Photos a lie

[Doggle Avaddit]

Originally Posted by Doggle Avaddit

Unusually, the photographer claims to have shot the wolf photo with a Haaselblad and film, not on digital.


Ooo, thats SO last century

Ah, I've just found the controversy in the other thread!

[snake]

Thank you all for your replies.
The way that I was thinking was, if somebody manipulated a photo in this way, entered it into a competition and won, is this acceptable?
In my view this would be wrong.

[Geoff F]

Painters paint what they think will make a good picture, which usually isn't the whole truth. It's the same with combining images to make a well balanced photo; just don't claim it is something which it isn't.

I remember when there was a lot of interest in wild big cats in some areas of the country and a tabloid team of photographers and reporters went to investigate. Of course they returned with some stunning photos; which no true nature photographer has ever achieved!

Mixing images successfully isn't easy and takes a lot of practice; so keep experimenting. There are several ways to achieve this. The commonest methods of using the Extract tools or creating a selection and then cropping to the selection are the easiest methods but they often leave a hard edge to the imported material.

I'm not sure if your software can work with layers; but one alternative method worth trying is to roughly draw a selection around the area to be added and crop to the selection. Paste as a new layer, enlarge the magnification, then carefully clean up the image by removing unwanted areas with an erasure brush. Vary the brush size, softness and opacity as required.

You can also use this basic method to selectively enhance brightness or sharpness on parts of a a photo. Work on a duplicate layer of your original and remove the areas which don't need any alteration and enhance the remainder. But once again, vary your brush opacity to avoid harsh edges.

For all of this type of work, a graphic drawing tablet gives better control than a mouse but good tablets aren't cheap; although if you enjoy this sort of manipulation there are hours of fun to be had.

[dunlin]

Originally Posted by snake

I have been spending a bit of time playing with and trying to understand the paint shop pro program that my daughter recently bought me, in particular the cutting and pasting from one picture to another.
In this picture I cut the owl from one photograph and paste it over another.
This is my first effort and I'm sure that given a bit of time it would get better, I guess there are people out there that are expert at this and can blend pictures together perfectly.

What I am wondering is whether this is acceptable practice in photography.

First off i like what youve done in fact its given me an idea as i have a nice moon picture somewhere on my pc
I would say most people who have photoshop or similar software only use about 20% of the program, by practicing different techniques you can only get better.
I was talking to a pro photographer who had been using photoshop for years and he said he is still learning how to use it.
There was a link on this site a couple of years back that explained about sharpening images, it was sixty pages long. It made me realise just how powerful a program photoshop is. I am always looking at different tutorials and trying to improve. It beats watching tv on a cold wet night

There are some people who think this type of manipulation is totally wrong but i bet the same people dont think twice about cloning things out, like stray branches and the like.
There are competitions you can enter if you get very good at it. Have a look on photo.net there are some stunning montages on there.

regards mark....

[PMG]

Anyone who practices photography will know that some form of manipulation has been used - and those that remember slide film will know that all sorts of jiggery pokery went off in and outside the darkroom! Photography covers all ways and means of obtaining a shot of something you want to photograph, at all levels of the procedure: if anything was a case of the end justifies the means then its producing a photograph that appeals (or in some cases repels) the viewer. Whats the point in producing something that does neither? The trouble comes if the photographer then tries to pass off a manipulated image as a non manipulated one ......... Digital is a fabulous medium for folks with artistic sides to their nature and I have no problem whatsoever in people creating a better impact photograph thro post production editing and manipulation just so long as they don't pass it off as something untouched Mainly cos that would be a lie and therefore wrong and it sets novices and beginners off in the wrong direction thinking something can be done within the camera when it can't .......

Even journalistic photography in the days of film - containing all the immediacy of action - war, disasters, celebrations - you name it - all those iconic images in your daily newspapers and on the television news - they all passed thro the art dept of the newspaper they were taken for or sold to .......... air brushing out and tidying photos for printing, cropping etc was done to every photo to improve its impact - complete removal of certain objects from around the main subject - you name it and it was done before going to press ....... and how do I know? Cos that was my dad's job at a number of northwest newspapers before he arrived at 'the holy grail' The Manchester Evening News!! God bless him. So the adage that a photograph never lies has never really been true

If a photograph lives or dies by the reaction of the viewer then how it is arrived at is a matter of skill not deceit - the deceit would trying to pass it off as untouched ......... the rest is photgraphic art

Pauline

[Geoff F]

The tutorials on this site may be of interest Ron Bigelow Articles plenty on sharpening and use of selection/masking; plus lots more.

[dunlin]

Originally Posted by Geoff F

The tutorials on this site may be of interest Ron Bigelow Articles plenty on sharpening and use of selection/masking; plus lots more.

Geoff to the rescue once again. I dont know if it was you who originally posted that link, but its the same one i refer to in my reply above.
I copied the article on sharpening so i could read it at my leasure, i made the mistake of lending my copy out to someone and never got it back and by that time i'd also lost the link.
If the article on sharpening is anything to go by (which goes into great depth) i cant wait to read the rest of his tutorials.
many thanks geoff
regards mark...........

[Richard G.]

Originally Posted by snake

The way that I was thinking was, if somebody manipulated a photo in this way, entered it into a competition and won, is this acceptable?
In my view this would be wrong.

So long as it did not break any of the rules of that competition, I think it would be fine. Of course, many competitions state that images must not be "manipulated", but even that's a bit of a grey area IMHO. Pretty much all photographers are increasing saturation, contrast, sharpness etc. even if it's done right in the camera, but most see that as enhancing, not manipulation, re-touching, not editing, but where does one stop and the other start?

Personally, I can't be bothered with competition; I've been involved in enough over the years to have reached the conclusion it's not often that healthy. It breeds envy and bitterness and leads people to the transgressions and deceit discussed on the wpoty thread. Judging such an art form as photography is always going to be completely subjective anyway.

FWIW, I like your owl, I think dunlins was excellent and I think the wolf that won the wpoty was also a superb image. I'd be very happy to see more of all of these types of image here on WAB.

[Jim Ford]

Originally Posted by Richard G.

Pretty much all photographers are increasing saturation, contrast, sharpness etc. even if it's done right in the camera, but most see that as enhancing, not manipulation, re-touching, not editing, but where does one stop and the other start?

People forget (or it was before they were born!) that even with film, images were enhanced to a degree when developing the negative. You could increase or decrease the contrast and increase the sharpness with the formulation of the developer and by varying the agitation. This was certainly accepted practice and not considered cheating in any way. Why shouldn't the same be acceptable with digital images?

Jim

[RichBrew]

Too true, Jim! I remember the days of cooking up high acutance developers and other concoctions, or under exposing and overdeveloping emulsions to get what I was after. Nobody thought twice about it.
The American photographer Ansel Adams (1902-1984), who at one point in his life applied himself to become a concert pianist, once used the analogy that the negative was the score: the print, the performance.

RichBrew