No one should ever be critical of any work, or blow it off as if it were nothing until they can produce better work than what they are being critical of. That's the challenge I have presented to you. You are indicating that the photographer named Jason uses heavy PP and a person who has sat with him says he doesn't. Who am I to believe, someone who has seen it with their own eyes or someone who has never seen it and just makes blind assumptions because they aren't capable of duplicating it since they don't know the guys secrets or maybe just aren't as good as Jason the photographer? Being a critic is the easiest job in the world, that's why there are so many of them.

FYI - Adams heavily manipulated his negative development recipes as well - time, temperature, concentration, and choice of chemicals - were all based on his field contrast measurements. The density of the film base which would change with each type of film and also with the development procedure, was something that he was very fastidious about recording and cataloging. He was "one" with his negative - and was able to record ALL the detail in shadows and highlights, then use copious amounts of dodge and burn to extend the dynamic range of his original capture. That's what "getting it right in the camera" meant in those days.

Today, getting it right in the camera means capturing all the tonal values without compromise - and you set up your exposure differently for jpg (which by definition is not getting it right in the camera) and raw. When you shoot raw, you avoid overexposing your highlights at all costs. when you shoot jpg you are targeting a middle value for your image brightness that reflects the scene, and if the contrast exceeds the camera's capability in jpg mode, then you will be sacrificing either or both highlight and shadow information.

Question for everyone: What do you think of all the enhancing of photos that software and cameras are capable of now? Things like HDR, Photoshopping the bejeebers out of a shot etc.. I like to see what can be done without help myself. Just the camera, the right light, and the photographer. But, that's just my opinion. Anyone else have any thoughts? Don't get me wrong, some beautiful stuff is being produced, but where should it end before it gets to be more computerizing than photographing?