20% photo 80% photo-shop

[dxqcanada]

Photography is Art ?

doubleyouwhy! » Photographer, Andrea Galvani

 

[flea77]

For example, this is an image i took. What kind of post processing (if any at all) do you think went into it?

Regards,
Jake

Turns out this is actually five raw images merged in photomatix, then edited to b&w in lr3, then levels contrast etc was all edited from there. What i am getting at is if someone is proficient at photoshop and editing, its nigh impossible to truly tell the extent of their post processing. Are you sure it was added? How can you prove it? And what does it matter? If it were good enough to win a contest, i can imagine its not "shoddy" editing. Can we see an example of your graphic art winners that arent really photographs?

Regards,
Jake

Sorry, going to have to call you on this one.

1) Look at the knots on the rafters, see how they just jump out and almost look like bruises? Classic HDR.
2) Look at the light coming in the window for direction and the difference between the light below the window and the light on the bright objects, classic HDR.
3) Look at the screen pattern, dead give away for digital.
4) Look at the conduit on the right top rafter as it goes towards the center of the image, bad digital artifacts.
5) Zoom in to any point in the image, no grain structure.

Now don't get me wrong, I have indeed seem images that I could not tell, and some that fooled me. Typically those artists spend litterally days on each frame, and they were dang good.

Also don't take this as an insult. I rather like your image, but it never even gave me a second's pause in declaring it a photoshop job.

Allan

 

[Buckster]

not good exsamples, but can't get to the site I was looking at at home.

I would agree - They're not good examples. I can easily see how to create either of them in the camera without a need to shop them.

For the first, place a glass pane between the model and the camera, then spatter and finger paint to taste, then shoot the image.

For the second, apply makeup, adjust lighting appropriately, then shoot.

None of this is new. Photographers have been using creative methods like that for more than half a century - long before Photoshop came along.

 

[SlickSalmon]

Sounds like we're discussing two different versions of what it means to 'photoshop'. I attended a show-and-tell recently where one of the presenters displayed one of those garish, over-the-top Photomatix HDR painterly effect things and got rave reviews. That's the sort of post-processing that I think the OP was objecting to, and I agree that it's taking over.

The photo by Jake (above) is something quite different, however. Here he's just using technology to render a difficult-to-render subject. It's difficult to render those kind of shadow values with standard digital technique because of the noise problem. Although to a trained eye the image is clearly HDR, I think it's firmly in the tradition established by Ansel Adams and others of just trying to capture the dynamic range of the scene. In fact, Jake's image is less manipulated than some of Adams work. If you've ever seen a straight print of "Moonrise over Hernandez" you know what I mean.

 

[myshkin]

I do a lot of HDR and still think the photo is the biggest factor. I see people who are great at processing and take their photos through 5-6 programs. They know all the tricks yet their photos are no good because they never learned composition and how to take a good photo in the first place

 

[Buckster]

Sounds like we're discussing two different versions of what it means to 'photoshop'. I attended a show-and-tell recently where one of the presenters displayed one of those garish, over-the-top Photomatix HDR painterly effect things and got rave reviews. That's the sort of post-processing that I think the OP was objecting to, and I agree that it's taking over.

That's not what her text or sample images implied.

The photo by Jake (above) is something quite different, however. Here he's just using technology to render a difficult-to-render subject. It's difficult to render those kind of shadow values with standard digital technique because of the noise problem. Although to a trained eye the image is clearly HDR, I think it's firmly in the tradition established by Ansel Adams and others of just trying to capture the dynamic range of the scene. In fact, Jake's image is less manipulated than some of Adams work. If you've ever seen a straight print of "Moonrise over Hernandez" you know what I mean.

Indeed. This type of work on photos has been going on for far longer than personal computers have even been around. It was all invented by the photo pioneers in darkrooms, including HDR, over the past century or so. While computers and Photoshop makes it something nearly anyone can do now, there's very little that can be done with Photoshop that talented photographers couldn't do and haven't done for going on a hundred years now.

And I'm still not buying the claim that photo contest winning shots are 80% Photoshopped. That claim seems based on some vague idea that they seem too good to be true, or perhaps the persons who make such claims can't figure out how to do it themselves without resorting to 80% Photoshopping.

Maybe my problem is that I've studied too much of the "old school" ways that great photographers of the past pulled off incredible, unbelievable shots in the camera, just by using their brains to set up compositions before clicking the shutter. Of course, my studies in that regard began long before the invention of the home computer or Photoshop, and that's what they had to work with.

In combination with wet darkroom work they did to take it even further, they were still photographs made by photographers. Anyone who thinks "Moonrise over Hernandez" isn't a photo because Adam's manipulated it like crazy in the darkroom hasn't got a grasp of what photography actually is or what all's involved. (not saying you don't consider it a photo SlickSalmon - just making a generalized comment)

If someone produced the same photo today, they might well be accused of Photoshopping it. Some naysayers would accuse the photographer of shopping in the moon itself, among other things. They might claim it's no longer even a photo - because it's been so manipulated.

I say pish-posh to all that talk.

Home computers and Photoshop are simply the digital version of the wet darkroom, as modern DSLRs are the digital version of the analog cameras that preceded them. They've opened photo processing to the masses, but photo processing was already an important part of photography from the very first image made - the didn't invent it. They've streamlined the processes used by photographers over the past century or so - they didn't invent them.

They're nothing more than tools. Photographers have always used tools to make images during each step of the making of a photo; See Adams' "The Camera", "The Negative" and "The Print". Now we use modern tools to do the same stuff they did with the tools they had at the time, and that's really the only difference at all.

Some folks just need to catch up and get over it.

 

[kasperjd4]

I think the difference you're looking for is the difference between photoshopping and Pixel-pushing.

A lot of the photo's I have seen recently in magazine contests, as Buckster said, could have been done with a artistic touch and no PP other than lighting changes.

There was one on the cover of Photographers Foum :

This seems like simple photoshop with the red on her face and paint splatter on the background. I don't see how they could have gotten that color on her face and blended it into her hair that perfectly without photoshop. Or I just don't know how to apply makeup very well.

It is really hard to tell what people do. I just did a little zombie shoot all done with liquid latex and stage makeup, a lot of my friends thought it was photoshop.

I say it's whatever the person/client wants. If my client wants some insanely edited cool looking photograph, thats what I'll give them. If I want to turn in a photograph to a contest I'll do it however I feel is the best way to portray what I want to express.

 

[Village Idiot]

http://pfmagazine.com/wp-content/plugins/p-gallery/index.php?level=picture&id=5309#


not good exsamples, but can't get to the site I was looking at at home.

That could be done without any advanced photoshop techniques.

 

[Village Idiot]

Post good shops and info here:
http://www.thephotoforum.com/forum/...r-creative-edits-techniques-instructions.html

 

[MichiganFarts]

I wonder if the cavemen who drew on cave walls had drawing contests, and then got pissed when paper was invented 'cause their #$%* didn't look good anymore.

 

[Village Idiot]

I think the difference you're looking for is the difference between photoshopping and Pixel-pushing.

A lot of the photo's I have seen recently in magazine contests, as Buckster said, could have been done with a artistic touch and no PP other than lighting changes.

There was one on the cover of Photographers Foum :

This seems like simple photoshop with the red on her face and paint splatter on the background. I don't see how they could have gotten that color on her face and blended it into her hair that perfectly without photoshop. Or I just don't know how to apply makeup very well.

It is really hard to tell what people do. I just did a little zombie shoot all done with liquid latex and stage makeup, a lot of my friends thought it was photoshop.

I say it's whatever the person/client wants. If my client wants some insanely edited cool looking photograph, thats what I'll give them. If I want to turn in a photograph to a contest I'll do it however I feel is the best way to portray what I want to express.

That top of the face and hair can be done with makeup.

 

[kasperjd4]

That top of the face and hair can be done with makeup.

Good to know!! I guess I'm not as talented with makeup as I thought. I'll have to give this a try soon.

 

[thingsIsee]

http://www.1stwebdesigner.com/inspiration/65-very-creative-and-funny-photoshopped-images/

http://www.1stwebdesigner.com/inspiration/65-very-creative-and-funny-photoshopped-images/

Although these were properly identified and graphic art this is the type of things I am talking about as being called photography

 

[D-B-J]

not good exsamples, but can't get to the site I was looking at at home.

I'm sorry but i think that first one is amazing. Sure, not straight up photography, but still awesome.

 

[D-B-J]

For example, this is an image i took. What kind of post processing (if any at all) do you think went into it?

Regards,
Jake

Turns out this is actually five raw images merged in photomatix, then edited to b&w in lr3, then levels contrast etc was all edited from there. What i am getting at is if someone is proficient at photoshop and editing, its nigh impossible to truly tell the extent of their post processing. Are you sure it was added? How can you prove it? And what does it matter? If it were good enough to win a contest, i can imagine its not "shoddy" editing. Can we see an example of your graphic art winners that arent really photographs?

Regards,
Jake

Sorry, going to have to call you on this one.

1) Look at the knots on the rafters, see how they just jump out and almost look like bruises? Classic HDR.
2) Look at the light coming in the window for direction and the difference between the light below the window and the light on the bright objects, classic HDR.
3) Look at the screen pattern, dead give away for digital.
4) Look at the conduit on the right top rafter as it goes towards the center of the image, bad digital artifacts.
5) Zoom in to any point in the image, no grain structure.

Now don't get me wrong, I have indeed seem images that I could not tell, and some that fooled me. Typically those artists spend litterally days on each frame, and they were dang good.

Also don't take this as an insult. I rather like your image, but it never even gave me a second's pause in declaring it a photoshop job.

Allan

But it is not as obvious as some hdr's. All im trying to say is that its nigh impossible to know the extent of editing.

Regards,
Jake