Ethical Question: Editing photos on a computer...

Kuristopha · Feb 24, 2005

besides basic touch ups do you think a photo loses something if the artist enhances it on their computer. For example a sunset landscape photo made into more vibrant colours. Maybe i'm just old fashioned, but i think computer editing can be taken too far. Thoughts?

danalec99 · Feb 24, 2005

A similar thread

ksmattfish · Feb 24, 2005

Does it lose something when a photographer chooses to shoot a sunset landscape with Velvia rather than Provia? How about with a polarizing filter? Computers just make it obvious how manipulated photography has always been. How they do it is new; what they are doing is not.

railman44 · Feb 24, 2005

There are "tricks" to film and digital photograpy. I guess I'm a purist. I'm not a digital guy. I've worked with photoshop and I know what can be done. Objects, colors and sharpness among other things can be inserted. This to me is not art. This is taking an average picture and making it something it was never meant to be. That, to me, is not art. I understand digital photograpy is here to stay. The photographer's eye is the brush of the painting not a piece of software that will make a wannabe something he/she was never meant to be. Sorry for the harsh words. As time passes, I'm becoming more of a critic of digital photography...

Kuristopha · Feb 24, 2005

Maybe i just love the nit and grit of the darkroom. Sometimes u gotta sit and wait for the right time to get the perfect colours of that sunset, or work it out in the darkroom to up the contrast, if a simple click of the mouse can do the same thing it just doesn't seem worth as much.

I guess the question is, is the final copy what matters most, or the energy put in to get that final copy, for me it's the ladder, that's what makes this hobby fun.

railman44 · Feb 24, 2005

Kuristopha said:
Maybe i just love the nit and grit of the darkroom. Sometimes u gotta sit and wait for the right time to get the perfect colours of that sunset, or work it out in the darkroom to up the contrast, if a simple click of the mouse can do the same thing it just doesn't seem worth as much.

I guess the question is, is the final copy what matters most, or the energy put in to get that final copy, for me it's the ladder, that's what makes this hobby fun.

I think you and I are on the same wave length. If you're a great photographer you're an artist. You don't need Adobe to help you...

Big Mike · Feb 24, 2005

This topic has been discusses to death, time and time again.

Would you say that using darkroom techniques is not true to the art work? Most of the things people can do to a photo with a computer...have been done by hand for a long time. Just because it's easier, does that make it less artistic?

If a carpenter uses a power drill, does that make his finished product less artistic than if he had used a hand drill?

The digital darkroom is just another tool available to photographers...it can not create...only do what it's told. I still takes an artist to work with the tools.

Big Mike · Feb 24, 2005

railman44 said:
I think you and I are on the same wave length. If you're a great photographer you're an artist. You don't need Adobe to help you...

That's like saying you don't need Kodak to help you. Or you don't need the maker of darkroom chemicals to help you. Adobe is a tool, nothing more.

MDowdey · Feb 24, 2005

honestly, if you have arrived at what YOU deem is a work of art, and you are proud of it, who the hell cares how you got there?

geesh.

md

Digital Matt · Feb 24, 2005

Kuristopha said:
Maybe i just love the nit and grit of the darkroom. Sometimes u gotta sit and wait for the right time to get the perfect colours of that sunset, or work it out in the darkroom to up the contrast, if a simple click of the mouse can do the same thing it just doesn't seem worth as much.

I guess the question is, is the final copy what matters most, or the energy put in to get that final copy, for me it's the ladder, that's what makes this hobby fun.

I don't think you are really aware of what photoshop can or can't do. You can't get the "perfect colors of a sunset" with photoshop alone. All photography, be it digital or film, is about capturing light, and that act is the first and most important step in any process.

Even if it were really just the click of a mouse, (which it isn't) it still takes an artist, and an artists vision to make that decision of when and where to change contrast, density, and color, and to what degree, to produce that stunning photograph, that work of art.

ksmattfish · Feb 24, 2005

I think that selection of tools and techniques is extremely important, but it's just a personal choice. Some folks don't like working in the darkroom; some folks don't like working on a computer. To say that one method is better than another for a particular individual is probably a truth, but to say that there is only one right way for all photographers is silly.

If you truely believe that the supposed ease of digital somehow makes it less valid, then I would counter with film is for pussies! You should be hand coating 8"x10" glass plates in the field, developing them in the field, and contact printing them on platinum paper. That's how a "real" photographer would do it

There's always going to be someone that can out-snob you as far as techniques and equipment goes.

I love black and white film. I love shooting it, I love all mechanical film cameras, I love developing it myself, and I love the look of a hand printed, gelatin silver print on fiber paper. That's the way I do it, and I'll be doing it that way for a long time to come. It would be boring if everyone else did it the same way.

voodoocat · Feb 24, 2005

This topic has been discusses to death, time and time again.

You can say that again :lol:

Not much more to add. ksmattfish and bigmike summed up my feelings pretty well.

My question for the "purists"... Does photoshop change the composition or lighting in a photograph? The argument against photoshop always involves "making a mediocre shot great" which really means correcting a poorly exposed shot. That is a weak argument as it is only one dimensional. You can polish a turd but it still remains a piece of sh*t.

Rogue Monk · Feb 24, 2005

voodoocat said:
You can polish a turd but it still remains a piece of sh*t.

That's classic! And oh so true!

Another thread

It all comes down to preference. ksmattfish prefers one methodology. Others prefer another. Could ksmattfish use a different method and get the same results? I bet he could.

Because he IS an artist.

Its very Machiavellian--which allows for a lot of different expression.

I can put a nail in the wall with a hammer or I can use my shoe. The important thing is "Will picture hang from that nail?"

The most important tool (the one between your ears) is still the same. That's what provides your finished product with value.

loopy · Feb 25, 2005

Kuristopha said:
besides basic touch ups do you think a photo loses something if the artist enhances it on their computer. For example a sunset landscape photo made into more vibrant colours. Maybe i'm just old fashioned, but i think computer editing can be taken too far. Thoughts?

Besides basic touch ups do you think a photo loses something if the artist enhances it in a darkroom?

A computer is a tool, I don't think it matters. I've spend years perfecting my photoshop techniques, I also know my way around a darkroom fairly well. I use photoshop because thats what I have access too.

It really isn't a click of a mouse either, I'll spend hours on my photographs, just like I would in a darkroom in order to get it just right.

Kuristopha · Feb 25, 2005

I understand the arguments u guys are making and i liked Big Mike's analogy:

Big Mike said:
If a carpenter uses a power drill, does that make his finished product less artistic than if he had used a hand drill?

but if a carpenter cut down a tree, cut out a block of wood, then typed a quick design into a computer, which did the cutting for him, i'd see it as less artistic personally.

I'm 21 and i've had a computer since i can remember, i've worked with photoshop since highschool and it's no sweat for me, but workin in a dark room i can make mistakes, maybe that's why i just have more respect for people who work off a computer, i could see how other people could see it as the opposite too tho, so i guess i could have a bias