Would you process a photograph to this degree?

[dan_south]

Rods and cones, Rich. Rods and cones. Color really does exist at night. It's not a magic trick, nor is it the result of

fanciful thinking on my part. It's a physical reality and, like the foot placement of the running horse, one of the many

phenomena that were hidden from us before the advent or cameras and light-sensitive media.

 

"On second thought, let's not go to Camelot. It is a silly place."

[richardsperry]

<p>Dan, I understand the rods and cones part, really I do. The blue light was there, I don't doubt. But you did not see it that way when you took the photo. That was one of your points, that one would <em>SEE</em> the scene as you photographed it if they were there.</p>

<p>The long shutter speed allowed you to capture 30 plus seconds of the blue light, that was there, that humans could not see. It is a trick, a good one, but a trick nonetheless. You had to "add up" all those blue registering photons to equal your photo over time.</p>

<p>I would not <em>SEE</em> the castle as the other photographer originally photographed it, either, if I were standing there. It has convergence and lens distortion from the wide angle lens. Look at them, his castle is bent in the original photos. I photograph on film in black and white, I am not colorblind. And I don't expect my audience to be either. It is a trick I use to produce the images, even unedited straight prints, that I want to produce(my performance). I see in color, for the most part.<br>

<br /> For example, black and white immediately removes the sodium orange from the lights of The City, in my version of the GG bridge. When I took my version, the sky was not even a tinge of blue, the lights from The City were producing an orange cast to the overhanging clouds. It appears as light grey now.</p>

[richardsperry]

<blockquote>

<p>It's a physical reality and, like the foot placement of the running horse</p>

</blockquote>

<p>This was a series of photos. Taken with multiple cameras. Inarguably, it also was the invention of motion pictures.</p>

<p>This is not a good analogy for still photographs. Using long shutter speeds to enhance car light trails, or produce a flowing waterfall photo <em>implying</em> or <em>suggesting</em> motion is not the same as multiple still photos viewed in rapid succession. Motion pictures rely on a physiological effect of sensory memory(persistence of vision/memory) to simulate motion. It is not the same thing.</p>

<p>You could have used the analogy of that old racecar photo taken with a planar shutter, which implied speeding motion. Any such blurring to suggest motion, in any such manner is still a trick.</p>

[richardsperry]

What's the name of the 1800s-1900s French photographer who would merge two plates for his prints. One for the sky and

one for the ocean usually? I can't remember.

[JDMvW]

<p>Because of the low dynamic range of the old plates, it was virtually impossible to get the foreground and the sky properly exposed on one negative. Almost every early photograph that shows clouds in the background is done by shooting a separate sky shot or combining one from 'stock'. There were many early photographers who did composites to create romantic and historical scenes.</p>

[dan_south]

Richard, I never claimed that still cameras work the same way that our eyes do. The differences are well known and clearly understood

by any experiened photographer. They are also a recurring irritation to the layperson who wonders why "the picture didn't come out

right," I.e. didn't match what they saw exactly.

 

I was referring to making imaginary trees appear, making buildings look taller than they really are, and CHANGING the look of the light

that existed at the time of capture. The linked photo does all of these. My GG Bridge picture does none of these. But, hey. I have to

hand it to you for making the pedantic argument of the day while pointing out differences between eyes and cameras that we all

understood clearly already. If you like I'll brush up on my Photoshop skills and make the bridge curve instead of going in a straight line.

Then it won't match what I saw.

[Norma Desmond]

<p>Well, I've been over the Golden Gate Bridge sixteen thousand eight hundred forty-two times since I moved here in 1975. Never once have I seen a yellow light on the tower. (Of course, for many of those years, there were no lights on the tower.) Some light does occasionally look yellow, particularly indoor incandescent light, but the lights on the Golden Gate Bridge tower do not. So, your Golden Gate Bridge photo is very much a lie, though only by your own terms.</p>

<p>It brings up an interesting point, though. The camera often captures things in a way so that they don't look accurate. Often, it is only through quite a bit of good post processing work that we can get the photo to look like what we actually saw, because the camera or the lens interpreted it inaccurately. So there are times when NOT post processing or missing things in post allows a so-called lie to live. How's that for a little twist?</p>

[richardsperry]

<blockquote>

<p>I want the viewer to feel a sense of trust <strong>that what they see is an accurate representation of what their eyes would have seen had they been standing beside me at the time of capture</strong></p>

 

</blockquote>

<p>Dan, those are your words. Not mine. </p>

<p>I am not being pedantic. I am making a clear point that your notion is wrong, using one of your own photographs as an example. It is a valid and rational debate technique.</p>

<p>It will not convince you, of course. But if there is another reader here, some new photographer thinking about this topic with regard to their own photography, it might give him or her some food for thought on the topic.</p>

[richardsperry]

<blockquote>

<p>"They are also a recurring irritation to the layperson who wonders why "the picture didn't come out right," "</p>

</blockquote>

<p>Untold thousands of layperson photographers since Ansel Adams have been wondering why their photos of Yosemite don't look like his. For decades. I have no obligation to them. To tell them how the magic trick was performed.</p>

<p>I know many of his tricks now. And can duplicate them producing the images I want to produce. Making my own magic.</p>

<p>My next performances are going to be my own versions of Jerry Uelsmann's style of blending. With negatives and enlargers. Because I have images in my head that I want to get out. If only for my own enjoyment and viewing.</p>

[dan_south]

It's a perfectly acceptable twist, Fred. I don't know whether our eyes or our brains are responsible, but something in there adjusts

color perception radically. The lights in most of our homes give off a garish orange light - as any camera set to Daylight WB will

clearly attest - but our perception is that everything looks normal. We filter out the orange cast, just as we filter the blue

cast of an overcast sky or a clear sky at high altitude. If anything, the camera captures and represents the colors MORE honestly than our eyes do. (I smile when people ask me why a shadow looks blue as though it's a fabrication.)

 

But selective color perception is well understood by most photographers. It has nothing to do with my comments regarding the castle image (I hesitate to call it a photo). I never claimed that the gentleman used white balance to represent the color of the castle inaccurately. I criticized the creation of objects and light ex nihilo and the purposeful distortion of shapes.

 

Regarding the bridge, some mercury vapor lamps create light with a yellow cast. What would you like me to do?

Confess that I altered the colors of those lights in Photoshop? Good luck with that! I wouldn't have a clue as to how to undertake such an edit. I have no interest in altering the colors of objects in my photos, and due to sheer lack of skill in

this area, I couldn't do it if you paid me. Maybe ignorance really is bliss at least in the realm of post processing. WYSIWYG

[richardsperry]

<blockquote>

<p>I hesitate to call it a photo</p>

</blockquote>

<p>Short for photograph.</p>

<p>Photo, from Greek for light.</p>

<p>Graph, from Greek for drawing or writing.</p>

<p>Together forming a word meaning to draw with light, or a drawing of light, or a drawing with light.</p>

[Brad_]

>>> My next performances are going to be my own versions of Jerry Uelsmann blending. With film and

enlargers.

 

As an aside, I've met Jerry Uelsmann and his wife Maggie Taylor. She's also a well-known photographer.

What's great is that they approach surrealism differently. Jerry's work is all film and darkroom. And

Maggie's is all Photoshop; with 40 layer composites not being unusual. Both great...

[Norma Desmond]

<blockquote>

<p>Regarding the bridge, some mercury vapor lamps create light with a yellow cast. What would you like me to do?</p>

</blockquote>

<p>I wouldn't like you to do anything except listen. I think your photo is just fine if you're happy with it. But the fact is the lights on the bridge aren't and don't look yellow like that. Your camera, perhaps with an inaccurate white balance setting, created that yellow. It is (in your words) lying to you. That yellow was NOT THERE. If you choose not to post process or not to have adjusted your white balance more "accurately" to begin with, then all I want you to do is recognize that your photo, like the castle photo, is NOT ACCURATE. The lights on the bridge tower are not and DO NOT APPEAR that yellow. I know shadows often look blue. That's different. The bridge lights have NEVER looked that yellow.</p>

<p>Now, the fact of the matter is, you might prefer the yellow to a whiter light. It kind of goes along with the glossy color palette and glow of your light in that photo, none of which looks like the bridge when I look at it at night. I think keeping them yellow is a choice you've made, or that you didn't make and let the camera make for you. But know that it is a choice. And you have either chosen or simply defaulted to not making it more "realistic." Just like the castle guy.</p>

[dan_south]

Rich, we're going around in circles. Everyone knows that photographic images differ from what we see with our eyes in

several important ways. Color casts. Contrast. 2D vs. 3D. Movement. How many times do you want me to admit this

before you'll feel that you have made your point?

 

Looking at a photo of the Eiffel tower is not the same experience as starting beside it. I never implied anything to the

contrary in any of my posts. But using puppet warp to make the tower bend over and dip its top in the Seine is a

contrivance that any two-year-old would notice. Maybe that's someone's artistic vision. Great. I wouldn't do it in most

cases, but I would consider it if I were making some sort of allegorical statement. Expressing fatigue or maybe the tower

is looking for something that slipped away. Noticeably unrealistic and perfectly acceptable. It's making a point. I don't

know what point the castle photo makes except that you can invent stuff if you're skilled in Photoshop. But who didn't

know that?

[dan_south]

> It is (in your words) lying to you.

 

Fred, I never used that verb anywhere in this discussion, so those aren't my words.

[richardsperry]

<p>Brad,</p>

<p>There is a real part of me that knows that my project(s) would be much better suited to PS and digital. It would be much easier of course. There may even be challenges to it which can only be done digitally.</p>

<p>I admired his stuff back when I was a layperson, and knew nothing about photography. Now that I know how he does it, I admire him and his work more.</p>

[dan_south]

> Photo, from Greek for light.

 

"Sawcy pedantique wretch

 

Goe chide late schooleboyes."

 

- John Donne

[richardsperry]

<blockquote>

<p>I don't know what point the castle photo makes except that you can invent stuff if you're skilled in Photoshop.</p>

</blockquote>

<p>Good.</p><p>A painter invents stuff when he or she moves and pushes paint around a canvas. Are you dismissing painting because it is all completely invented?</p><p>Or sculpting? I want to take a night photo of the Rodin Thinker copy in SF soon. Was he a hack too? It was completely invented, it doesn't exist at all. Is it pointless because it is completely fabricated? It must be even more pointless because it is a copy of a fabricated non existence, perhaps.</p>

 

And beyond beyond pointless to take a long exposure black and white photo of a copy of an invented thing.

[Norma Desmond]

<blockquote>

<p>Fred, I never used that verb anywhere in this discussion, so those aren't my words.</p>

</blockquote>

<p>Oh, please, Dan, don't dwell on the minutiae. The point of my post was to say that the yellow light on the bridge tower was inaccurate, and you declared accuracy to be important . . . the word you used was "honest." Address that. Don't worry about whether you actually used the verb "lie" or not. We often ignore the spirit of posts in favor of attending to a silly detail like that. It doesn't advance the conversation. It attempt to shut it down or at least sidestep it.</p>

[Tim_Lookingbill]

<p>What was Eastway sensitive to in taking the picture of the castle as it appears in the before image and making it look like it's glowing yellow with no obvious point source light? What was it about the scene that made him trip the shutter and felt he needed to add trees that weren't initially there? Was he being honest with himself? Genuine? in his reaction to what he saw?</p>

<p>The story of any created image is about communicating to the viewer the creator's sensitivities whether in their head and/or what they saw and wanted to share with others. You can't lie to the viewer about the sensitivities that went into first SEEING the image and then creating/enhancing it into it's final rendering.</p>

<p>This is why we make pictures. Accuracy has nothing to do with this. It's about knowing why the creator made the picture in the first place.</p>

<p>You want to paint a picture to share this sensitivity to whatever is being expressed? That's fine. It will be known that it's a painting even if the painter made the image look as real or even more real than a photograph. The viewer knows it's a painting. There's no lie and the viewer gains even more understanding of the creator's sensitivity from a technical aspect.</p>

<p>You want to take a picture with a camera to share a sensitivity with others that was seen through the viewfinder and then enhanced later in post to show this sensitivity? That's fine. You change it into something that wasn't there to begin with then you better tell someone what you did or you're depriving the viewer and the creator of additional SHARED sensitivities. The creator is not being honest. He is stealing from the viewer and shooting them self in the foot by not tooting their own horn about their technical prowess which is another form of sensitivity from a craftsmanship aspect. Are you following me so far?!</p>

<p>If I'ld not seen Eastway's manipulations I would still look at that castle image as a mediocre attempt at capturing a castle because he's clearly screwed up the manipulation/enhancement into getting me to ask where the light source is coming from. It looks like a Kinkade/Velvet Elvis painting. Eastway is telling me in his manipulations that he'ld rather put lipstick on a pig as a part of his sensitivity instead of finding ANOTHER WAY of expressing his sensitivity for WHY HE TOOK THE SHOT IN THE FIRST PLACE.</p>

<p>I'm not talking about accuracy here only if it applies to the creator being honest in expressing their sensitivity. I'm left with judging Eastway's intent because he's clearly worked the crap out of that image with very little to show and for what reason. I'm left not knowing a damn thing more about Eastway's sensitivities before I even saw that castle image.</p>

<p>When the creator makes the viewer ask the wrong questions about an image, the creator has missed the boat or gone to far in manipulating the image into something no one knows FROM WHERE IT WAS DERIVED! You want to make a photo look like a painting? Fine! Tell the viewer or else you're making fools out of both.</p>

[Norma Desmond]

<p>Come on, Tim. Do you really need the photographer or anyone else to tell you that castle in that photo was manipulated? Look at it, dislike it, and move on. That's what I did. It wasn't all that difficult. I didn't feel made a fool of. Did you?</p>

[Tim_Lookingbill]

<p>Fred, I could tell it was manipulated which makes me doubt Eastway's sensitivities and whether he even knows himself in how he expresses them. This is why I feel this level of photo manipulation is akin to giving scissors to children.</p>

<p>Alternatively your access to the gay community as a framework in expressing an alternate universe with ingenious subtlety in your PN gallery yells loud and clear about your sensitivities over any kind of manipulation you decide to perform to express that alternate universe. I wouldn't care if you cut and pasted all of your images. It's the fact that you've made it clear you have this sensitivity that is unique to you and you alone and out shines any manipulation or enhancement. IOW I can tell your images have been manipulated but it adds instead of detracts. I'm not asking the wrong questions about your images when I look at them.</p>

<p>Just think you're a better photographer than Eastway in this respect. Hope you're getting the same recognition. </p>

[mike dixon]

<i>Photo, from Greek for light.<p>

 

Graph, from Greek for drawing or writing.<P>

 

Together forming a word meaning to draw with light, or a drawing of light, or a drawing with light.</i><P>

 

Flagrant, from Latin "flagrans," which means burning or fiery hot. <P>

That's just one example of a word derived from another language which doesn't mean the same thing as the original word. It wouldn't be difficult to compile a long list of such words. The origin of a word does <B>not</b> restrict or define its current meaning.

[Norma Desmond]

<blockquote>

<p>This is why I feel this level of photo manipulation is akin to giving scissors to children.</p>

</blockquote>

<p>Tim, what you're pointing to in bringing in my work is precisely where I think you and Dan have gone wrong, which I've said from the beginning. It's not about "the level of photo manipulation." It's about the <em>sensibility</em> behind the manipulation. What you are saying, with which I agree, is that it's not whether or how much manipulation is performed. It's how the manipulation relates to the imagery, to the style, to the content, to the message, etc.</p>

<p>These discussions are begun and conducted with the wrong emphasis. The emphasis, as you have just made very clear, should not be on manipulation <em>per se</em>. It should be about aesthetics and aesthetic decisions. Why zero in on manipulation, which is a complete distraction from where our heads should be, which is on photographic sensibility?</p>

<p>Instead of discussing the difficult and nuanced subject of how our photographic sensibility works and can best be brought to bear and utilized to communicate what we want to communicate, we instead waste our time talking about the very simplistic and distracting subject of whether or not we should manipulate an image. It's downright silly. And I think you've just made a great case for that.</p>

[richard_john_edwards]

Tim, what is the point in arguing from a static viewpoint? You are making comments as if others views and opinions

are irrelevant. You are asking why he does this. Does it matter. I also think some of your analogies show a stagnant

non open point of view. To each his own.