Tampering with Nature

I love all sorts of photography but perhaps my favorite is nature

photography. I try to pride myself on being a purist that only wants

to capture what is there and not manipulate the scene to suit my

needs. For some reason, this gives me a great satisfaction in

knowing that my hard work in searching for a worthy subject is

rewarded.

 

However, recently when I shot photos of wild mushrooms, I found

myself having to move a pine needle here and there or move other

leaves away from it. Hence, I broke a personal rule for sake of

aesthetics. While it's in no way a matter of ethics (unless it gets

serious like harming certain species of plant/animal), I was

wondering how others felt about this practice?

 

Is it a greater sense of accomplishment to leave things natural as

found or greater in the sense that you know that something may

hamper your aesthetics in a shot if you don't move or alter things?

 

Furthermore, I have never used a lighting tent, not due to laziness,

but because once again, I feel that nature photography is best shot

in a natural manner. Perhaps it's just too purist of an ideology?

 

Thanks for your upcoming responses.

Some people photograph captive animals and consider it "nature" photography, others don't."Gardening" a flora shot isn't quite the same as shooting, say, a lynx held in a fenced area with "natural" landscaping and baited into position for paying "nature" shooters.

It all depends on where you personally draw the line. A couple of pine needles, no problem. Lopping off branches, problem. Pulling back reeds exposing a nesting bird, DEFINITE problem. I personally, like you, want to keep the scene as "pure" as possible, try to depict it the way I found it. But sometimes if there's a bright little twig, leaf, pine needle, blade of grass in the way, and I can remove it without disturbing something, out it goes. And quite often I'll take a shot or two before removing it. I don't mind using a reflector to bounce in a bit of light, if you think about it, at different times of day and in different weather conditions the light conditions are constantly changing anyway. My eye can see the subject much better in the shade than what the camera will produce on film, and I want that image to come out the way I'm seeing it. I'm not into setting up a small studio around mushrooms or whatever, just getting light in there so I don't have a black colourless blob in the picture. Hope that helps!

A little housecleaning as you describe really doesn't bother me, and I tend to lean towards purism in nature work. Not as avidly as some, perhaps, but I do believe that idealized nature photography does insidious harm. Onward.

<i>Hence, I broke a personal rule for sake of aesthetics. While it's in no way a matter of ethics (unless it gets serious like harming certain species of plant/animal), I was wondering how others felt about this practice?</i><p>

 

Hotel California has a stanza in it that says something like "We're prisoners of our own devices."<p>

 

Myself, I like to think that we all have our own personal way in which to drive ourselves crazy. Move all the leaves, pine needles or add lighting to your heart's content. It's not a game of golf, it's photography.<p>

 

The point, do what makes you happy when it comes to capturing an image, don't project this thinking on others as there are no rules like there are in a game of golf. And in the final, it's up to the viewer to complete the process, not the photographer who captured or created the image as this isn't photojournalism or a crime scene that's being photographed.<p>

 

Enjoy rearranging things to your photographic needs and have a good sane life.<p>

photography has changed quite abit. most people tweak all their prints in PS now.If there was a twig, its gone in PS.I see a beautiful print on this site and i find out the picture has 15 layers and the guy worked on it for 2 hours to get it that way. thats not photography.Thats being an ace in PS, if it was photography you wouldn't have used the PS and the picture would have been sweet the first time. don't worry about moving some twigs or branches, theres alot worse going on. i want to learn how to use the camera correctly, not PS.

I have images with many layers to them that I would absolutely qualify as photography. Whether or not PS has been used, even "extensively", shouldn't be the litmus test. It's possible to do a lot of work in PS and end up with a beautiful print without being faithless to natural beauty or dishonest about content.

I agree that Nature shots in general need to be more nature and less pose or alterations. Minor shifts of materials or position will never cause much fuss. I have noticed on many of the nature photos that create a big stir, show the signs of major alterations. I still think they are great, but should be marked not a nature but something else.

<i>the guy worked on it for 2 hours to get it that way.</i><P>

If you want to maintain any respect for the "masters," I'd advise you to ignore any information about their techniques. Negative intensification, selective toning or bleaching of the print, dodging/burning, sandwiching negatives, . . . those bastards were horrible cheats. If only they'd known how to operate a camera . . .

remember way back when people used slide film. they were good for +/- a 1/2 stop. there was no tweaking there, maybe alittle during processing. thats my opinion of photography, not 15 layers and 2 hours of work. yah, you took the picture, but does it look like what you saw in the view finder? I seriously doubt it. you can call it photography but just put an asterisk at the end. I'm not saying theres anything wrong with doing the PS, but i get pissed off when I try to learn about photography and you ask the guy how his picture was so great. i'm waiting to hear about the shutter speed and f stop and he throws me a PS manual.the photos are stunning, no doubt, i just don't feel its photography. thats all.

I find it interesting how many people in this thread seem to be opposed to

anything more than just aiming the camera, determining an accurate

exposure and shooting. Personally I would find that very limiting and lacking

in expression. While I'm not a fan of mediocre photography made acceptable

by intense PS work, I do find a great deal of enjoyment, and personal

expression in manipulating the image in the darkroom, or even cleaning it up

or tweaking it in PS.

 

If you want to make the comparison to painting, it's like saying that only photo

realistic paintings are true paintings, and that Impressionism, expressionism,

abstraction, surrealism , etc are not because they do not accurately reflect the

scene they are based on.

 

If you are photographing nature for use in determining the true behavior of an

animal then you should leave the scene natural, however does removing a

few distracting leaves or branches beforehand alter the behavior of the

animal or make the scene unnatural?? I would think that most people who

photograph nature are not doing so for scientific study but for the love of

seeing the animals in a beautiful and natural environment.

 

I find Mike Dixon's comment a bit confusing, I'm not sure if he's being serious

or sarcastic. Operating a camera is merely the first thing in a long chain to

create a good image.

I realize this is off-topic since the orginal question was about manipulating the scene, not manipulating the image, so after addressing this point, I'll let it rest.<P>

<i>yah, you took the picture, but does it look like what you saw in the view finder? I seriously doubt it. you can call it photography but just put an asterisk at the end.</i><P>

By that reasoning, any b&w "photo" would require an asterisk, as would images made with highly-saturated films like Velvia. A polarizing filter would also result in an image that didn't accurately portray the original scene. You can have your own definition if you like, but it's not one that is consistent with historical or current usage.<P>

My view on manipulating the scene is that, unless you are operating under some journalistic standard for fairly reporting the facts (to the extent that's possible), do what you want to improve the image.

<i>I try to learn about photography and you ask the guy how his picture was so great. I'm waiting to hear about the shutter speed and f stop and he throws me a PS manual.the photos are stunning, no doubt, i just don't feel its photography. thats all.</i><p>

 

If it helps, PS is part and parcel of today's digital photographic effort.<p>

 

Shutter speeds and f/stops are an integral part of photography, always have and I suppose, always will but the mechanical aspect of the image making process, "tripping" the shutter, is just one cog in a chain of many cogs, irrespective of if the final image is created in a wet dark room or if it comes off of a dry printer.<p>

 

To me, I'm wow'd by what's in front of me as one might be by magic. I don't need or want to know how the magician performed the illusion. As a viewer, I'm there to be entertained. I see a photographic image, which might be in front of me, in the same light; entertainment. I really don't care how the "photographer" or "painter of light" got the final image to paper, nor do I think it's relevant to the image's creation as the act of viewing the final image is what counts, everything in the middle, is nothing more then the process by which this marvel is created.<p>

The only extent to which I care about the use of Photoshop or other digital manipulation tools is the issue that still exists with digital output media. I don't mind if someone tweaked their photos of fall leaves to produce a particular color or color pattern... that's using the creative tools at hand to achieve a desired effect. As long as they're not claiming it as documentary evidence of something. I'm still leery of digitally output images because of the questions of their longevity. If I'm the consumer, I don't want to buy a beautiful image and have it fade off the paper in my lifetime, especially if I've paid multiple hundreds of dollars for it.

 

As for myself, when taking pictures of landscapes or closeups of natural settings or objects, I concur that there is no sin at all with housecleaning. I'll even bend branches or tall grasses (if I can hold them with my free hand so they come right back when I'm done). Removing dead leaves from a branch is also ok, so long as it does no harm to the plant, but again, it all comes down to intent. If your intent is making an artistic statement (colors, patterns, shapes, textures) then minor manipulations of the scene are aok... if your goal is documentary (insect damage, herbicide contamination, forest fire, etc), then you have an absolute obligation to leave everything exactly as you see it when you walk up.

I practice <b>selective gardening</b> all the time. But I like to try to capture iconic ideals of reality, not the humdrum. Sometimes I change angles to hide a flaw. Sometimes I change angles to emphasize a flaw. I regularly pluck blades of grass and carefully place other blades of grass when shooting mushrooms. Sometimes I will carefully place a leaf in a shot. Often times I remove leaves from the background of a shot to get a less distracting uniform green blur in the background. I have recently taken to using scissors to remove grass as it is faster and less destructive.<p>

 

When I leave my yard, it is another story. I still practice selective gardening, but I do not pluck stray grass or leaves off a plant. But this is about respect for others, not photographic integrity. Photographic integrity if about crafting my vision, it is not about making everything "real". But then, having grown up in a media saturated culture, learning how to use a camera to deconstruct the myths of ideal beauty (in anything) have helped me see how beautiful our sloppy and imperfect world really is. <p>

 

In the end though, if you are true to your photographic vision (what do you wish to create?), then you are doing just fine. Worry about the craft and the final image. That is where I find joy in the process. For you, it may be elsewhere. So I would suggest feeding your soul as need be not worrying about it past that.

Each person must set their own guidelines and live within them. And, hopefully, allow others to set their guidelines without undue criticism. Moving a few random pine needles or loose leaves? That's nothing more than a gust of wind would do. I also tend to be a purist and, for the most part, limit my use of PS to balance color, contrast, maybe dodge and burn, to try to render the final image as close to the way I visualized it when I took the photograph. I usually don't alter the image by way of removing distracting objects, changing backgrounds, etc. I have done it on occasion if I am trying to convey a particular emotion, but that is the exception. On the other hand I realize those who are skilled in the use of PS and work for hours and remove, add or alter their images to get a photo just right are expressing their artistic creativity. That approach just usually is not for me.....

Does anyone believe "nature" really exists as a given?

If Ansel was still around, he'd be a Photoshop expert and advocate. I'd bet his B&W images would have fifty layers and take weeks to dial in.

Looks like a reading of Simon Schama's "Landscape & memory" may be required.

 

There is no such thing as wilderness or unspoilt landscapes or even 'nature' (in the way it is portrayed in nice pictures).

 

I am not a purist. Do exactly what you need to get the shot. You (and I) would have an animal killed, butchered, packaged and driven to the local shops for our lunch and we will require farmland to grow potatoes or rice and vegetables to go with the lunch. Why would you agonise over whether moving a few pine needles is ethical?

 

I expect you drove (or maybe used a train or aircraft) for at least part of the journey to get to the 'unspoilt' spot. Its too late to worry whether you will effect it or not. Somewhere is being 'spoilt' every day to ensure the continuance of our high consumption lives.

 

Do not worry if a re-assuring picture of wilderness hanging on a wall is 'tidied up' or not. It really does not matter.

 

I hate pictures that cover up the presence of pylons and power cables and roof antenna in a landscape. I like the human clutter of now. If there had been litter around the mushroom I would photograph it as well. (Or maybe the litter instead!)

Everything in this 'nice' English countryside picture I took has been planted by man or erected by man across a range of centuries from the bronze age (and before) up until the current century.

 

Nothing is 'natural' in that sense. (Unless you see mankind as a part of nature and therefore whatever mankind does is natural too.)<div></div>

Trevor wrote:<p>

 

<i>I hate pictures that cover up the presence of pylons and power cables and roof antenna in a landscape. I like the human clutter of now. If there had been litter around the mushroom I would photograph it as well. (Or maybe the litter instead!)</i><p>

 

Enjoy this shot as your above was part of the thought process as it was created.<p>

 

When we go on drives, to get away from it all, man's hand is pretty much everywhere; so for one to expect ta get away from it all is more a dream then a reality cause all we have to do is to look to ourselves in order to easily destroy the myth that we're not here:)<p>

 

<a href ="http://www.photo.net/photo/2132883&size=lg">Yearning</a><p>

 

The "yearning" is in our inability to escape ourselves and what we do.<p>

Trevor gets to the real question here, which is whether nature photography as practiced by most North American photographers is honest at all. The problem isn't with what you do in PS, or with what you do with a leaf or twig, it's with the thought process that leads to the picture in the first place.

 

The divide between North American and European perceptions of nature has already been discussed on this forum. In short, European "nature" is as Trevor has shown it, fully bearing the human footprint. North Americans, on the other hand, are caught up in ideas of wilderness which underly the idea that nature must be "natural" and that nature photos can't show any sign of human interference. This leads directly to the notion that moving a pine needle is unethical because it alters that "natural" scene.

 

The irony, of course, is that much of this nature photography is done in national parks and other managed settings, in which photographers stick to (or fail to stick to, to the disgust of the folks on the nature forum) designated paths and shoot from designated positions. Shooting the "natural" landscape involves a conscious effort to exclude signs, paths, people, jet contrails, hydro lines, and so on.

 

This means, of course, that the landscape is no longer "natural" at all, but constructed. It's simply another expression of the North American wilderness myth, and had the photographer stepped back five paces and used a wider lens, the falsity of that myth would be revealed.

Just as much a landscape to me....

 

<center><img src="http://www.photo.net/bboard/image?bboard_upload_id=19919784"></center> </p> <center><i>As found on a beach</i></center>

Is it natural to create fantasy landscapes? Over saturated skies etc. Common theme.

 

What is natural in photography?

Pick up the garbage while you're out. Perhaps then you can more easily stop agonizing about moving a few leaves / etc.