When is a photograph not a photograph but graphic design?

When is a photograph not a photograph but graphic design? I know if a camera is used it's a photograph

but when does it cross the line in to being graphic design? To remove scratches is one thing...............

If you have a PDA phone, what is it - PDA or phone? What if it also plays MP3s and movies? What a terrible dilemma!

 

Who cares? (Actually, I know a lot of people care, but I can't understand why.) Just use the tools you wish to make the images you want.

Yep Aaron:" ... to make the pictures you want ..." you said. But isn't the issue to "TAKE the pictures you want", so rather than use paintbrush to draw your picture via computer, to take if from nature via photography.

 

And that is where the rub is, right there. So the question posed is easily answered and the answer is so obvious. Graphic design might be nice, of course, so is watercolor, cubism, expressionism, oil and acrylic paintings as well, but photography these are not. Even if you start out from a photograph, once you denature it to a sufficiently foreign to the actual picture degree.

Do flat, dull, cluttered, confusing, blown-out, blocky, or otherwise boring or ugly pictutes of anything more accurately portray the nature of that thing than a photo that has been edited (even heavily) in order to evoke what the artist feels is the inherent message or emotion?

 

Anything but the real thing is denatured. There is no such thing as an honest photo. Pursuit of "real" representations of anything through photography is a flawed endeavor.

 

At what point is it not "photography"? This may be an interesting debate, but in the end, pretty pointless - something for academics. It's just semantics.

A photograph is the representation of a moment, printed by the light. Once you add anything or take anything away from that photo, it becomes a picture, or as you say graphic design.

There is an art to taking good photos and doing good graphic design work or anything

with

an artistic ability. But no way in hell are you an artist in the classical sense.

 

Most people who I've met or talked to who call themselves "an artist" usually aren't and

you

can tell by looking at there work. Not even in the unclassical sense! The day I call

myself an artist I've told

my friends to shoot me right then and there.

 

It's the people with no artistic ability that call just about anyone an artist with certain traits

or abilities more than them. Bla bla bla......................

So , if you use a filter - it's not a photograph.

If you use a wide angle lens ( which distorts ) - it's not a photograph.

If you use a telephoto lens ( which compresses ) - it's not a photograph.

If you use Infrared film , use hard or soft paper in the darkroom , dodge or burn .... etc. etc. - it is not a photograph ...you get my drift ? Semantics , semantics , semantics ...how many more times do we have to have this totally futile discussion ?

<i>Once you add anything or take anything away from that photo, it becomes a picture, or as you say graphic design.</i><p>

 

As usual, a ridiculous definition concocted without any sense of the history of photography, a definition that eliminates much of the photography section of museums, galleries, and photographs shown in books.

My post was in reply to Yann's post , but drew got in first ...

Sorry - Drew ...:o(

<p>Drew - First, I wasn't calling myself an artist. Second, I would love to hear your definition of an artist, and why somebody who takes and edits pictures can not be one.</p>

<p><i>Once you add anything or take anything away from that photo, it becomes a picture, or as you say graphic design.</p></i>

<p>It's therefore impossible to view most photographs because under that definition, once it is transfered from film or a digital sensor it is not a photograph.</p>

Photo = phos (greek) = light

graphie = graphein (greek) = to trace.

I believe that whenever you want to find the difference between words, it's always best to use a dictionary first, that's just what I do, not to stir a controversy.

Using a filter, whatever lens, even sensor from a digital camera, it's still photography. The light is tracing a photo. If you use a leaf to make a photo (photosynthesis)it's a photo. Graphic design (not the word photo here) is the art of "tracing". The photographer uses the light, he could use whatever lens or filters, shutter speed, but still what the light reflects, and what receives this light (paper, film or whatever) makes a photography. Now if I use a photo of me and one of Marilyn Monroe for example and I put them together with a beautiful sunset as a background, that's a graphic design, not a photo. I don't think there's anything ridiculous here, (excepted to make such a design of me and Marilyn Monroe that's not the point), just my 2 cents.

Aaron, under my definition, once you transfer a photo, it's still a photo, you transfer you don't add or take anything away from it. Simple.

Compress, distort, as much as you want, the light still hits the support used (film, paper, leaf, whatever) and it's a photograph.

No ?

So, compositing two images cannot be photography. What if I did it in the dark room? Or, what if I do it in camera with multiple exposures? What's the difference between that and doing it in Photoshop (other than the obvious ease)? Physical or chemical manipulation is allowable, but digital is not?

 

What about dodging, burning, cropping? Why is it more valid to use a physical filter in front of the lens than an electronic filter in Photoshop? I can blur a picture with a wide aperture, or I can do it in Photoshop? What's wrong with doing it in Photoshop?

 

My point is that the only thing that is "real" is reality. People pretending that some photographs are real and others are not is ridiculous. They are all fake. Some are just more skillfully created than others.

 

People learn a craft and they feel threatened by deviations from what they learned and love - even if the deviations only amount to a change in method to achieve the same result. They defend their insecurities by attacking the validity of others' work.

 

You have your narrow definition of photography. The dictionary doesn't seem so restrictive to me. Even if it did, it wouldn't make a bit of difference. I'll continue to make photographs (images, pictures, designs or whatever you want to call them) the way I like.

There's absolutely nothing wrong with using photoshop, I don't recall talking about photoshop, neither talking about "physical or chemical is allowable but digital is not". I didn't know it was about film vs digital here, otherwise I would'nt have participated. Whatever the meaning of words, then... This forum is just for people to chat, not people to allow or not. Things have become complicated nowadays,words change, technology, people, cultures, it's more and more difficult to draw the line anywhere, for anything. I only wanted to answer a question that so far noone seems to have answered, (even me) I'd say you're right to continue make photographs, since you're doing very well (I''ve just seen your portfolio...) and that's the most important.

Drew: Just shoot ! Don't ask !

Not really a film vs. digital debate, I guess. You can do the same things to a scan that you can from a native digital file. I think you can even commit many of the same atrocities in a dark room that supposedly turn a photograph into something else. But, nobody does that anymore. Photoshop is just too easy.

 

And not that my opinion matters much, but in my opinion there are usually limits to what can be done to a photo and have it still look nice. For example, I am seeing a lot of HDR photos that have been ruined by the process. I'm not morally opposed to any of it, though. And if they still want to call it photography, it doesn't bother me at all.

 

I agree - Just shoot (and, if you want, edit)!

Aaron; I only wanted to start or create a dialogue about photography and or vs graphic

design

etc... and see what other people think and feel about it.This topic has been good, but I didn't

think some would take it literally.

 

Drew

 

P.S. I like your pov in your photos taken in the cemetaries.

As someone who has been converting photographs into "graphic designs" since 1988, the difference between them is in the artist's (Yes! I'm a poseur!) intention.

When its the other artist's work.

"As usual, a ridiculous definition concocted without any sense of the history of photography, a definition that eliminates much of the photography section of museums, galleries, and photographs shown in books."

 

In other words, vapouring curators of museums and galleries and publishers of remaindered books, whose every utterance we must surely worship and adore, are the AUTHORITIES (all bow down!) who TELL US what a photograph is. Therefore UNAUTHORIZED IDEAS by mere photographers are RIDICULOUS.

 

Sounds familiar. George Orwell?

This is not an unimportant question though.......there is an awful lot of layered, super

saturated, HDR, stuff that everyone seems to be pushing out, and its is

"reallygreattolookat" and very difficult to do even...I can't.....but this stuff tends to get

disconnected from some kind of realness or validness, becomes eye candy......

 

 

I am not much of a photographer but I am a pretty good recording engineer (who likes to

take a few snaps) and in the music world you really have to have some kind of a

performance, composition, or a lyric or you are just shining you know what. Sure you can

pile on the effects, and the reverb, and edit, and auto tune, and on and on.....(in guess

what - a Mac - I've got Photoshop right above ProTools in my Applications folder in the

studio) but the result is usually vacuous........

Fred, I think "vacuous" is a big issue.

Drew, from your trailing final sentence it sounds as though you have formed at least a "lose" defintion of the two, but that you are open to debate on the subject. I wouldn't attempt to diminish the importance of your question, for if it is important to you...it is important. it's a question that will never end in a consensus. i don't see the slightest indication that we can ever reconcile the differing views expressed in this post alone...and there are countless arguments that have been made and are waiting to be made that will drive us even further apart. personally, i think it's a waste of time discussing it...but then here i am. there are people on this site who devote most of their waking hours to debating such philosophical questions. if that's their passion...it's their perogative, and more power to them. i'd rather use my time taking photographs.

There was a time when "enlarging" was not considered proper; and a true photograph was just a contact print; super rich with subtle tonality; zero grain.