"Straight Digital Photography"

xsquiggy · October 18, 2004

Does anyone else refuse to "touch up" your digital images?

This is not a right/wrong question, so please check your ego at the door. And feel free to discuss the pros/cons of straight photography vs. fake

.

GREAPER · October 18, 2004

Calling a touched up photo fake kinda lets us know where you stand.

It depends on what your purpose is.

I take photos to make images I like. I will use whatever means it takes to make the images I want to make. I am not trying to record history or the news, I am creating artistic images that appeal to me.

ian408 · October 18, 2004

Remember that even the famous burn and dodge their stuff

I try to keep my photoshop'ing to a minimum. But I don't have a problem with
it. I have occassionally taken it to the extreme. But then that's been done
before digital too.

OTOH, if I took a picture that represented a newsworthy event, I don't
think I'd want to do anything to it.

Ian

Andy · October 18, 2004

i post process 100% of my shots, since i shoot exclusively in raw and let the camera do nothing re: color, sharpness, contrast, etc. 80-90% of my shots get nothing more than whitebalance fine tuning, exposure correction (via levels and / or curves adjustment), color adjustment (hue / saturation), and sharpness.

i think most all digitial camera images benefit by some postprocessing. now some cameras, you can set the in-camera settings to do this post-processing for you - but make no mistake, it's still post-processing, just done in-camera

xsquiggy · October 18, 2004

GREAPER wrote:

Calling a touched up photo fake kinda lets us know where you stand.

Where I really stand is "There is no right/wrong answer."

FreeUps · October 19, 2004

I am a firm believer in Photoshopping. Anything you do to create the image that makes you happy, do it. I usually stick to basic darkroom techniques, but sometimes I go over the top. Regardless, I dont feel guilty.

The only thing I will stick to my guns on is my composition. I've never cropped an image in my life. I don't know why I'm a believer in it, but I am. If I am unhappy with the way I shot the image, I will go back to it. Theres always a reshoot..

Other than that, I'll go to the extreme with photoshop. Like I said, theres no guilt.

lynnma · October 19, 2004

I think it totally depends on what you are trying to produce. If it's a document of some historic fact or what ever I would not touch it but mostly we are creating images of things we remember.. how we remember them is part of the post processing I think. I think Andy is right on, the camera processes the image, our brains process the image. I spose the question is.. what is the image for. It's a picture after all, just as a painting would be, it's our interpretation of the scene, moment, feeling etc etc that counts and how we see and want to remember it, and how we want others to share that experience.

phew.. I'll put me box back now and go out for breakfast...

ginger_55 · October 19, 2004

xsquiggy wrote:

Does anyone else refuse to "touch up" your digital images?

This is not a right/wrong question, so please check your ego at the door. And feel free to discuss the pros/cons of straight photography vs. fake .

I just happened on this thread. That is interesting: Fake Photography........

I will have to think on it. What would "fake photography" be made of, or what would be the process.

A fake painting is one not by the painter whose name is on the painting, is it not? A fake photo?

Never seen one, but then I was not looking.

ginger

Trying to get out of here to shoot in grey, sunless, colorless world. For a 2 hr mid day break??? Maybe this is one I should fake:D

nadi · October 19, 2004

This is also an ongoing debate I have with a close friend of fine (respectfully of course!) He is a painter, and cursed with the compulsion to make everything he paints as close to reality as possible. To him, the art is in creating the "perfect" reproduction of the subject.

I disagree. To me, art is about expressing something about yourself, your subject, and the interaction between them. It doesn't have to look real, even if it is. It just has to stimulate something in the viewer. To me, thats the beauty of photographing in digital - you can really push the limits of the image to suit your imagination.

I would love a painting hung on my wall by this particular friend of mine, but to me his ultra-realistic paintings lack something vital. And when I excitedly show him my latest "masterpiece" and try to convey the work it took in photoshop, I can see him try to hide his disapproval. I guess it takes different people to make the world interesting, and thats why we have been great friends for so long

RocketMan · October 20, 2004

I've been reading quite a lot about this, as well as the pro's and cons of RAW and I think it boils down to what you're trying to do with the photos you take. Just like there are painters who believe in realism, there are others who prefer styles such as impressionistic, or cubist. One is no more “right” than any another, it’s simply how you wish to intrept what you see. As others have said it depends, in part, on what you are trying to capture, real events such as news, or something for a technical record, in which case a minimal processing would probably suit better. But if you are going after a mood or feeling then you may need/want to do more to enhance the photo. To me that is the key, enhancement of a photo is great, whereas modifying may not be so good, unless you are trying to record more than just an image.

Right now I'm trying to concentrate on getting it in the camera, but it's not that I think photoshopping is "wrong" it's just that I am trying to learn what my camera can do and how close I can get it "see" what I "see". Once I'm more comfortable with it, then I may try more things in post processing, but still that for me would only be to bring out what was there in life, not change or add something that wasn't. That is unless I was trying for "surrealism", in which case, I guess anything goes.

RM

mercphoto · October 20, 2004

As little as possible

xsquiggy wrote:

Does anyone else refuse to "touch up" your digital images?

I try to do as little post-processing as possible for a variety of reasons. For one, I'm trying to do photography, not photo-illustration. I'm not saying there is anything wrong with it, its jut not what *I* am trying to do. The only time photo-illustration is wrong is when it is done as photo-journalism. I think in that realm it is clearly "wrong" to process an image much. But I don't do journalistic photography anyway.

I'm also a bit too lazy to do much post processing. I don't enjoy it. And when I do process an image it is because I need to correct the image to become an accurate reflection of what I saw in the view finder. It may simply be that I don't have a good digital workflow and I've made that chore hard on myself when it doesn't need to be.

I am also influenced by advice given to me by two professional sports photographers. "Learn to get the image right in the camera" Learn how to use the camera, don't rely on the computer as your crutch.

Lastly, I have color vision problems and I find the thought of processing an image for saturation and tone a daunting one. But I find it relatively easy to capture an image in a realistic manner. My 20D does a great job with white balance, and I have a grey card to use when things are critical. But I do not feel confident in adjusting colors in such a way that they become better and not have an obvious processed look to them.

For those reasons I strive for accuracy in my images.

Andy is correct, however, that cameras that let you adjust saturation/etc. are post-processing an image for you. And you can choose a setting that makes an image more realistic or more "pleasing" or more "processed" as you desire.

ginger_55 · October 20, 2004

I have a routine I follow in post. Levels, saturation, contrast, USM (unless I forget that). Someone here, don't remember who, said that was the minimum one should do, so I incorporated it into a routine. I could do it blind. Color blind, whatever. Sometimes I skip a step, like contrast, sometimes I add a specific extra saturation, like red or yellow, in the saturation process.

I usually use the whole photo as it comes out of the camera. I learned that was the only way to be "true" as a photographer, I learned that at a photo workshop up in Wisconsin in the 1970s. I am proud that more than not that is how my shots are done. However, I have come in on them to check the focus, when they are in the camera. They would look good cropped, too.

I am not a fanatic. I am lazy. Slack. Don't understand much about layers. I, too, aspired towards photo journalism. I have found that it is easier in my world right now to do landscapes, dogs, beaches, etc. Not much in the way of photojournalism, but that was the mind set I had for years. I will try to go either way now.

(Anyone who saw my last "arty" entry in the last challenge, perhaps that could be explained by the fact that my background is more in the arts, and my previous husband of 14 years was a commercial artist. I used to "think" with him of ideas. I like it all)

So, I have no "morals" here. I just like to take photos. I would prefer not to have to do much to it, but I sometimes will. I don't think we are "there" yet in this new digital world, we go through fads and stuff with everything, it seems. Now we have the technology why not use it. Maybe all that will swing back to a new "less is more".

I am 65 years old, my photography is more in the past........... I will not see the future, but I am sure enjoying the present, in every way.

By the way, I have been doing digital, albeit with a small canon elph, started with an S100, years ago. My husband, a pro, said it would never catch on. He does not do it yet. I love that digital is here. I love that I am here to experience it.

(The photo journalism idea of being "in the field", "on the run", that probably explains my reluctance to use a tripod. My father was an amateur photographer also, he thought more than one photo of something was over shooting, my idea was get 100 or more photos of something, come back with the goods. We joked about it. He used a tripod. Got up in the morning on his trips to take the sunset coming up over some great ancient ruin. One shot, or two at the most. Good photos. We were not in competition, different approaches, some good natured joking.)

ginger

lynnesite · October 20, 2004

I post-process 100% of my shots, in such a way that meets the basic editing criteria over at dpchallenge.com. Rarely do I spot-edit. Unlike the guy who said you can reshoot and it's not necessary to post process, when you are shooting fickle beasts like horses who don't take direction well, you can't reshoot.

I also fix the horizon if I blew it--I have a 2 degree list to port some of the time, and make it interesting by listing to starboard occasionally too. Can't stand looking at images where that hasn't been fixed.

Some of my work is for magazines, editorial/storytelling, and that gets basic editing only.

Since a few challenges ago, I've forced myself to shoot mostly RAW, only changing when shooting events where the storage time to CF is a factor. Now that I'm using Dr. Brown's Image Processor to batch the RAW proofs into JPGs for gallery upload, I'll probably stay in RAW 100% of the time.

Check out [URL=http://]www.equinephotocontest.com/winners.asp?cat_id=2[/URL]
The first image was shot as a JPG--horizon corrected, cropped, a little noise reduction and USM. Pretty much as is. The 2nd place image was *extensively* photoshopped/filters galore. How do I know? Both images were shot the same rainy afternoon, there were 25 of us shooting in that barn aisle. I know what the light was like. I got to see the other peoples' rendition both shots at a photo review that night. Nobody caught the horse and rider in repose as I did with the conformational requirements met as well, and there could have been no reshoot. Just lucky. Especially shooting JPG.

IMO the second place shot should have been entered in the competition's "Open Creative" division. Not quibbling, just an observation.

On this page: [URL=http://]www.equinephotocontest.com/winners.asp?cat_id=3[/URL] I suspect that there was a background and sky replacement done--and the rest have the kind of post-processing I call "normal".

I don't like to replace backgrounds wholesale and am not completely comfortable with the shooting two landscapes one metered for foreground, one for background and merging--but the latter is something that could be done in the traditional darkroom and acceptable in my worldview.

Lynne

wxwax · October 22, 2004

My 2 cents....

Any photograph may be touched up using "darkroom" techniques.

No photograph purporting to represent reality can be altered beyond primitive, basic darkroom techniques. i.e. dodging, burning, cropping. Anything more and the photo no longer represents reality.

Photographs for personal use, for sale as art or for sale as craftsmanship can be further altered in anyway that the creator wishes. They're not selling fact, they're selling feeling.

We all have our pecadillos. Some don't like to crop. Others, like me, don't really like replacing skies or inserting objects. But those are purely personal preferences. The larger question is: what is the photo presented as being? If it's presented as fact, I think one's obligation is to limit the retouching. Anything else, all bets are off.

ggetzin · August 27, 2006

I like this definition: straight photography, a style of detail and focus which
portrays subjects simply and directl. It was a reaction to pictorial photography by greats such as Ansel Adams, Paul Strand and others.
Adams probably wrote in the clearest way about it, acknowledging that
the images were not meant to be exactly like the scene.

Processes don't make for the style. Adams saw digital coming in 1981 when rewriting some of his technique books, "The Camera" etc. He loved Polaroid, experimental film and would use an array of chemicals in developing to
get what he wanted. He would be head over heels about digital and would likley know more about how it works than anyone. But his processes were used to portray the scene in realistic ways--no distorition whatsoever, only tonal and light change.

There is no reason why digital cannot be used to make straight photography images. It produces some differences in texture, etc., just like different films do. It is an incredilby fast and pleasing method.

I still like this type of photography better and it is easier for me to make good images by way of a straight style. I use only a part of what Photoshop can do. Very seldom do I use a filter, or patch anything. Just use levels, contrast, channels, saturation and size and mode tools.

Adams and the Group 64 photographers tended to look down on other styles. I think there is room for anything. I am just glad that some still know what straight photography is.

claudermilk · August 28, 2006

Good post.

The OP's fiinal comments kind of belies the whole initial "leave the ego at the door" thing

Anyway, to address the question & not the bait, if you're shooting for art anything goes; it really depends on the shooter/artist's intent & what they want to do with the image. For journalism, anything beyond a simple color correction is a problem, witness the brouhaha over Reuters a few weeks ago.

For myself I usually like to get things as right in the camera as I can since it saves PP time on the computer. There are shots where I intend from the moment I frame it that there will be significant PP--usually a B&W conversion. There's even been a few ocasions where a "ruined" shot got some play time in PS and ended up a cool, heavily-processed arty piece that turned a mistake into a cool digital art image.

The fact of the matter is that post processing has been a part of photography ever since the beginning whether you care to admit it or not. Digital is just a different set of tools; developer bath/enlarger/paper=PC & Photoshop/printer. Think about it, without PP, there would be no image to look at (yeah, ok there's a few older processes that this doesn't apply--the exception that proves the rule

).

bham · August 28, 2006

You could have straight digital photography, but in reality you never had straight film photography. It doesn't exist. Once the image was captured on the negative it then has to be developed. Even though many machines do a very precisise process of chemically exposing the film, you could and did get variables, not only from time, the chemicals used, the calibration of the machine for variation, etc. Then the process of making the print whether manually in a darkroom or in a machine. In fact taking the exact same image on two different rolls of film and having each developed and then printed, I would say there would be a good chance you could end up with a difference in what was produced. The difference not being much more than what is done in basic photoshop post processing. Remember that all film developed by machine must be regularly calibrated for a reason. So people doing basic photoshoping of images (levels, curves, color correction), are just doing what most of the minilabs used to do to the images for printing.

Nikolai · August 29, 2006

xsquiggy wrote:

Does anyone else refuse to "touch up" your digital images?

This is not a right/wrong question, so please check your ego at the door. And feel free to discuss the pros/cons of straight photography vs. fake .

With no ego, no pun, all due respect, etc, I dare to say the following:
most of the people I've personally met who raised this sort of questions simply don't know how to use photo-retouching software properly.
I know: I myself was one of them just a few years ago.

Luckily, I got healed, not without a help from the friendly communities such as dgrin and old stf.

There is nothing, absolutely nothing straight in any light capturing process as we know them now. Chemicals, timing and temperatures in film developing process, particular CCD/CMOS response curves and hardware algorithms used in digital cameras... Only very naive person can call this ginormous set of possible variations "straight" or "true"..

Dixi.

Richard · August 29, 2006

Nikolai wrote:

There is nothing, absolutely nothing straight in any light capturing process as we know them now. Chemicals, timing and temperatures in film developing process, particular CCD/CMOS response curves and hardware algorithms used in digital cameras... Only very naive person can call this ginormous set of possible variations "straight" or "true"..

Dixi.

Well put, Nik. Processing is processing, whether done with chemicals, in-camera hardware and firmware, or post-processing software. There's even a new HP camera that has a shooting mode to make people look thinner!

Seems like the answer depends entirely on the purpose of the pic. If you are doing police forensics or photojournalism, cloning is definitely a violation of trust. But enhancing contrast might make the pic yield more information, so that would be OK. If the pic is in the realm of artistic expression, then anything goes. Insisting that post-processing makes a pic somehow less pure seems to me misguided and vaguely moralistic.

thebigsky · August 29, 2006

Why is this question always raised as though it's something new? Haven't film photographers used everything in their arsenal, filters, pushing film, tinting, development tricks etc for years to 'alter' their images from what the camera actually saw.

Surely we're striving to produce art here rather than historical documents?

TomaS · August 29, 2006

Silly question
The implication is that if one forgets to set the correct White Balance (or whatever), but can correct it in PP, one should not becasue that would not be a 'pure' image.

It also implies that the picture taking device is somehow perfect. Like every camera ever made would record the same thing.

Or that technical decisions (shutter speed vs. apeture) do not exit.

Dee · August 29, 2006

My two cents
Or maybe more.

My ideal camera would take pictures the way I see them.

Until that happens... I'm stuck making adjustments in photoshop... get rid of the "haze," get rid of the "too much blue caused by fog," use shadow/highlight to get more dynamic range, etc.

I straighten my crooked horizons (gee, what happened

it looked straight in the viewfinder, I know it did!) I crop because my telephoto isn't long enough, and I clone -- where did that tree trunk come from?

I darken backgrounds so the object I want to have more emphasis has more emphasis... I'll hold a piece of white paper to reflect light in to my subject, I'll drape black cloth behind the object to make it stand out more...

Do I want to do these things? NO.... I want the camera to read my mind and take the photo the way I see it....

Until that happens.....

On the other hand, I recently went to one "great photographer" website where it was obvious that extensive photoshop was used -- the photos were fantastic, but they were "art" and not anything one would see in nature. I'm sure they sell, but as an artist/photographer myself I really call that much processing "cheating." It's no longer a photo, but a piece of art based on digital photography.

As others have written, it's also what the photo is being used for. I can take a photo of a pretty girl and be happy with it, but if it's meant to sell a product, that same photo has to be retouched, blurred, smoothed, cloned, background removed, replaced, chubby bits thinned, etc., to be suitable for today's marketing values purposes. (note: marketing's values & purposes, not mine.)

Also, people like different types of color -- some like vivid, bright, over saturated colors, and anything less doesn't "pop." Other people like more natural, gentle, soothing colors.

Remember the film days? Ever get a photo enlarged or reprinted only to get the print back and the color didn't match the original? Same thing really with digital photography -- it's how it's processed that defines the photo.

So personally, I try to seek a balance between what the camera gives me and how I remembered the scene. If I'm entering a challenge or contest, however, you better believe if I don't post process the photo to death, it won't "pop" and it won't get voted for! Been there, tried that, done that.

And, if you want to sell photos -- well, then there's no holds barred. Add a sail boat to that lake -- or a rowboat, add some birds in the foreground, change the background, change the foreground, clone out that crooked branch, select those leaves and give them autumn colors, there's no limit...

I will add, that one photographer actually added a letter combination code explaining how much manipulation was done to the photos on the site. I found that rather intriguing! And I bet it doesn't hurt his sales one bit.

claudermilk · August 30, 2006

Dee wrote:

On the other hand, I recently went to one "great photographer" website where it was obvious that extensive photoshop was used -- the photos were fantastic, but they were "art" and not anything one would see in nature. I'm sure they sell, but as an artist/photographer myself I really call that much processing "cheating." It's no longer a photo, but a piece of art based on digital photography.

Cheating? How so? That seems contradictory to the rest of your post. So his tools for his art are a digital camera & PS instead of canvas, paint, and brushes. I don't understand how using the tools at hand is "cheating" anything.

Dee · August 30, 2006

Is it really a photo?

claudermilk wrote:

Cheating? How so? That seems contradictory to the rest of your post. So his tools for his art are a digital camera & PS instead of canvas, paint, and brushes. I don't understand how using the tools at hand is "cheating" anything.

OK, a true to life story, with the names of the innocent protected.

Jimmy sends me a link to a photograph. It's a beautiful photograph of a lake scene. Jimmy knows where the photo was taken, goes to the same place and takes a photo. The two images look very different.

Jimmy asks the photographer, Joe, how he managed to get the photo. Joe proceeds to show him his original image and his digitally enhanced/manipulated image where he cloned out trees, added a tree to "frame" the scene in the foreground (from somewhere else), added some flowers along the path from a photo taken somewhere else, added a float with some canoes (from another photo taken somewhere else), cloned out some houses from the far shore, and added some misty hills from another photo. Joe did an excellent job, all the light and shadows match.

Jimmy wrote me and said, "but he cheated." That's not what that spot looks like at all.

Nikolai · August 30, 2006

Great story, Dee!

Dee wrote:

OK, a true to life story, with the names of the innocent protected.
...
Jimmy wrote me and said, "but he cheated." That's not what that spot looks like at all.

Funny, in my pre-PS life I felt the same way about Andy's famous "Horse in the fog" (ole gud stf times:-).

The difference is, however, that instead of whyning and crying uncle I decided that I need to learn how to do this kind of "cheating" myself.
And I actually did!

Richard · August 30, 2006

Dee wrote:

Jimmy wrote me and said, "but he cheated." That's not what that spot looks like at all.

You know, it just occurred to me that if you go to Yosemite, it doesn't look at all like Ansel Adams pics. It's in color.

I wonder what the purists have to say about that.

bham · August 30, 2006

rsinmadrid wrote:

You know, it just occurred to me that if you go to Yosemite, it doesn't look at all like Ansel Adams pics. It's in color. I wonder what the purists have to say about that.

And Ansel burned and dodged with the best of them. I have read a couple of books about his prints, etc and they by no means were straight prints. Heavily adjusted in the darkroom. He didn't add things that didn't exist, just adjusted things that were there.

saurora · August 30, 2006

Over-zealous?

rsinmadrid wrote:

Well put, Nik. Processing is processing, whether done with chemicals, in-camera hardware and firmware, or post-processing software. There's even a new HP camera that has a shooting mode to make people look thinner!

Seems like the answer depends entirely on the purpose of the pic. If you are doing police forensics or photojournalism, cloning is definitely a violation of trust. But enhancing contrast might make the pic yield more information, so that would be OK. If the pic is in the realm of artistic expression, then anything goes. Insisting that post-processing makes a pic somehow less pure seems to me misguided and vaguely moralistic.

Seems that no one is resistant to the temptation to "tweak" their images. Check out tonight's news regarding an over-zealous CBS employee in this thread:

http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20060830/ap_en_tv/tv_couric_altered_photo

pathfinder · August 30, 2006

When folks shot 'chromes for publication,, they dropped them off to the photo editor and believed they were used just as they shot them. Not!!

Dan Margulis describes the processes the photo editors used to get the images ready for publication. They involved correction of color, contrast, cropping, sharpening with a mask, converting to B&W, etc, etc.

But the shooter didn't do them then; the techs who ran the drum scanners and the layout software did it, so the shooters thought their work was used without any after processing. It was just done by someone else.

Now, we can do it ourselves, to our own satisfaction.

And that is fine by me!!:):

Shay Stephens · August 30, 2006

It comes down to freedom
I tend to spend my time global editing in raw. I only really dig down into photoshop spot editing for things that need special attention, cover art for dvd cases, large prints, etc. Probably 95% or more of my work only gets global editing.

That is not to say I am opposed to any kind of editing a photographer deems needed or even desirable. I would err on the side of artistic freedom everytime rather than stick to a notion of "purity". A photographer needs to be mentally free to pursue their direction, be that direction mimialist or mega-photoshopping.

silvershoes · August 31, 2006

Apologies in advance, this is a subject that gets me going.

I'm not comfortable with the idea of refusing to touch a photograph, simply because it's the "all or nothing" syndrome in my eyes.

There are no hard and fast rules, it comes down to judgment and intent.

If I'm shooting a newsworthy event, then manipulation isn't appropriate, although it's hard to call sharpening or noise reduction manipulation. Neither impacts the original photo in a manner that would change the capture more than cosmetically.

If I'm shooting art, in the form of a landscape to be printed and hung, then it's fair in my eyes to clone out trash. If the same photo is intended to document bad behavior and ecology, the trash should stay in. (Never mind the folks who manicure a scene by picking up that trash - performing a public service - before shooting.)

If the camera, due to its limited ability to handle stops of light when compared to the human eye, blows out a sky, I see nothing wrong with working to bring back that sky. It could be argued that in so doing, I've presented a truer picture of what I saw and what you would have seen if you had been there. I fail to see how using an ND grad filter is inherently more virtuous than using a software version after the fact.

Deliberately manipulating a photo with the intent to deceive or sway emotion (like putting a person into a situation when they were never there) is wrong, but any form of deliberate misrepresentation is wrong, be it pictorial or text or speech. The software is merely the tool, the intent was bad.

Photography is itself a form of manipulation. We impact a scene through lens choice and composition, showing the subject the way we want it to be seen, emphasizing some objects and minimizing others. Isn't moving the camera so a trash can is hidden behind a bush manipulation? If the goal was strictly to document, the Brownie box would be the only camera we'd ever need.

The whole point of being an adult is learning to judge appropriately based on the situation. Creating an arbitrary rule that says the camera is always right puts us at the mercy of technology. If I shoot the same scene with my *istD and one of those cheap drugstore cameras, the results will be quite different - which reality is the "true" one?

"Refusing" to use software is a choice, and if you can live with it, I'm happy for you. I just see nothing virtuous in the choice, I'm sorry.

/end soapbox

"Straight Digital Photography"

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