As a digital photographer, my key post-processing tool to edit my photography is Photoshop CS3. This program enables me to do everything that the film photographer can do with a darkroom: edit contrast, saturation, color balance, etc. The problem with Photoshop is that not only does it allow me to accomplish these tasks, but it also presents a whole other world of possibilities. I'm sure many of you have seen evidence of the power of Photoshop; it can make a person with severe skin problems look like they have flawless skin, or turn someone's eyes from green to blue. An extreme example can be viewed here [http://youtube.com/watch?v=PG-25nNlEkYhere], in which an obese woman is made to look like a skinny model.
This is where the problem begins: because of the choices that Photoshop affords, the photographer is left to draw the line between what constitutes enhancement of the picture, and what is considered lies. Is erasing blemishes merely enhancing a person's appearance, or is it misrepresentative of who they really are?
While more and more people gain access to the popular photo-editing program, evidence is beginning to appear in popular networking sites such as Facebook and Myspace. On my personal Facebook account, I can easily show you numerous friends whose profile pictures hardly resemble their appearance in real life. It's so easy to press a few buttons and create instant makeup, but by doing so, we erase the very purpose of pictures themselves: to capture a real moment in history. The more we misrepresent ourselves and our society through falsely doctored photos, the sooner we begin to erase our identities themselves.
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Beautiful writing and so true. Its almost as if people are using photoshop to make them look more attractive instead of fixing the basics of a picture, light, contrast, ect.
i really like the way you put this.
"Is erasing blemishes merely enhancing a person's appearance, or is it misrepresentative of who they really are?"
It depends on what the image is for. Different degrees of creative licence should really be applied to images in regard to digital editing.
If the photo is meant to be photo journalistic, then anything beyond adjusting levels, colour correcting and cropping is essentially disengenuous.
If the image is to be used in a fine art situation, then there should be no rules. In such a scenario a fine artist will use whatever medium he chooses, in whatever manner he chooses; many photographers are fine artists. Digital editors like Photoshop are merely a new generation of photographers tools.
If the image is to be used in Advertising, forget about it. Your image will find it's way into the hands of designers and retouchers, who will do whatever they want with it, and advertising isn't really known for it's scrupples.
In regard to fashion photography and magazine cover airbrushing, I think ultimately the fashion industry, like the movie industry, should not be blamed entirely for the publics' inability to differentiate art from life. I view fashion photography as an extremely artistic vein of photography. High fashion, in itself is all about artistic expression. Fahion is part of the arts and fashion photography is the creation of still images that reflect that artistic subject in an equally artistic manner. If you banned airbrushing, photographers would simply use lighting and make-up more effectively to achieve the same effect. All that would result would be a different style of misrepresentation emerge.
When airbrushing should not be allowed and where a set standard for lighting should be enforced is in regard to cosmetics advertising. There should be an all out ban on retouching beyond levels and colour correction. Airbrushing in this scenario and posibly a few others is making a non-verbal claim about the product, which is in fact untrue. When you have a model, who is lit creatively and heavily airbrushed endorsing a cosmetic product, it makes a non-verbal claim that her perfect, digitally manipulated, skin or hair, or whatever, are the result of the product. Advertisers can't play innocent on that one, it's plain as day lying.
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I am the people my mother warned me about.
http://www.progressiveu.org/blog/tuffgong
You make many excellent points, and I can see you've really thought this out. What I understood from your thoughts is that there are different categories of photos and their subsequent levels of editing. This brings up another question, however; is it still accurate to call fine art and commercial categories "photography" equally? I can see the many appropriate uses of Photoshop, but my concern is that the software is blurring the lines between the abilities of the photographer and the abilities of the software. If you feel like it would be appropriate to totally rearrange the components of a picture or add or subtract from it, then be wary of calling it "photography" still, and consider giving it another more fitting label such as graphic design. I think in this way, we can keep a better distinction between what is real and what's not.
"is it still accurate to call fine art and commercial categories "photography" equally?"
I would say yes. Both catagories just require different approaches.
"I can see the many appropriate uses of Photoshop, but my concern is that the software is blurring the lines between the abilities of the photographer and the abilities of the software."
The photographer's ability to use the software is part of modern photography, in the same manner darkroom technique was prior to Photoshop. I think a lot of the snobbery surrounding the use of Photoshop comes from an older generation of photographer, who are classically trained, and who feel threatened by the new technology. They pass this attitude on to other photographers. I have friends who adhere to this way of thinking, but one constant amongst them is that none of them excell in Photoshop technique.
I noticed a similiar bias against technology from older lecturers when I first entered my course in Visual Communications. The older lecturers at the time were clasically trained in graphic design, they insisted that the PC was useful only to the degree that they personally could use it to and that anything that was produced on it by young students who embraced the technology to level beyond the lecturers frame of reference was little more than cheating. But the fact was, they just feared new technology that they were unfamiliar with and didn't want it saturating their classes, because they would have to learn whole new sets of skills in order to teach students the new technology, but also they would need to understand techniques inside out so they could mark projects. Use of computers was banned in our course in 1st year.
What happened over the 4 year course was that new lecturers were hired specifically to teach specific applications like Adobe Illustrator, Flash, Quark, Dreamweaver etc. as they were recognized as the latest set of tools for graphic design.
I lived with a photography student who was in second year when I was in my third year of my course. She had that traditionalist mentality drilled into her by lecturers who were trained using manual SLR, medium formats etc. They only did basic Photoshop and were focused toward a more classical training in photography. As a result of this kind of training, many should-be professional photographers are finding themselves being left for dead in the image making sector, by those who understand and respond to changes in technology and understand the dynamics of the commercial market.
In commercial photography, the client generally wants the most striking image possible, very few will give a rats ass how the image is concieved. This is why in advertising, photographers' work ends up in the hands of retouchers and graphic designers, who often have a more advanced understanding of photoshop and the willingness to do what a particuliar photographer might not. I've been handed photgraphy jobs that should have gone to a professional photographer, because the ones that were hired refused to use modern digital techniques.
Photoshop is a tool, it is the new wave of technology. Just like darkroom techniques constantly evolved, so do other photographic techniques. An amazing photographer is a master of all his tools, he doesn't just select a couple and declare all the others as cheating. A creative photographer learns to use all his tools in innovative ways, in creative ways, he doesn't set strict rules on how tools should be used. There is no line between the abilities of the photographer and the abilities of the software, the software has no abilities at all in the hands of a photographer who can't use it.
The software requires skill to produce results; sure even rank amateurs can produce nice images by toying around with Photoshop, but they can't produce the results that a properly trained photographer should be able to. It's just like the camera itself; in the hands of pretty much anybody, a camera is bound to capture at least 1 nice shot on a day out shooting, but in the hands of a professional the camera can do a whole lot more. The problem is, that too many photographers have neglected photoshop and are now feeling threatened by the fact that amateurs and hobbyists are developing more advanced digital skills than they have as professionals.
"If you feel like it would be appropriate to totally rearrange the components of a picture or add or subtract from it, then be wary of calling it "photography""
I do, I call it image making. The thing is that when image making is done using purely photographic elements, in the eyes of many clients and viewers alike, it is photographic work. Photographers are going to need to eveolve as image makers if the want to work in many very competitive areas of professional image making. I very rarely outsource any photography any more, because essentially a professional photographer will charge me a hefty sum for an image, which I then have to spend hours working on. Photographer friends of mine keep complaining because few of their graphic designer friends are outsourcing work to them, but the fact is they aren't meeting our needs as photographers. I've heard some friends grumble about designers stealing photographers' jobs, but the fact is that designers shouldn't be able to do this in the first place. My feeling is that if a photographer doesn't want to do what is required for a job, then the job isn't theirs.
" think in this way, we can keep a better distinction between what is real and what's not."
But photography is about so much more than what is real and what is not. To completely divorce the two, would be like saying that any painting which isn't photo-realistic, should be classified as something apart from painting.
To sum up I'd like to cite a question put to a partner in German design studio Bionic Systems. He was asked this:
"You're a graphic designer. But isn't anybody with a copy of Photoshop a graphic designer these days?"
his answer:
"Yes, in the same way anybody with a set of tools is a mechanic."
That applies to photographers too.
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I am the people my mother warned me about.
http://www.progressiveu.org/blog/tuffgong