'Digital images can't be trusted...'

<h1 >Digital images can't be trusted, says war photographer Don McCullin</h1>

<p>http://www.theguardian.com/artanddesign/2015/nov/27/don-mccullin-war-photographer-digital-images</p>

<blockquote>

<p>"All of a sudden the art world has caught up with photography and they are trying to hijack us."<br>

</p>

</blockquote>

<p>Funny, for a really long time, photographers were unhappy that the art world looked down on photography. Now some (well at least one) wants to take that back to where it was before.</p>

Will all respect to Mr. McCullin, who is not only a better photographer than I ever will be and far, far braver than I am, an

a decades old saying applies: "Photographs don't lie but photographers frequently do."

<p>^ Ellis beat me to it.</p>

 

Interesting. If you look at the amounts of heavy dodging and burning that Ansel Adams did to get his stunning images.

Under a very strict interpretation, are his prints doctored?

<p>Cropping a picture, digital or otherwise isn't a lie? <br>

http://www.boredpanda.com/image-cropping-changes-everything/</p>

<p>I think most of us know what McCullin means, and he is not lying. McCullin is making a distinction between his being happy to be a "photographer" (i.e. he is taking documentary photos primarily) and not an "artist", but now the idea is that photographers are "Artists" with a capital A, which I suspect he feels is unnecessary and rather pretentious. I think his attitude is a healthy one for a news photographer. It does not mean some of his pictures are not artistic, but that is not his primary purpose. Ansel Adams was an entirely different kettle of fish: he considered himself to be an Artist.</p>

<p>I would submit, there are a number of photographers who <strong>are</strong> artists. McCullin might not consider himself to be one, fine. This of course has absolutely nothing to do with conventional vs. digital photography any more than it has to do with Adams using a large format camera and Greg Gorman using a DLSR. </p>

<p>I don't think Ansel Adams considered himself a photojournalist. At least not his Yosemite pictures. I think Robin said it pretty well. At least to me, the best photos from photojournalists are artistic and I would consider the photographers artists, but not at the expense of the tenants of the genre, that is, no altering of the image because of the purpose of the image. As to whether photos tell the "truth" or lie, is a whole other philosophical discussion.<br>

I think McCullin would think of himself as a photojournalist, and in photojournalism you don't crop and only make minor tonal adjustments. Thats why outfits like Reuters will no longer accept edited raws, only jpg. But really I don't think its the medium, at least these days. Even film will be digitalized, but at least I suppose in the "old days" (20 years or so ago) the editors could see the negs or proof sheets. As far as the ethics of editing news photos see:<br>

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2544662/Pulitzer-Prize-winning-photographer-fired-admitting-doctored-Syrian-war-rebel-picture-photoshopping-camera-original-image.html<br>

BTW, love the link Andrew, great for a good laugh. Once a photo is in digital form it is of course much easier to alter. See:</p>

 

<p>It's interesting to run across this conversation. I've been pondering the whole "how much post-processing is too much?" question a lot lately. I don't have any problems with changing things around as long as we're not talking about photojournalism. With art it's Ok as long as those viewing the results of post-processing are made aware that, for example, the bee on a flower was added after the photo was taken. What's got me wondering, though, is why so many photographers today utilize significant post-processing without any concern for the impact on truth and consumers. It seems as though the days of "photographs not lying" are over! What do you think? </p>