Papa Joe Loc: Midwest U.S.

zazendude, it appears to me that you have already 'minipulated' your photo even before taking it from the camera, (unless all humanity 'sees' in black and white. Good topic to get many replies from, but hardly a true definition of what a photograph is - (in my opinion, of course). Happy shooting, no matter of with film, digital or even pin-hole.... main thing: Enjoy!

cesar2

We can talk about this all day and at the end is what you like to do or don't like to do, it will be entirely up to you. This may be a simplistic answer but you see, if you are not a professional photographer your question should be not be complicated.

Skiextreme2 Loc: Northwest MA

B&W, color or digital, if an image is composed (accounting for lighting, subject position, aperture, shutter speed and more), it is a photograph. B&W and color film are often manipulated during both development and enlarging to achieve the end result, same as digital, just different methods/tools.

Stephan G

See?

Now, let's look up "transliteration"...

russelray Loc: La Mesa CA

I think the problem is that there's not a single camera anywhere that can capture what the human eye sees after the brain has post-processed it. As Edgar Degas said about his painting: "Painting is not what you see but what you make others see." I think the same way about photography.

Jeffcs Loc: Myrtle Beach South Carolina

When I made the "switch" from film to digital in its infancy, I said I'm going to stay true to photography and I'm never going to digitally alter the capture to the extent that it no monger is representative of the original. That said I was/am truly ( without tooting my horn ) good into darkroom and in no way can an excellent print be made with out manipulation, so again fast forward back to digital I decided that I would keep the computer work at a minimum and was falling behind! Today I fully embrace the digital photography world but I still try to keep the produce the best in camera so I don't need to produce something that was not created in camera!

SalvageDiver Loc: Huntington Beach CA

What ever floats your boat. Use the program/fully auto mode on your cameras and your done. Send the film to be processed and printed at your favorite photo shop or drug store.

As a hobbyist, my boat is floated by doing all the things you're complaining about. I have no personal interest in a fully automatic image capture-to-final print workflow. After all, its a hobby.

Further, if that's all you want's you interest in the craft. Many P&S and cellphones do just what you ask.

billnikon Loc: Pennsylvania/Ohio/Florida/Maui/Oregon/Vermont

I agree with you. But this is a common type of answer he uses on a lot of us from time to time. Consider the source and have a great day.

Tomcat5133 Loc: Gladwyne PA

Well I have been in the creative world for many years.
Since I was one of the artists in high school that got his drawings put up in the hall.
Went to The School of Visual Arts in NY. The ad business on Madison Avenue. I worked for many ad agencies. Did an ad in Life Magazine.

Marketing was always tied to art. Always followed art in museums and architecture in other countries and here. Met great photographers.
Pete Turner who change the world. Art Beck great food shooter. Great fashion shooters. Always had a camera and sometimes used it.
Launched Egg McMuffin for McDonald's east coast. Sat in LA with Peter Falk (Columbo) hoping we could make him wear the raincoat for
an ad. Co-owned an awarding winning design company. Started a production company. Was early into video. Created national sales meetings
for large companies in different locations. Produced a President's appearance for a big company. Designed stages. Organized choreography.
Produced celebrities and motivational talent. Taught 1/2 day a week at the Art Institute.

These days I have become a Producer/run & gun video shooter with small or no crew for some profit and some charity and local events.

Now this is NOT bragging! It is a lifetime of trying to understand what art, photography and communications is all about.
I never thought I was high on the creative meter. I still don't know why I love images. B&W very much. Why artists have
such a hard time making a living. Why we argue about the importance of a photo or a movie.
Why children are not the Creative Directors.

I went to the famous Art Basel in Miami a few weeks ago. After seeing all kinds of art and imagery I realized
I had no idea what this was all about. Why one piece of art is worth 500k and another 5k or 50 bucks. The social networking and
commercializing of art is very sad. Most families cannot afford to go to art shows like this. The Metropolitan museum in NY is now
going to charge for entry for out of towners. don't know what I would have done without the free art and culture in NY growing up.

I think I am a visualist. A mental script writer-- I see and here things all the time they seem like plays and pictures around me.
This gift which I don't know I have done justice is a passion about life. And a photo or video which is 24 frames (pictures) each second
is why I still wonder and learn and live. The love of art and life and compassion and family.....well you know what I mean.

Oyens

At the same time, how high is up?

Stephan G

A query I heard so long ago, "Then why do you make it look so easy to do?"

LouV Loc: Juno Beach, FL

And I suppose those “perfectly exposed photos” just magically spring forth from your camera?

I’ve shot hundreds of rolls of b+w film and hundreds of hours in the darkroom manipulating those images, adjusting exposure, contrast, dodging, burning.

Finally, as at least one other has said, you chose to alter that “moment in time” the second you chose to shoot it in b+w.

Welcome to the hog. Perhaps you might consider a less holier-than-thou tone for your future posts.

russelray Loc: La Mesa CA

You do realize, though, that a great many cameras can do post-processing? My little Canon 760D has all sorts of interesting stuff under the Menu item "Creative filters": Grainy B/W, Soft focus, Fish-eye effect, Art bold effect, Water painting effect (my favorite), Toy camera effect, Miniature effect. And one can use one creative filter, save the result, and then apply another creative filter.

In addition to that, under the Menu item "Picture Style," one can set Auto, Standard, Portrait, Landscape, Neutral, Faithful, Monochrome, User Def. 1, User Def. 2, and User Def. 3. Then, under those settings, one can set the Sharpness (0 to 7), Contrast (-4 to +4), Saturation (-4 to +4), and Color tone (-4 to +4).

I also want to create the best, but what does "created in camera" and "not created in camera" mean? I think one also would need to identify the camera in addition to the various settings because the software engineers at Nikon are different from the software engineers at Canon, and the software engineers working on the Canon 760D probably are different from the software engineers working on the Canon 1D. Thus, the product of those engineers' software programming is different. That's why we have different RAW files—NEF, CR2, etc. Heck, even Adobe, a non-camera manufacturer, has gotten into the middle of things with their RAW DNG format.

JohnSwanda Loc: San Francisco

Yes, there are a lot of options for "preprocessing" with camera settings. But the problem with that is that everything is applied to the full image. A lot of the post processing I do is done with selections and masks to adjust different areas of the image in different ways. That can't be done in camera.

Dannj

I guess you can "fabricate" by adjusting camera settings BEFORE pushing the button or AFTER by pushing several. If you are pleased with the result, does it matter?