Post Camera manipulation (Page 3): But who's to determine what is done well and what is done badly? If only there were hard and fast rules, but there aren't. What I think is done well...

EstherP

MW wrote:

Post processing used well ... snip...

But who's to determine what is done well and what is done badly? If only there were hard and fast rules, but there aren't. What I think is done well, you may absolutely abhor, and vice versa.
So, I'll happily carry on with the techniques I know and like, to turn out photos that I like !
EstherP

charryl Loc: New Mexico, USA

joer wrote:

And then there are people like myself that believe that any manipulation or no manipulation is ok. Do as much as you like or none at all.

Believe what you like but don't condemn others that don't share your beliefs. That's my out look on all things period!

:thumbup:

charryl Loc: New Mexico, USA

mborn wrote:

Great answer and Rod Sheppard, who was editor of Outdoor photography for a long time, just post an article about this on his blog http://www.natureandphotography.com/?p=1794

A really excellent, balanced article.

philiprispin Loc: Currently: Longview Texas

I don't think anyone was or is talking about condemnation. The point is that manipulation happens at the most basic level and the goal is to produce an image you or the market is pleased with however that may be done.

gemlenz Loc: Gilbert Arizona

Taking a photo is a process from the moment you look at a subject, compose it and capture the image. Post processing is all part of the process, especially if you shoot in RAW. You're not creating something from nothing, you're creating an image. The camera captures the information and in post you are bringing out the details and colors that you saw when you composed the scene.

nekon Loc: Carterton, New Zealand

cthahn wrote:

If you take a picture and it turns out exactly the way you viewed it, what is there to change? If you are careless and do not do a very good job of taking a picture, then you have no choice but to try to fix it. It is always better to take a good photo first then to have to repair it later. It all depends on you, the photographer, as to what you want the final results to be.

Because no camera sees the way we do, no camera is capable of producing exactly the images we see-thereby the need for post-processing is obvious.

Pepper Loc: Planet Earth Country USA

gemlenz wrote:

Taking a photo is a process from the moment you look at a subject, compose it and capture the image. Post processing is all part of the process, especially if you shoot in RAW. You're not creating something from nothing, you're creating an image. The camera captures the information and in post you are bringing out the details and colors that you saw when you composed the scene.

Thats a pretty basic and simple view of a very complex question. Heres an example with a follow up question. Last Halloween my nephew took a photograph of himself then in post he added some scars, removed a tooth added a beard and some hair, changes his eye color to red along with a background from a cemetery. Okay my question, is this still a photograph of my nephew? Im not sure that PP even has a legitimate definition it can really mean just about anything.

Dewar Loc: Summer in MN & Winter in FL

Howard5252 wrote:

There are people who consider that any post camera manipulation of a photo removes the photo from reality and makes it a creation rather than a photo. I'm not talking about actually creating something from nothing. I'm talking about lighting adjustment, cropping, blurring, and other adjustments to improve the photo. I'd like to hear from both sides.

I submit that a photo itself is removed from "reality" and is a "creation". Anything else you do to it could make it more, or less, real.

Bloke Loc: Waynesboro, Pennsylvania

joer wrote:

And then there are people like myself that believe that any manipulation or no manipulation is ok. Do as much as you like or none at all.

Believe what you like but don't condemn others that don't share your beliefs. That's my out look on all things period!

Exactly! :thumbup:

Unless you are a CSI, a news reporter or some other class which requires forensic portrayal of the facts, then you can do whatever you feel you want to, in order to get the results you are looking for.

This question comes up regularly, and some of the tosh which is posted about it just cracks me up! It isn't just in the Hog, either. I am in a couple of photography groups on facebook, and it is constantly being argued there too. I have seen people posting that, once you modify the image in PS, it is no longer a photograph! Not sure what they thought it *was*, but...

Most of my PS work to date has been retouching scans of old 35mm negatives; I am only just starting to produce digital originals.

I do agree that some people overdo the processing, but even that was possible in the darkroom too!

oldtool2 Loc: South Jersey

MW wrote:

I've read that Brady staged quite a few photos by having the corpses moved and rearranged for compositional purposes. Plus the colors and smells and sounds are absent. No photo will tell us true history nor will any book. All you can get is a glimpse.

From what I have read this is very true. In order to get the people to believe he needed them to be able to see what was going on, not as he originally saw it or was seeing it. Often, by the time he arrived on many of the battle fields a lot of the wounded had been removed, and some of the dead had been buried. So he recreated what he thought the original would have looked like.

Jim D

oldtool2 Loc: South Jersey

mborn wrote:

Great answer and Rod Sheppard, who was editor of Outdoor photography for a long time, just post an article about this on his blog http://www.natureandphotography.com/?p=1794

mborn,

Thank you for bringing that to the attention of us!! It is well written and very truthful. He brings out some excellent points.

I especially like that he keeps bringing out the fact that the camera CAN NOT see what our eyes can see! All we can do in PP is try to correct, or capture, what the camera did not get correctly.

I agree it is often over done. This is something I have been guilty of and need to watch, and I am sure that many of us are or have been guilty of also. It is so easy to do if we are not careful. This is why I often walk away from my work and come back to it a half hour later. It is also the reason I never delete the original I have worked from. I am in a continuing learning process! I have gone back to a photo I took a year ago and did it over again, and was much happier with it because of what I have learned in the past year.

Jim D

gemlenz Loc: Gilbert Arizona

As fa as I'm concerned it's still the same picture. Without the original picture there would be no opportunity to modify it. It's like restoring an old Chevy with a new paint job and body work. It's still a Chevy.
According to Wiki: Image editing encompasses the processes of altering images, whether they be digital photographs, traditional photochemical photographs, or illustrations. Traditional analog image editing is known as photo retouching, using tools such as an airbrush to modify photographs, or editing illustrations with any traditional art medium. Graphic software programs, which can be broadly grouped into vector graphics editors, raster graphics editors, and 3D modelers, are the primary tools with which a user may manipulate, enhance, and transform images. Many image editing programs are also used to render or create computer art from scratch.

Pepper wrote:

Thats a pretty basic and simple view of a very complex question. Heres an example with a follow up question. Last Halloween my nephew took a photograph of himself then in post he added some scars, removed a tooth added a beard and some hair, changes his eye color to red along with a background from a cemetery. Okay my question, is this still a photograph of my nephew? Im not sure that PP even has a legitimate definition it can really mean just about anything.

travelwp Loc: New Jersey

Ansel Adams spent more time post processing than actually taking photos.

jimmya Loc: Phoenix

Howard5252 wrote:

There are people who consider that any post camera manipulation of a photo removes the photo from reality and makes it a creation rather than a photo. I'm not talking about actually creating something from nothing. I'm talking about lighting adjustment, cropping, blurring, and other adjustments to improve the photo. I'd like to hear from both sides.

Hi Howard.

Call me a purist. Except for a slight sharpening, if needed, which can also be done in a film lab I'm a guy who likes it right from the camera.

As you've stated, to me, post production is fine for those who want to create something from something else but I'm not like that in most cases.

schuchmn

cthahn wrote:

If you take a picture and it turns out exactly the way you viewed it, what is there to change? If you are careless and do not do a very good job of taking a picture, then you have no choice but to try to fix it. It is always better to take a good photo first then to have to repair it later. It all depends on you, the photographer, as to what you want the final results to be.

PP isn't all about "fixing" pictures, although it can be. PP is more about things like overcoming the limitations of the medium, expressing your feelings about the subject or, yes, sometimes creating something that wasn't there.

If you don't PP your images, they're not as good as they can be and the goal of photography (my goal, anyway) is to create the best pictures I can.

The only misuse of PP, in my mind, is to intentionally misrepresent the truth for malicious purposes. Photojournalists have a duty to represent the truth and so do nature photographers. The North American Nature Photography Association (NANPA) has a set of rules for labeling pictures so that the viewer knows whether or not an image has been manipulated.

For the rest of us, it's art and it's the results that count.