Asher Kelman
OPF Owner/Editor-in-Chief
So who gives you the right to call a "manipulated" digital picture a photograph!
Maris,
It might be educational, at least, for folk here to be educated on the possibility that we have departed a long way from the pioneers who made it possible to sensitize a prepared flat surface to allow light from an image focused by a tiny opening or lens to leave its mark as an image. Your recent post in photo.net is helpful in this respect.
Terms:
Manipulation: I hate the term, since it has negative connotations. I'd use processing, work, development, masking, contrast adjustment and other specific terms.
Photographist: An interesting and probably accurate term for those who use photographs or parts of them to make something else. However, it breaks down when we overlay or cut up negatives and put them in the enlarger together and expose a new sheet of paper!
So if one uses a card to dodge or rub more fresh developer on the slowly appearing ghost of some object on the film, then what? I could call all this manipulation!
Modern Definition of Photography: Photography cannot be fairly defined as an end of the road creative process that was completed once silver could be precipitated on to the fibers of a sensitized photopaper in the early 20th Century. I propose the following working definition that respects where photography started and celebrates where it might go in the future:
It is not, in itself, "the truth" or some representation of the truth. That requires many controls, strict record taking, several cameras, witnesses, chemical and movement sensors perhaps and a whole lot more aids. Photography, outside of strict documentation, then, is just for spreading likeness of things, enjoying or musing about. It's not some religious doctrine. However, where I do concur with you is that it's somewhat dishonest to represent a digital photograph as being a silver gelatin photograph, even if it's printed chemically.
Even where I feel your words are extreme, your stance does serve the need to raise the flag of classical chemically-developed photography. That's the furnace where the standards of fine photography were formed and from which the concepts and quality, craft and expression were annealed with so much sacrifice. All of the pioneers shared imagination, devotion, insight, skill, craftsmanship and a stoic long term commitment. That's the simple way to making awesome pictures. Not to know about this foundation leaves us unprepared as we can go in our own journeys. It's the compass we need to guide our own explorations.
So Maris, keep on with your positions. I learn from your writing and find your photography, (as scant and tiny as I have seen), remarkable in quality and originality.
Asher
Maris,
It might be educational, at least, for folk here to be educated on the possibility that we have departed a long way from the pioneers who made it possible to sensitize a prepared flat surface to allow light from an image focused by a tiny opening or lens to leave its mark as an image. Your recent post in photo.net is helpful in this respect.
Maris Rusis said:It's manipulation all right but it isn't manipulation of the photographic process. Basically it is a cut 'n paste job that can be done with any photographs, drawings, paintings, whatever.
There is a difference between a person who makes a photograph, a photographer and a person who makes things out of photographs, a photographist . The famous American critic Arthur C. Danto has pointed out how often photographism is mistaken for photography .
The Wikipedia article about Roger Fenton moving cannon balls in Crimea is another example that shows how easily manipulation of subject matter can be confused with manipulation of photography .
In principle, photography does not lie, but liars may offer non-photographic lookalikes in order to deceive. An even stronger view suggests that photographs cannot, even in principle, be manipulated without ceasing to be photographs. A photograph occurs when a sample of subject matter penetrates a sensitive surface and occasions the picture forming marks in it. There is no room for a manipulators hand to get into this process. And if picture forming marks are fudged in by some external stratagem then the darn picture isn't a photograph anyway.
Terms:
Manipulation: I hate the term, since it has negative connotations. I'd use processing, work, development, masking, contrast adjustment and other specific terms.
Photographist: An interesting and probably accurate term for those who use photographs or parts of them to make something else. However, it breaks down when we overlay or cut up negatives and put them in the enlarger together and expose a new sheet of paper!
Maris Rusis said:And if picture forming marks are fudged in by some external stratagem then the darn picture isn't a photograph anyway.
So if one uses a card to dodge or rub more fresh developer on the slowly appearing ghost of some object on the film, then what? I could call all this manipulation!
Modern Definition of Photography: Photography cannot be fairly defined as an end of the road creative process that was completed once silver could be precipitated on to the fibers of a sensitized photopaper in the early 20th Century. I propose the following working definition that respects where photography started and celebrates where it might go in the future:
"Photography is a stratagem, an intelligent sequence of steps, (each with opportunities for creativity), for directing a likeness transmitted from an object, in the form of light altering a sensitive surface such that, it's particular qualities are translated in end to an agreeable form, so the resulting likeness can be enjoyed, over time, under suitable light. The resulting image can shared and is called a photograph."
It is not, in itself, "the truth" or some representation of the truth. That requires many controls, strict record taking, several cameras, witnesses, chemical and movement sensors perhaps and a whole lot more aids. Photography, outside of strict documentation, then, is just for spreading likeness of things, enjoying or musing about. It's not some religious doctrine. However, where I do concur with you is that it's somewhat dishonest to represent a digital photograph as being a silver gelatin photograph, even if it's printed chemically.
Even where I feel your words are extreme, your stance does serve the need to raise the flag of classical chemically-developed photography. That's the furnace where the standards of fine photography were formed and from which the concepts and quality, craft and expression were annealed with so much sacrifice. All of the pioneers shared imagination, devotion, insight, skill, craftsmanship and a stoic long term commitment. That's the simple way to making awesome pictures. Not to know about this foundation leaves us unprepared as we can go in our own journeys. It's the compass we need to guide our own explorations.
So Maris, keep on with your positions. I learn from your writing and find your photography, (as scant and tiny as I have seen), remarkable in quality and originality.
Asher