I believe that if I started a thread entitled "Photographing the Mating Habits of the North America Cuckoo Bird", the SOOTC vs. Post-Processing argument would arise and dominate or even overtake the conversation.

I think this "argument" is ridiculous but I will admit that my lifelong job as a professional photographer and my starting my career in the "old school" has tainted my opinion. I'll explain.

In the olden days of film photography, precise and accurate camera work was more important in that there were few and difficult remedies for poorly crafted negatives or transparencies. There were many specialized chemical treatments and techniques for darkroom manipulation but most of these were time-consuming, painstaking, costly, and oftentimes resulted in lesser quality, and production and delivery delays. So, as a veteran of this culture, I try to address as much of I can at the camera whenever possible and still encourage others to do so, even with the advent and great flexibility in digital imaging. Whether performed in the old-fashioned darkroom on in a computer-driven program, tweaking, enhancement, and special effect added post-shooting is perfectly acceptable and routine as far as I am concerned- that is not tantamount sloppy shooting and radical post-processing.

In professional photography, we have the added element of the CLIENT who expects good work delivered on time. Frankly, how we arrive at a good image is of no consequence to the client or for that matter anyone else we want to impress, persuade, gift, or illustrate anything or tell a story to with our images. Whether you are pleasing a client, selling images at a gallery or crafts show, submitting pictures to an editor for publication, or inviting the neighbors in for a slideshow of your last vacation-who case, other than yourself, how you made those images? They will stand or fall on their own. There is nothing to prove in the process!

In professional circles, if you over-process an image and it becomes apparent - it the pastel dress has turned to "hot-pink" or the shrimp looks like a lobster because to went nuts on a slider, you will get an objection. If you over sharpen or under soften, you may run into a blooper! If you would rather have an azure blue sky instead of a sky blue sky in a landscape, who is on gonna question you? Perhaps the editor at Nation Geographic or the curator at the Hayden Planetarium- never know? Lots depend on who you are working for and what you want to accomplish or if you just wish to express your vision differently.

Enhance the dynamic range of a photojournalistic image that does not amount to fakery. In fine artwork, there is no real or imagined "code of ethics" that dictates everything must be authentic. If someone takes pride in his or her ability to create perfect images without any further enhancement, they too deserve respect and should not be criticized for the philosophy. There are some situations where a photographer can not cull every image they are not completely satisfied with and have no othere alternative but to salvage it in post-processing. Theses should be individual artistic, practical and personalized choices.