Gordon
It take me time to express my thughts in English...
You are right that the line to stop PP is an individual matter. The question I thought many times about, is when a photograph is a photograph and when it is a PS creation/manipulation with some source of the original (s) . I don't say it is not accepted ,each to his way of creation. For me, I try to develop my seeing, so the original will have the substance I look for a priory. I use PS as well, for enhance the original. Looking at Bader's work uploaded to PN , my impression is that there is more or less a pattern to his PP, with some differences.
I don't see myself as a purist, as I use PS as well, but I create with the camera and not with PS. And I'm hocked on photography ...;-)) and try my best IN CAMERA.
I still think that Bader is skilled with PS, the result at the end for the viewer is to connect to the end result or not.

Lannie,

Realistic is photography if you see it realistically, but I look to find some more than only reality, a saying, a statement , a message that is connected to human life. My way of doing it is mostly through the performing arts ( Life as a dance),and street photography ( not only), but I'm not trying to imitate painting, even though I graduated art school and practiced painting for many years. I see photography as creating with/in the camera!

Rashed
Please read my answer to Gordon and Lannie, I think it will answer your question as well. I agree with John as well , about creating In camera.
( btw Rashed, the example is created in camera).

The strong points making the photo striking are also being figured as weak points. The digital production is striking none the less.
Shall we dare an adventure in telling wives putting make up on that they are photo chopping too much?

Pnina, as you know since we follow each others work, I go to sometimes great lengths to create in camera results which others achieve with a few clicks of the mouse. For me it is about my pursuit of personal goals and a strong preference for the look of in camera results over post shooting manipulation. I understand your question about at what point does an image cease to be regarded as a photograph although such a distinction does not hold any importance for me. I suppose that if the original source material was rendered with some sort of a light recording device ( camera ) then the result is a photograph, regardless of how much it has been manipulated. I am not too sure of what we gain by imposing any sort of strict definition on what constitutes a photograph. While I can sympathies with the sentiments of the more purist photographers who think heavily manipulated images compared to more conventionally render images is an apples to oranges comparison, I see it as more of a good apples and bad apples issue.

Dea Jim, ladies do not only photo shop their faces with make up but they do more than that like photoshoping their faces skin medically and they do photoshop more than that also, it is just unfortunate we do learn all that from the west and we practice it now a days all over the world, of course non of us these days in a position to reject that other wise we gonna sleep out side our door steps, why not is the modern world and personally I do except that, or I have to except that.

Thank you again for the analysis interesting and fun to me .. I would like to show you a very important point and it has been losing a lot of photographers and some of you also do not own with great respect for your experience in this area
My idea or my work presented here depends on the imagination of the final model or work and how will its final form before they start filming
For your information I do not use Photoshop once and for all this work, because it Impossible and not easy access to such acts only photoshop has sold and long experience in this program
In the latter, which I learned in all the business before I could think and imagine what the final work before the filming never
This talent lose a lot of photographers and also lose some of you with great respect to you and your experience in this area
Some of you may be able to access these training talent and imagination, though I doubt it
God has created each according to his thinking and imagine
Oqdrickm and respect you and I respect every member of this site
Regards.

Gordon
"I see it as more of a good apples and bad apples issue. "

Completely agree with you.I think what count to the viewer is the end result. The way to the end result is important to the creators/artist.

Bader with his last input here had to go to google to do the translation work which is of course comes with many different phrases than what he being trying to say here, Bader do not se photoshop, specially for this work and it is not possible to do this process with photoshop, Bader is saying he looks at his model as being at his final result and not while shooting his image, his imaginations drive him to final process how it will look like and while working with the model in his studio.

Rashed, I don't know how one gets from the original shot posted here to the Image posted as the POW without a massive amount of post processing and I think I hear you and Bader suggesting that none was done? Am I interpreting your statements here correctly?

Not at all dear John, this is another language issue , Bader is saying he did not use photoshop for this work and he also do not use photoshop much, but he did use a different soft ware for this image which is the light room as photoshop do not do this sort of work.

I think we all use "photoshop" as the default shorthand for "digital post processing".

It isn't an essential point here, but of course photoshop could create this sort of result.

Thank you again dear John.
For me this its all ok for any of us to post his images here or else where and the critique from other members are great we do learn a lot of them, it is just the person who post is image and prepared to receive he Critique from others is having my all respect being a brave person, while some very few are so scared to post their images for other to critique them, although they love critique other people work, they are not prepared o have their images on the table for the same.
I find Bader a brave man like many others on photo.net and I respect them all for sharing their images with us and do except our critique as we respect their, this we we all learn and not just sleep and wake up with having in mind we know everything as some people do.Here comes the CRIDET of photo.net POW for the members, that why I will never complain about the selection of the Elvis.

Rashed, thanks for the clarification.

Lightroom is a raw conversion software and Photo Shop ( outside of ACR ) is a more powerful digital manipulation software. A usual workflow would be to process the raw file in Lightroom and then use the power and layers ability of photoshop to further work on an image. I will admit to being surprised, even somewhat dubious of the statement that this was created entirely in Lightroom.

The master of this kind or should I say style of editing is Edd Carlile,as far as I know
http://www.photosig.com/go/users/view?id=257069
he have done some very great and fine works titled Faces of the Past,a collection of very fine portraits that include some 86 portrait,
http://www.photosig.com/go/users/viewportfolio?id=216800&sort=id-d&page=1
and there are some twenty portraits having what have been called here as a veil,you could find also some few kinds of turbans and different types of head covers,the whole collection is a perfect one,I thought some of you might have a look at them if there is an interest in this style of editing portraits.
 

Dear Gordon, the thanks again go for you my friend.
Personally I do some work on photoshop but I am not mastering it yet, I plan to have a course in that when I go to Thailand this time after December, the light room, I never did any work with it and I do not even have it, may be thats just too much for me and the film work is engaging me more these days.
Thank you my friend again and wishing you all of the best.

Thank you dear Saad, indeed there are more than just portrait work out there, very interesting collection of fine Art, at the end of the day I enjoyed what you have guided me to.
Thanks to you

well personaly it doesnt transmit much to me. Certainly shows very good post processing skills but I fail to see anything original or authentic, it's fake for me, not much to write about.

..."while some very few are so scared to post their images for other to critique them, although they love critique other people work, they are not prepared o have their images on the table for the same."

Rashed, who could you possibly be referring to?

Not everyone will understand how there are different needs and issues regarding participation on sites like this. If you want to read my own views, about critique and why I participate as I do, you can read an interview I did here:
http://www.flickr.com/groups/ngproinvitation/discuss/72157622838800681/

I talk about my reasons for being on these sites as well as my own view on why I don't post images. Of course, you are more than welcome to send me an email anytime with your comments regarding my work, which is available to be viewed by anyone.

Thanks for your understanding and respect.........

and hope this helps.

John, that was a very good interview. I've bookmarked it so that I can read it at length. The notion that anyone who critiques should/must also post and receive critiques makes no sense to me at all. I'm much more interested in the ideas the person brings to the discussions. There are some incredible photographers who post photos but essentially never participate in any of the conversations, and other folks who participate in the conversations but seldom or never post. I learn much more from the latter than the former.

Some of the most valuable contributors to Photo.net have never posted a picture here, although sometimes I wish they would. My desire to see their work creates no obligation on their part. of course.

John, thanks to you and many others like you who are willing to share your very significant experiences and observations with the rest of us.

--Lannie

Dear John, I am sorry to answer you too late, it is the time difference between us and I was sleep by the time you posted your last.
I was not referring to you at all and I always been to proud with your contributions here plus I have seen your work long time back and I did enjoy viewing your work.
May be you are one of the most essential person with the POW and always been too polite and meaningful with your inputs, may be if not you here, the POW will have less meaning to many members as well as Gordon and Stephen.
Have a nice day my friend and be well.

Often, our language does not keep pace with the way in which our forms of life change. This has happened in photography. What we need here is not more discussion about manipulation, processing or any other such thing. What we need are new concepts. We simply have not incorporated in to our linguistic practices appropriate concepts to denote what we see in front of us in this "picture" of the week. What Bader has done here is so far removed from a picture that it can hardly be properly called one. It is also conceptually problematic to characterize what Bader is doing as photography. Obviously, photography is involved, but there are other rather distinct practices that are heavily involved as well. The simple fact is that digital manipulation offers us vastly more and different capabilities than traditional darkroom manipulation. This means that digital post processing can not be correctly characterized as a mere digital darkroom and the concept of photography is misused when applied to images that contain forms of manipulation that are vastly different to darkroom manipulation. These are conceptual problems, not logical or factual ones.

I have often thought that this site should be called PHOTOSHOP.NET rather than PHOTO.NET to recognize the changing nature of what is being shown here. There is a fundamental change taking place in what we are doing. Those of us that want to impress others by making them think that their photography skills are responsible for the change are involved in base rhetorical ploys. Those of us that want to impress others with their digital manipulation skills are at least being honest.

So, can we be clear? I've got a suggestion. Let's call this digital art, not photography. Let's call Bader's selection this week the digital art project of the week. And when we pick a photograph, then let's call it picture of the week. JJ

Yes, Jeremy, let's talk about words instead of looking at and reacting to what's in front of us. Your comment is conceptual. Such conceptualization is not more photographic than had you said something visual about what you were seeing. Instead, you distracted yourself by playing with words when you could have been looking, seeing, and talking about those things. If it makes you feel better to call what one person is doing photography and what someone else is doing digital art, go for it. It won't help anyone make stuff.

Fred, this is not about how I feel. I am trying to point out that we get ourselves muddled up by not articulating what we are seeing and how we are reacting correctly. There has been a lot of discussion here about manipulation. This is the discussion to which I am responding. My comments may not help us make art, but they certainly would help us talk more coherently about it. JJ

There is always going to be a natural level of resistance to change and a thus a need or movement to relabel things to isolate them. Throughout the history of photography, there have been new tools and materials that have evolved to help us better achieve the vision of the creator. Some choose to use them and some remain loyal to their previous practices. Certainly, there has been name calling and disgust along the way, even with those things we all consider as "photography" today.

The difficulty is to remember in all of this is that Photography is a primary category and within that category we have all sorts of subdivisions, even Digital photography (capture) is a subset of the larger concept--something which many would like to also exclude from THEIR view of photography. We generally accept many forms, which have existed over time, as photography such as photograms that don't even start with a camera.

I think we need to give the debate a bit of a rest and either address an image as Fred suggests or choose to ignore it, which I believe is an unfortunate and limiting stance. By now, I think it is obvious that there is no consensus on what level of digital manipulation of a PHOTOGRAPH renders it no longer a photograph, here or outside these pixels, and so taking the opportunity to analyze a visual is more productive than arguing about categorization.

The discussion about the manipulation, like has taken place here is about how that manipulation has or hasn't made this image successful. It has also been about, in a round about way, a balance between the skills behind the camera and those behind the computer and how they sometimes work in harmony and how they sometimes don't. For the last several weeks, it has actually been about transforming something organic into something that is more contrived and how that affects different viewers. All valuable input and information to those who take the time to read and understand.

Just sayin'.............