Can there be a concept of 'An Honest Photograph'.

<p>Can there be a concept of 'An Honest Photograph'? - or as photographers do we naturally look for 'the best photograph' and in doing so skew/edit any truth to our individual agendas?<br>

Small crowds photographed to fill the frame to give added power to the crowd. Two steps to the left to hide the telegraph pole. Clever framing to hide tourist shops/tourists and their rubbish when we visit beauty spots. Cloning out the unwanted in portraits and just about any other image. Bird on a stick in your back yard. Zoo animals shot tightly to make it look as if it's in the wild. Long focus lenses to pull distance together, wide angle lenses to separate. Tweaked contrast, tweaked colour, dropping to black and white to hide blemishes. <br>

I'm NOT saying we shouldn't do such things - that's what photographers do - making their points through selection and manipulation, but can the results still be considered 'honest'? </p>

 

>>> Can there be a concept of 'An Honest Photograph'.

 

I noticed you have B&W photos in your gallery. Lets start with that...

A photograph is a two dimensional object created through physical processes of some sort. It is always

honest, it's simply what is inside its boundaries.

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<p>that's what photographers do - making their points through selection and manipulation, but can the results still be considered 'honest'?</p>

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<p>If they're using the final results of their image-making process to communicate what they <em>honestly wanted to communicate</em>, then ... yes.</p>

<p>No there is no honest photography (at least in the sense you have laid out for us). Photographs are a representation of the real world. They are simply copies of things not things themselves. We can do our best to make them as realistic and non manipulated as possible but in the end they are just copies of the world. I could go on about if anything we perceive in anyway can be considered real, citing the allegory of the cave. I think this link (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Treachery_of_Images) relates best to the subject. It is a painting of a pipe and the words underneath translate to, "this is not a pipe." It looks like a pipe but it is not, it is simply a visual representation of a pipe. This is the same with photography, even if we make the most realistic, natural perspective, shot imaginable, all it is is a visual representation of something. So no I don't think there is an 'Honest Photograph'. </p>

<p>Brad - ..... what's your point?</p>

>>> Brad - ..... what's your point?

 

Loading your camera and shooting with B&W film, or converting a digital image to B&W in post is not

creating an "honest" representation of what was before you.

 

Using your words, it is skewing/editing the truth to your individual agenda. I'll give you a pass if you can

produce a doctor's note stating you are totally color blind.

<p>Steve, it sounds like by "honest" you mean without the input of a photographer. Anyone is going to bring their own ideas, preferences, etc. in the making of a photograph. Is that dishonest per se? Or are you re-disguising your previous argument in new terms?</p>

<p>You make the assumption that all photography has to be a document of record, and some how has to accurately portray the "reality" (whatever that is, because it differs for every one of us) in front of the lens.<br>

I reject this notion of photography utterly. I can make an honest image photographing what isn't there, or what you think is there in one manifestation, but may be something else. The honesty in these cases lies in my desire to make my image a catalyst and a conduit for a relationship between the image and the viewer, and through the image, me as its creator. I can honestly say that much of my imagery honestly does not portray the reality the vast majority of people see. Examples can be seen on my site, www.furiousennui.com .<br>

Frankly, I see little point in attempting to capture reality, because it is a Quixotic undertaking. Realities, and there are an infinite number of them as every sentient being in the universe views their environments from their own physical, social, cultural, motional and psychological viewpoints, only exist in the past because of the processing time lag. In essence, humans all live, on average 0.3 seconds in the past, because that is the average reaction time, plus the time take for the stimuli to reach our sense organs. We can only photograph what has been - never the present.</p>

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<p>We can only photograph what has been - never the present.</p>

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<p>But the camera records it's present when the shutter fires, not what you saw when you pushed the button. You are starting a chain of events that photographs the future when you push the shutter button.</p>

<p>Bob, not really. There is shutter lag, and the fact that the "present" is an infinitely small point of time, to the point where it doesn't really exist, whereas the camera records a period of time, or a succession of presents, even at 1/8000s. It is only in the future in the sense that when you throw a ball you set off a sequence of future events. At the moments of recording the initial light imprints are in the past compared to the last instant of exposure, and by the time you see the image it is well and truly past.</p>

<p>Which makes this entire conversation in the past, also. Which is a good thing.</p>

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<p>Which makes this entire conversation in the past, also. Which is a good thing.</p>

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<p>Agree. Completely. </p>

"Can there be a concept of 'An Honest Photograph'? - or as photographers do we naturally look for 'the best photograph' and in doing so skew/edit any truth to our individual agendas?"

 

Is this photo "An Honest Photograph"?<div></div>

I ask because I think it meets your criteria, but I don't think you would know that without a text card.

 

 

Text Card:

 

Pentax SPII, 28mm f3.5 Takumar, Kodak High Def 400

 

Setup: pre-focused to the DOF scale for aperture setting, pre-set to sunny 16, shutter cocked.

 

My wife and I are standing off the curb about to jaywalk when a notice movement in my peripheral vision. The camera is hanging off my left shoulder. Still looking in the opposite direction, I reached around with my right hand, turned the camera to face behind me, and released the shutter with my thumb. I didn't see what was captured until the negs came back from processing.

 

Is it an "honest photograph" as you mean?

<p>Don, as an objective document of record it is probably as "honest" as the physical limitations of the technology allow, but, of course a photograph isn't actually capable of honesty. Accuracy, perhaps, but honesty is a trait only a self-aware being can exhibit. It is the photographer's intention that really matters. If the intention of the photographer was to take a completely random image, then he is probably being honest. If the intention of the photographer was to take a photo of a pretty woman without his wife's knowledge, knowing she would disapprove or be hurt by it, then maybe the image isn't as innocent as it may seem, or rather the photographer, having already established that a photograph, lacking sentience, cannot be innocent, guilty, honest, happy or manic.</p>

<p>Matt and Jeff, I don't think that dismissing this sort of conversation is a good thing. I take the ethics of photography seriously. I know, from personal experience, that not all togs do. At least one of them served time for failing to pay heed to ethics/morality. Take the famously cropped image of the young, naked girl fleeing a burning Vietnamese village as an example. The uncropped version told a completely different story, showing the twin columns of indifferent US troops filing into the village they had just napalmed. For many it's the difference between Sally Mann's iconic images and exploitative imagery.<br>

For decades I have said that, while the camera itself may not lie, the same cannot be said of the photographer.</p>

Peter, I agree that "accuracy", well defined in the sense you mean, it is a a far better term than "honesty"

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<p>Matt and Jeff, I don't think that dismissing this sort of conversation is a good thing</p>

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<p>The topic of the conversation was originally stated as:</p>

 

<blockquote>

<p>Can there be a concept of "An Honest Photograph"</p>

</blockquote>

<p>Then you say:</p>

 

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<p>of course a photograph isn't actually capable of honesty</p>

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<p>With such a direct statement, it doesn't appear that there is any point in <em>not</em> dismissing this sort of conversation.</p>

 

<p>Peter RYAN - I was not trying to dismiss discussion on the subject, simply putting in my own input on what I think. Can photography tell a story and can that story be representative of the truth? Certainly. But as I say photographs are simply a representation of the real world. They capture a moment(s) in time for us to observe but they are not actually that moment. It's like looking in the mirror, it looks like us in there but in reality it is just a reflection. I think photographers certainly can create photographs that are truthful but no photograph can truly replace a moment in time. </p>

<p>OH HELP! Here we go back to the old and moldy, done that, been there topics where we beat the crap out of "truth" and honest" photography. Soon we'll hit the "what is art?" diversion. For you just boarding our merry-go-round please read some of the back topics.</p>

 

<p>What Stephen formulated as question in this thread is whether there can be a <strong>concept</strong> of "an honest photograph". You can, by definition, make concepts on anything, so why not ? If we had a suggestion on such a concept, we would have something to discuss, as for example : "An honest photograph is a photograph that doesn't lie". We have been there before, and it did not lead us anywhere of great interest, as far as I remember.</p>

<p>Well, don't we have a lovely collection of jaded cynics. I talked about a football match 35 years ago, so we don't need to talk about football any more, and the shadows on the cave walls are all I need, really. You know, someone just might say something that your, obviously vast, intellects had not previously cogitated on. Some people might enjoy talking about the topic, whether because it helps their creative process or just for knowledge's sake with no expectation of a definitive answer. Someone might be a new, keen photographer who would like to discuss these issues to clarify their own creative positions. If you've had the conversation before, and don't care to again I think it is blatantly obvious what you need to do. Just ignore it, rather than leap down the throat of someone committing their first posts on their first day on what, they have been told, is one of the best photography communities on the 'net. <br>

To get back on the topic someone obviously felt was worth asking, and accepting his rewording from "honest" to "accurate", my point is why does an image have to be accurate? Accurate according to whom? I would regard some of my most minimalistic and abstract pieces as being entirely accurate, just not of the scene that most people see. This delusion that photographs must look real baffles me. We don't expect that of painting, sculpture, dance or the others arts.</p>

<p>Excuse my impatience. If the topics were like a football match, other than stats and trivia, there would be little to inform the new and keen. Looking at past topics is a quick way to get up to where things left off at least. There are no doubt many gaps to fill with "concepts." Luis mentioned photographer-less cameras. Did we miss blind photographers? My concept a while back was camera-less photography but it never gained any traction. I'm letting the technology mature before re-introducing it again.<br /> We could try and conceive of dishonest photographs to contrast with similar "honest" ones. Start with FSA stuff. Read "<a href="http://www.amazon.com/Believing-Seeing-Observations-Mysteries-Photography/dp/1594203016/ref=wl_it_dp_o_npd?ie=UTF8&coliid=I3Q8RGAX6D0CHU&colid=29GIRMSK49FSS">Believing Is Seeing: Observations on the Mysteries of Photography</a>" by Errol Morris.</p>

<p>I totally, completely, unequivocally and irrevocably disagree about black and white photographs inherently not being "honest". It's not the colour or lack of colour that makes honesty, it's what's in the picture, or what's not in it.</p>

<p>Are NASA's radio photos of space dishonest?</p>