has some very serious issues with light and lighting. Increasingly we see positively preposterous lighting schemes, passed off as "good lighting".

Anyway...your manifesto is a fascinating concept, and I honestly think a very fine academic essay could be built around your manifesto's ideas!! And...your blog is not dumb. Your HAT might be, but your blog? Uh...no...

 

[Ysarex]

The problem with this is that it's an attack. It's sarcastically and ingenuously presented in the form of a manifesto. As a negative assault it isn't productive.

HDR/tone mapping is a new option that digital methods provide. It's in it's infancy and the photographic community is exploring it. That should be encouraged not assaulted. I'm also not a fan of over-processed, over-saturated, haloed and poorly executed tone mapped photos of which there are ample examples. At the same time I have seen some stunning and very exciting images come out of these new technologies. I look forward to seeing more and I'm excited by the potential and the promise of new directions. Patience will see what's valuable surface. There's lots of room in this world for different approaches and different media and modes of expression. One doesn't have to negate the other; directional light doesn't have to be crushed to make room for tone mapping. Paul Strand said it best: Whether a watercolor is inferior to an oil, or whether a drawing, an etching, or a photograph is not as important as either, is inconsequent. To have to despise something in order to respect something else is a sign of impotence.

Joe

 

[bs0604]

I was never interested in photography until I saw my first Topaz HDR image. HDR is just another art form. I don't particularly appreciate Rap music but I can understand how others might, and see it as just another art form of music, not meant to replace symphonic, jazz, or rock, but simply to add to the repetoire.

 

[amolitor]

The problem with this is that it's an attack. It's sarcastically and ingenuously presented in the form of a manifesto. As a negative assault it isn't productive.

This is completely false. You might read it as an attack if you like, but it is not intended as such, and I fail to see how it can easily be construed as an attack.

ETA: Let me expand on this slightly. When I wrote this piece, I had not one iota of thought of making an attack on HDR. I felt, instead, excited and pleased that I had found a way in which I might contribute an idea, in which I might in some small way point a way forward for these new visual ideas. I recognize fully that I would probably not like the results, and said as much, but there is much in art that I simultaneously dislike, and respect as art. Nothing would please me more than to have some cadre of photographers take up my manifesto, modify and bend it to their taste, and direct their vision with clarity and power along lines slightly related to what I have said here. While I might not like their work, I would be pleased that it exists, in the same way that, for exmple, I am pleased that cubism exists.

 

[KenC]

I didn't see it as an attack or as being sarcastic. Perhaps so many people on here are heavy on the sarcasm that we look for it everywhere.

 

[ClickAddict]

The first sentence "We propose to do nothing less than to destroy light in photography" is highly negative and sets the tone for the rest. The puropose might not be negative but the statement is. Kind of like saying "We freed all the slaves, by letting their captors meet their maker" vs "We killed all the captors to let the slaves go" Both have the same meaning but words such as "killed" vs "free" at the beginning really changes the tone of the sentence. "Destroy light" when Light is typically a symbol of good is almost pretty heavy on the attack side.

 

[ClickAddict]

Having said that, I still agree with his manifesto. :mrgreen: I just see where many would read it as sarcastic / attacking. (I did)

 

[Ysarex]

The problem with this is that it's an attack. It's sarcastically and ingenuously presented in the form of a manifesto. As a negative assault it isn't productive.

This is completely false. You might read it as an attack if you like, but it is not intended as such, and I fail to see how it can easily be construed as an attack.

ETA: Let me expand on this slightly. When I wrote this piece, I had not one iota of thought of making an attack on HDR. I felt, instead, excited and pleased that I had found a way in which I might contribute an idea, in which I might in some small way point a way forward for these new visual ideas. I recognize fully that I would probably not like the results, and said as much, but there is much in art that I simultaneously dislike, and respect as art. Nothing would please me more than to have some cadre of photographers take up my manifesto, modify and bend it to their taste, and direct their vision with clarity and power along lines slightly related to what I have said here. While I might not like their work, I would be pleased that it exists, in the same way that, for exmple, I am pleased that cubism exists.

It was easy to construe it as an attack, especially in light of your response to Derrel. "Crushing and destroying" isn't positive language:

"In all cases, the dominance of the directional light shall be crushed."
"We propose to do nothing less than to destroy light in photography."
"I'm old, I hate stuff, it's what I do ;-)"

Derrel's responses also provide support that what you offered was negative in intent -- he caught it as such; ".... you hit upon the unstated goal of many practitioners of the dark art of HDR-type tone mapping..."

I still read it as offered in a sarcastic and negative spirit.

Joe

 

[Derrel]

I did not see this as an attack either; it falls under the umbrella of photographic criticism and observation/commentary. Of course, I have been following amolitor's blog about photographic lighting trends,off and on, for a while now. In the posts he has done prior to this one, he has discussed multiple aspects of the many trends in photographic styles and lighting, photographic tropes, memes, and styles. Honestly, while this could be interpreted as an attack--at the very same time, it is also a VERY ACCURATE description of the net result that we see in oh-so-much HDR-type work today: a sense of light that emanates from God-only-knows-where... lighting that just seems to come from MULTIPLE sources..or from underneath...or which has been hit so damned hard with the Software Hammer that the finished results look absolutely IMPOSSIBLE given the laws of physics on this planet.

I think that amolitor's manifesto would make a great central theme in a lengthy essay. Of course, the HDR-type fanatics will condemn him. And will soundly curse his audacity to condemn their Software Hammer based religion. THis is similar to most manifestos: when a person of an opposing political or religious faith hears something he does not like, he immediately resorts to screaming at the top of his lungs that the other party is "A Communist!", or "a Socialist!" or, "A bloody liberal!", or a "Godd82n3ed freaking _________!".

The fact is, there's a massive mine full of nuggets in his manifesto...

 

[amolitor]

I still read it as offered in a sarcastic and negative spirit.

You are, of course, welcome to continue to do so.

I assert only that I did not offer it in a sarcastic or negative spirit, and note in passing that am more familiar with my own motivations than you are.

 

[Derrel]

My opinion is this: for a HUGE majority of HDR-type practitioners, it's much more about the process than about the picture. When anybody takes note of what this "process" does to the rendering of light,shadow, and tonal and color values, as these things are viewed in relation to the 1839 to 2004 traditions in traditional photography, the HDR crowd roars in disapproval, seemingly unable to comprehend that many viewers do not give two whits about how many hours they spent blending nine bracketed exposures together to make one "shot" when the picture was $h!++y to begin with...

Is my last statement an attack? Or just a deeply-held personal opinion based on having seen thousands of bad,meaningless HDR-type images slaved over by HDR fans?????

Of course, amolitor's manifesto is part of a much larger, and longer-lasting series of observations directed at SERIOUS thinking about photography and photo criticism. We'll call him the Susan Sontag of TPF...and as such, he's gonna' have a lot of people whining about what he has to say, and shouting him down...

 

[amolitor]

Let me expand a little more on these ideas, to support my bona fides here.

As I suggested, there is much work done with HDR which would not fall under the rubric of this manifesto. Very well. There is some work which is not HDR would would fall under the rubric of this manifesto. Very well.

For those interested in pursing these ideas with the camera and the computer, I will note that if you destroy light and eliminate its dominance in the image, then you must find other solutions to the problems solved by the presence of light and shadow in your photograph. It is this which renders so much HDR work a muddle -- the light IS crushed, but the result is a visual muddle since the problems solved by a directional strong light are not solved in these images. The forms and structures are not revealed, they are confused with one another. This is certainly not true of all HDRs.

I recall distinctly an HDR of one of Thomas Edison's lab in which the light was thoroughly destroyed, yet the masses of glassware, the benches, the complete sense of the laboratory was wonderfully present. I didn't *like* it, but it was a photograph with its own kind of excellence, and it surely revealed structure, it revealed form, and by GOD it revealed the idea of the laboratory, and really of all laboratories. How it managed this, I cannot really say, I don't recall it clear enough, only the impression it left is clear. If I could find it, I might present it as the archetype of the sort of thing I am talking about.

In the same way there are excellent figure studies made with "strobes all over the place" which crush light pretty thoroughly, and which have their own kind of excellence. Most of them are just cheesecake, but that's because they're just creating mass market photos of hot chicks. There's nothing about the method which precludes brilliant and powerful work.