What happened to Foundview guidelines?

[portobello belle]

I used to hear about Foundview guidelines quite a bit some years ago.

Now I never hear about it. Anyone have any ideas why not?

[leeblackman]

Interesting concept, but it doesn't really seem to have any practical purpose, except for maybe some specialized circles. Obvoiusly, if it were maybe marketed better. I really don't see why there would be a need for any standardized set of rules. I think it would be up to pretty much each individual artist to decide how much they would want to manipulate their images, or what they want percieved, whether it be reality or some manipulated variant of.

[christian deichert]

"FoundView" disappeared a while ago. An archive of the old Foundview site is available <a href="http://www.vad1.com/photo/foundview/">here</a>, but it hasn't been updated since 1999. Apparently they have changed their name to <a href="http://trustimage.org/">TrustImage</a> (I like the old name and logo better, personally). <p>

 

I used to link to their site from mine, since I follow their principles (that, and I'm just not good enough with Photoshop to do much manipulating); I may or may not link to the archived site or the new site.<p>

 

I'm just not as offended by digital manipulation as I used to be, so I may not get around to it. Or, rather than saying I follow their tenets, I may just change my site to say something along the lines that I don't manipulate my photos and what you see is what I saw...something like that.

[bobatkins]

Objecting to digital manipulation is like objecting to the quality of McDonalds hamburgers.

 

Neither is exactly desirable, but if that's what everyone wants, that's what we're all going to get.

 

Both have those who protest against them, but most people never hear about, and don't much care about, the issue.

[ilkka_nissila]

Well, it's up to the viewers to discern whether they like the image or not. I quite like the idea of FoundView because it makes a distinction between adding/removing elements of the image and adjusting brightness, contrast and the colours, which is often necessary to get a good image. That's where my line goes, too. However, a lot of people like to play in Photoshop and they think moving image elements from one picture to another is supercool. Although it is not nature photography, it is routine that models are made thinner digitally for magazine publication etc.

 

Nature photography by its very name indicates that nature is photographed, which is quite different from digital art drawings of nature. To me, photography and drawing should not be mixed in the same image. If you don't like a powerline in a landscape or would like to add a couple of deer into it, you can always draw or paint the scene as you saw it. To do this with the means of digital photography and image manipulation is deceiving.

 

I believe a lot of people can appreciate true nature photography. What is important is that the editors of magazines which publish nature photographs as documents of nature or showing nature's beauty and behaviour have a strict line against digital manipulation, and the FoundView standard would have been a great starting point for this. However, I believe in the end it is up to the editor to decide what to accept and that ultimately is reflected in the credibility of the publication. With digital photography, it is more difficult to control this standard, in fact I am sure we will see lots of manipulated images as "documentary" published. Film has this one nice characteristic: it is a physical object and the content of it is more difficult to fake digitally. If you do use a digital slide printer to print a digitally created piece on film, I think there are still methods which can reveal that this was done. And at the very least, it is very expensive to do so, so people don't bother with it.

 

Although there are digital raw files which can be authenticated I think publishers cannot enforce the use of such formats simply because all manufacturers don't support it. And generally editing files is fine (color corrections etc.), just as long as you don't alter the content of the scene. I suppose it would be possible to write the history of commands applied to create an image to the file, so that what was done to the image can be traced back, but again this enforces the use of certain programs.

[dave_yuhas]

Would Ansel's black skies be consistent with the Foundview guidelines?

[ilkka_nissila]

Yes, I think so.

[michael gordon httpwww]

With respect only to print sales (not scientific/journalistic use of stock images), that a potential buyer has greater concern with an image's FoundView compliance rather than the artistic impact of the image (regardless of manipulation) is setting the wrong tone for the relationship/business transaction. It's quite akin to prenuptial agreements, which I feel the same about.

 

www.mgordonphotography.com

[micah_marty1]

TrustImage (formerly FoundView) is pretty low-key at the moment; we're rewriting the

entire site in preparation

for the first book of TrustImage-labeled photographs (which is still more than a year from

publication) and after that you may hear more about it. The next year might be pretty

quiet, but with every Martha-Stewart-Newsweek manipulated-cover controversy, more

members of the general public

"get" what TrustImage is about so in a couple of years, who knows?

 

There are a lot of misconceptions about TrustImage. Some of them are expressed above;

others of them are holdovers -- now corrected -- from FoundView (as one poster

said, we haven't been real aggressive about marketing, as we're waiting for the first of

several books of TrustImage-labeled photographs to come out over the next 2-3 years).

 

For example, far from being esoteric, antiquated, or out-of-touch, TrustImage pretty

much

summarizes the guidelines of almost every photo contest and magazine that limits

manipulation in submitted photos ("Nature's Best" submissions, "Smithsonian" magazine

photo contest entries,

etc.).

 

But it's simply not worth expending the energy addressing those misconceptions until all

600 pages of the website are back up, and that'll be awhile yet. (It's a very large website,

and every word is being scrutinized for defensibility.)

 

We still think TrustImage is ahead of its time; click on "Further Reading" at the bottom of

the page linked below and then on "Growth Expectations" if you care.

 

We left a few pages up during reconstruction for those who want to know the basics:

 

http://trustimage.org

 

Thanks--

 

Micah Marty for TrustImage.org

[walang_pangalan]

Well, they said that all my images of static scenes that are built from from stacking multiple exposures (to reduce noise and/or increase dynamic range) can't be trusted -- because of their narrow-minded definition of 'exposure', 'sensor', 'manipulation' and such.

 

Maybe it is this "let's carefully define a trusted image so that everything Ansel produced passes" mentality that is why no one cares too much about FoundView nee TrustImage?

 

Or perhaps it's because it looks like another instance where there are too many lawyers and not enough engineers: 500 (600?!) web-pages and not even a hint of an objective, formal, proof process?

 

More and more, it looks like a marketing gimmick/scam than anything else. A book is coming? Why am I not surprised?

[micah_marty1]

Photographers often are chagrined or disappointed to learn that when they combine

multiple exposures or perform other content manipulations, the result may not be

regarded on an equal footing as photographs that did NOT undergo content

manipulations. Perhaps this explains the harsh tone of the previous post.

 

Still, there are so many innuendoes and misconceptions in the post that one can only

conclude that its author did not bother to visit trustimage.org website. (Most of the

angriest judgments about TrustImage come from those who are unwilling to spend 2 or 3

minutes learning what it's about.)

 

Let's look at six(!) misconceptions among the previous poster's four paragraphs, and at

what the TrustImage website actually says:

 

1. "[TrustImage] says my images can't be trusted" -- Where does TrustImage say this? The

page

 

http://trustimage.org/more/onTrustworthiness.html

 

addresses this concern head-on. (Summary: "No need to get defensive!")

 

2. "Maybe it's this 'let's carefully define a trusted image so that everything Ansel produced

passes' mentality..." -- Hmm, let's see. On the page

 

http://trustimage.org/more/famous.html

 

which lists dozens of "world-famous

photographers who have each made thousands of photographs that would each meet

TrustImage's three qualifications," Ansel Adams is the *only* photographer singled out as

an example of a photographer who "created a significant number of photographs that

would NOT qualify as TrustImage."

 

3. "It looks like another instance where there are too many lawyers and not enough

engineers" -- Not sure what this means, but TrustImage was created by photographers,

for photographers, and the TrustImage website has been vetted by numerous high-level

photojournalists and photo editors at major newspapers. (Frankly, it's hard to think of any

non-photographers who would be able to write in such depth about the technical aspects

of photography.)

 

4. "500 web-pages and not even a hint of an objective, formal, proof process?" -- If this is

supposed to refer to a quest for an easy way of checking photographs, TrustImage

prominently offers its 5-point checklist at

 

http://trustimage.org/more/checklist.html

 

On the other hand, if the poster is searching for "objective" standards, perhaps he should

be an engineer or a

lawyer, not a photographer. See

 

http://trustimage.org/more/noteQ3

 

for more on how all photographs are subjective.

 

5. "More and more, it looks like a marketing gimmick/scam than anything else." -- Um,

Hello? TrustImage is FREE, as the Home page makes crystal clear. Where exactly is the

money going to be coming from? ("Yup, those ruthless nonprofits, raking in the money by

hosting ad-free websites and never charging a penny!")

 

6. "A book is coming? Why am I not surprised?" -- Again, the point is unclear here. We are

talking with several photographers (some prominent, some not) about forthcoming books,

at least one of which will likely use the TrustImage label (there seems to be no downside in

having publishers use TrustImage). Why is this objectionable? Any photographer is free to

use TrustImage (in a book or elsewhere), there's no money to be made from using the

TrustImage label (it's free, remember?), and there are never licensing fees for using

TrustImage (in a book or anywhere else). So where exactly does the "scam" come in?

 

Enough examples; addressing critics who don't take the time to read the TrustImage

website is very time-consuming. TrustImage speaks for itself, but only to those who

approach it with an open mind.

 

We welcome constructive criticism (much of the site has been improved that way!). Our

only request is that critics actually bother to *read* the few pages we currently have

posted at

 

http://trustimage.org

 

Thank you.

[micah_marty1]

Oops! The third link above needs an "html" on the end:

 

http://trustimage.org/more/noteQ3.html

 

Sorry 'bout that!

[bobatkins]

It's not so much "trust image" as it is "trust photographer". Digital manipulation is now at a point where, if it's done well, it's undetectable. I'm not talking about adding eagles and wolves to a landscape (though that could be done), I'm talking about cloning out powerlines, errant branches, leaves and other undesirable picture elements. It's trival and undetectable.

 

If "trustimage" is a selling point, what's to stop anyone simply lying about their image? Reputation if found out, sure, but I could give you a list of some fairly well known photographers whose ethics have been known to come second to their wallets.

 

What happens if you think someone is using the "trustimage" logo when they shouldn't be?

[mike dixon]

I think Bob nailed it--it's not the image that you need to trust. A reasonably-skilled photography can tell whatever story he wants without violating TrustImage guidelines. Applying the label "TrustImage" to a photo makes about as much sense as applying the label "SafeWeapon" to a gun.

[sprouty]

Mike, Bob, et al,

 

 

At some point in the near future (if not already) images created by graphic programs will be indistinguishable from images created in-camera by the process of recording light. How will conventional photography be valued then? Will it be important to know the difference? Or lacking the ability to "prove" there is a difference, can or should a statement of work guidelines serve as the basis of context?

 

Truthfully, I don't know, but I'm inclined to listen to a discussion and entertain the arguments.

[ilkka_nissila]

Well, a photographer may be trustable but if the printing house heals powerlines out of the landscape to sell more books, then it's not a question of trust between the viewer and the photographer. If on the other hand the TrustImage logo is in the book, then the people at the printing house will also know that it's expected that no manipulation occurs. Just a thought. I know some cases of nature photography books where the manipulation was done by an image processing pro.

 

Indeed, in the not too distant future, digital photographs and graphics will be more and more difficult to tell apart.

[bobatkins]

I'll bet you guys been watching "The Matrix"

[leeblackman]

I seriously doubt that adding that stupid label to anything will make it sell better. I'm sure the average individual looking to have a portrait done could care less if it was manipulated or not, as long as it looked good.