Does anyone do "as shot" photos any more?

[markjwyatt]

I think there is a consideration for how much manipulation and what type of manipulation. When people start replacing elements or adding elements, then in my mind at least , this can lead to issues. For instance someone shoots a scene on a sunny day with no clouds. They go into PS and add dramatic storm clouds. But the lighting in the scene is not consistent with dramatic storm clouds. An artist may want to do this specifically to add tension or inconsistency to a picture (and some people may not explicitly or consciously pick up on the inconsistency, but possibly subconsciously something may not feel right), but often it is done just to add drama or excitement to the scene. I am not going to judge whether manipulations of this degree are "right" or "wrong", but personally, I may think less of a work if it were done.

 

[markjwyatt]

A camera lens is not a human eye, therefore, a photo is never going to what the eye saw. In addition to what Joe ( @Ysarex ) has said above I will add this: Often, significant manipulation is required to render an even somewhat accurate representation of what the eye saw, Vis: I have covered several Christmas parades for the local paper ...

Agreed here. The intent of the manipulation in this case is to restore the balance (in this case make the latitude more like what the eye saw), plus you probably did not add a beautiful girl to a float that was not there (did you ?), nor likley did you double the size of the float and add a flying saucer hovering above it.

The issue (if there is one) is not about manipulaiton, as there often is some, but the degree and type(s) of manipulation. I would say the intent matters also, but from a strictly objective sense intent may not matter.

 

[tirediron]

... add a flying saucer hovering above it..

Busted!

 

[Ysarex]

My beagle was abducted.

Joe

 

[petrochemist]

I use a digital camera now. How do I get an "as they were shot" photo?

Joe

Simple you make the decisions on WB, sharpening ... before taking the shot, and shoot JPG.
With digital cameras many of those aspects are the equivalent of selecting which film to use.

The fact you can change so many options when post processing RAW files doesn't mean you have to.
I generally do very little processing, tweaking contrast & brightness in global fashion, cloning out the worst dust spots & resizing if for the web. IR shots often have color changed as well but I rarely do that for visible shots.
My results aren't quite SSOC ('straight out of camera' = 'as shot') but are pretty close.

I've always preferred the results the camera gets in JPG to what I can mange from the RAW.

 

[DGMPhotography]

I edit all of my pictures for the basics like exposure, contrast, etc.

And then any photo I plan to use on my website or social media, or share with a client, I take the extra step in Photoshop to remove distracting elements, smooth skin, etc.

With nature/wildlife I don't do as much, but I still do selective sharpening, dodging and burning to make things "pop" and will remove elements if they are distracting, like a twig blocking my view of the mountain.

I have no qualms about editing a photo to make a more appealing piece of art. The only issue I have is when people edit their photos and claim to not edit them, acting as if their sooc shots are that good. That, and when things are edited with an intentionally harmful agenda.

 

[Dean_Gretsch]

With nature/wildlife I don't do as much, but I still do selective sharpening, dodging and burning to make things "pop" and will remove elements if they are distracting, like a twig blocking my view of the mountain.

Oh come now! Who doesn't appreciate a nice twig photo? It's that annoying big bird in the background that I should have PS'ed out!

 

[Ysarex]

I use a digital camera now. How do I get an "as they were shot" photo?

Joe

Simple you make the decisions on WB, sharpening ... before taking the shot, and shoot JPG.
With digital cameras many of those aspects are the equivalent of selecting which film to use.

NOTE: Petrochemist, I'm responding in this post of yours but I'm responding more for the benefit of the OP, thanks.

When I used to shoot film I had maybe two dozen different color slide films to chose from and I did of course have some filters I could use that effected the result but that's orders of magnitude different than now.

I put "as they were shot" in quotes because I was quoting the OP. In response the OP also said, "It is true that with digital some cameras use different jpg algorithms for Landscape, Portrait, Macro etc. to enhance colors or smooth skin texture but the camera still basically taking a picture of what the eye sees." The OP is making the connection between "as they were shot" and "what the eye sees" and also seems to be suggesting the SOOC camera JPEG as a vehicle.

Here's my problem with that: How do I know which one is "as shot" "what the eye sees"? My camera is capable of approx. 1.9 million different setting combinations that will all produce different SOOC JPEG output. And that's just my camera. What happens if we add in Nikon, Canon and (OMG!) Sony?

Yeah 1.9 million is crazy and arguably the differences are very subtle so we can assume in fact there's less real variation than that number suggests. Still the output differences can be quite substantial. I took a raw file of a normal sunny day scene and put it back in my camera. My camera (like many modern cameras) can re-process a raw file to any JPEG setting combination. Here's just three of them:

Purple sky

Cyan sky

Toxic green sky that's about eradicate life on earth.

"What the eye saw" when I took the photo was a blue sky. You may want to bring up WB and in the above I did just set AWB but from spending time with my camera I'm pretty sure it's Velvia film simulation can't record a blue sky without turning it purple and I'm fully convinced the CC simulation is only capable of simulations of a future apocalypse.

I exclusively shoot and process raw files and I admit I often take considerable liberty with the processing to get the image I want. I'll remove items from the scene if they're a distraction and with a heavy hand manipulate the tone and color of the image beyond what was possible years ago in the darkroom.

And yet with that said I can't imagine I've ever mangled an image so severely as the EXR processor in my camera did to that third image above. When there's a blue sky in my photo at least I render it as blue -- you know, "what the eye saw." So that leaves me still asking my original question from back in post #9: I use a digital camera now. How do I get an "as they were shot" (meaning "what the eye sees") photo?

Joe

The fact you can change so many options when post processing RAW files doesn't mean you have to.
I generally do very little processing, tweaking contrast & brightness in global fashion, cloning out the worst dust spots & resizing if for the web. IR shots often have color changed as well but I rarely do that for visible shots.
My results aren't quite SSOC ('straight out of camera' = 'as shot') but are pretty close.

I've always preferred the results the camera gets in JPG to what I can mange from the RAW.

 

[Grandpa Ron]

Ok folks you are reading far to deep a meaning into my simple question.

As already pointed out, just as an artist can take brush to canvas and move the location of a tree for a better rendering of the scene. Photographers can now cut and paste with relative ease. From the artistic stand point this is a good thing, we can eliminate the clutter and enhance the subject. Still, in our effort to improved on an image have we, like the painter, have we created an entirely new an non-existent scene?

None of this is new. It used to be called "trick photography". Is increasing the amount of Aurora in the sky or deepening the blue color of an iceberg not the same as adding a dog's head to a man playing poker? Both create a photo not likely to be encountered in real life.

The simple fact is digital technology has created a quantum leap in the definition of photography. It puts incredible editing and creative power at our disposal. Marvelous technology to say the least. But are we compelled to embellish our photos.

This is what lead to my simple question, "Does anyone do "as shot" photos any more?" Warts and all as they used to say.

 

[limr]

Ok folks you are reading far to deep a meaning into my simple question.

As already pointed out, just as an artist can take brush to canvas and move the location of a tree for a better rendering of the scene. Photographers can now cut and paste with relative ease. From the artistic stand point this is a good thing, we can eliminate the clutter and enhance the subject. Still, in our effort to improved on an image have we, like the painter, have we created an entirely new an non-existent scene?

None of this is new. It used to be called "trick photography". Is increasing the amount of Aurora in the sky or deepening the blue color of an iceberg not the same as adding a dog's head to a man playing poker? Both create a photo not likely to be encountered in real life.

The simple fact is digital technology has created a quantum leap in the definition of photography. It puts incredible editing and creative power at our disposal. Marvelous technology to say the least. But are we compelled to embellish our photos.

This is what lead to my simple question, "Does anyone do "as shot" photos any more?" Warts and all as they used to say.

I agree - folks are reading far too much into the question.

And I repeat my answer: yes. There are still people who use their camera, rather than the editing software, as their main tool.

Of course, I can only speak for myself as to why. Sometimes what catches my eye is something purely visual, graphical. For those pictures, if I don't get it 'right' with exposure and composition, I might edit the parts that need to be highlighted or reduced in order to recreate the visual impact of the scene that I noticed and shot.

However, very often, what I am after is more about a mood, a moment. If I don't capture that essence with camera and film (yes, I mean film), then I am not likely to be able to recreate that mood by significantly altering the image during the editing process. It will always ring false to me, and it would also take much more time in front of the computer than I am willing to put in. As for warts? Depends on the wart. Sometimes an unintended element that would normally be a flaw in the photo ends up highlighting the mood or moment that I am trying to capture. In those cases, I will absolutely leave in the streak or light flare.

For me, the feeling of an image is more important than flawless, highly-manipulated visuals.

Some may agree with me in terms of valuing the feeling of the image as paramount, but believes that the manipulation is necessary to convey the feeling they want. And that's fine. I really have no problem with that. It's just not how I work.

 

[Ysarex]

This is what lead to my simple question, "Does anyone do "as shot" photos any more?" Warts and all as they used to say.

OK, simple then: I use a digital camera and I still need you to tell me what "as shot" means. Does it mean the SOOC JPEG image that comes from the camera? If so then no -- never. I'm too concerned that my photos depict "what the eye saw" and so the camera JPEGs are unacceptable. They're just too far removed from reality for me.

Joe

 

[Grandpa Ron]

To me "as shot" means the object, scene or location you captured in a photo would be recognized by anyone viewing the same scene with you.

True they might crop it differently or perhaps tweak the exposure, but if they stood by that waterfall, or canyon or tree or flower etc. they would recognize it from the photo.

Jpeg, Raw or Film, the camera can never see what the mind sees but it can capture what you are looking at; and often that is pretty good photo.

 

[Ysarex]

To me "as shot" means the object, scene or location you captured in a photo would be recognized by anyone viewing the same scene with you.

That would describe 100% of my photos over the past 40 years. All of which, since I switched to using a digital camera, are typically pretty heavily processed since I'm a "Photoshop wizard" and expect my photos to look like "what the eye saw."

Maybe an example could help. Let's start with the JPEG that came from my camera:

Retired now I spend a lot of time walking around the neighborhood. This is me walking to the grocery. The grocery is right behind that distant bldg sticking out from behind the long bldg covered with graffiti. I live right behind the trees on the other side of the tracks opposite that bldg. To get to the grocery I have to cross the bridge over the tracks. I took this photo from the bridge. I see this scene a lot and I like it so I snapped a photo. I carry a camera with me every where I go and because it's a digital camera and I know how to use it I photograph whatever I want -- like this scene.

That photo really sucks doesn't it. It's SOOC. The reason it's all green is because I keep the camera WB set to unity. It's a little trick that's handy if your camera has a live histogram and my G7 compact does. Setting the WB to unity forces the live histogram to better reflect what a raw file will capture and that's all I care about. Here's the photo with the WB set to auto:

It still really sucks. It sucks because of the lighting. The sky is nuked to hell and that's because the scene is backlit. Now you can take any camera you want (digital or film) and use any combination of settings on that camera you can possibly conceive of and you will at very best be able to get that photo from sucks to still sucks. So there you have it -- warts and all as you say it's "as shot" and nothing at all like what the eye saw at the time. That's not what I saw. Our eyes have no trouble handling that dynamic range but film does and all digital camera JPEG processors do. If I reduced the exposure to darken the sky the foreground will get too dark. I can do that with a copy of DPP (Canon raw processor). If you check the EXIF data for the camera you'll see I set a +1 exposure comp to take the photo. Here's the photo with that 1 stop removed:

It still sucks. The foreground is too dark now and the sky looks flat and still blown. Very simply if you want to "as shot" this photo in the way that most people will understand that term then you're going to have to be happy with sucks because that's the best that film or any digital camera JPEG processor is going to give you in that lighting condition.

BUT you could resort to some manipulation. Let's say it's 35 years ago and you're a Zone System photographer. Well then an N-2 neg and proper darkroom technique could pull it off. But any attempt to photograph that lighting with transparency film will just major suck -- money in the waste basket.

So if you walk with me to the grocery some afternoon and see this scene crossing over the tracks it's going to be backlit and if you have a film camera or digital camera that can save a SOOC JPEG you can take a sucky photo warts and all.

I prefer that my photos don't suck and that they look believable when people see them -- what the eye saw. And as I said above I carry a camera with me all the time and I photograph whatever I want regardless of the lighting condition. I can do that because I'm not restricted by some camera's sucky JPEG processing or 5 stop DR slide film. There is no JPEG processor in any digital camera that can SOOC produce the photo you see below -- they can only do sucks.

Joe

Oh yeah and notice that the sky is blue -- because, the sky is blue.

True they might crop it differently or perhaps tweak the exposure, but if they stood by that waterfall, or canyon or tree or flower etc. they would recognize it from the photo.

Jpeg, Raw or Film, the camera can never see what the mind sees but it can capture what you are looking at; and often that is pretty good photo.

 

[smoke665]

I can't help but find it slightly amusing that most people assume that an SOOC digital image is without processing. The truth is every camera manufacture applies some propietory "enhancing" to the image during the conversion to present their version of what the camera saw.

@Ysarex I can't wait to try your WB trick out! I've been playing with gelled flash and WB settings in camera to cancel out ambient light color. Finding a whole new world to explore.

 

[limr]

For pete's sake, the OP has said repeatedly that he is NOT talking about images with no processing whatsoever. He is talking about manipulating the actual scene - changing the placement of objects, adding elements like shadows that weren't there in the first place, altering the size and proportions of objects to each other.