Today I want to talk about something that I've been thinking about for quite some time, and that is "Just how realistic is photography these days?".
Is photography more about depicting reality? Or has it become more about people's post processing skills in the "digital darkroom", and creating images that not only appear more pretty than reality, but perhaps never happened at all?
Reasons for both ends of this argument are as varied as people themselves...
Reasons from the unreal end:
There's always going to be the unscrupulous application of any skill set. Some might argue that the widespread use (perhaps abuse) of Photoshop and similar software packages doesn't just "pretty up" images, but can also "falsify" them. Of course, then you've got your digital artists, who's job is to create "artists impressions" of things we can't photograph yet... or it just might be easier to "make up" interesting stuff digitally.
Frankly, photography is as much a form of art, as drawing and painting. Yet we don't necessarily get on our soapboxes if our images using pencils and paint brushes are entirely flights of the artist's imagination. It seems unfair to single out photography, or perhaps more appropriately, limit photography to such a narrow minded view.
Going further into the grey areas from the creative end, you've got things like computer generated special effects in movies, or almost completely computer-generated movies like "Avatar". In time, I believe the ability to generate ever more realistic 3D models will surpass our ability to differentiate them from reality. But that's just not cost-effective... yet. In any case, simply making things look more awesome, seems to me at least, a worthwhile argument for letting a hefty degree of manipulation slide.
Reasons from the real end:
At the other end of the extreme, you've got your scientific photographers, forensic photographers, live news photographers, where the real-world implications of their accuracy may significantly impact people's lives. People's reaction from seeing these images may be significantly detrimental if images like these are heavily doctored. These are definitely areas where I genuinely believe that the only acceptable manipulation would be to make the relevant information easier to discern.
However, at the same time, there are countless situations where a little bit of realism can be sacrificed (indeed, it may even be expected) for the sake of "enhancing realism". Naturally, there's always some degree of grey coming from the real side as well. Documentary photographers, wedding/event photographers, and even fashion shoots use various techniques to "get the look", or improve things. While it's likely that these activities really happened, but it's not exactly out of the realm of possibility that a lot of things happened out of the scene, in the scene, in the camera, and in post processing to make those shots a least a little bit nicer, or even significantly so. Even if the entire process is contrived, as long as the photograph itself isn't too heavily manipulated after being shot, you're still considered by most "a photographer".
I find documentaries a prime example, of reality's end being sacrificed a little for a greater goal. Ok, so the team of documentary photographers drag all their very expensive equipment to far-flung locations, spend weeks if not months shooting wildlife and scenery. They then condense many hours of disparate footage into an hour-long episode and try to weave a story from all these disparate parts. Sometimes you'll see footage back-to-back as though this is one event, but the footage might be shot many miles apart, and there might be days, weeks, or even months between one scene and the next. The editors and producers weave a story a little more by getting David Attenborough to do the voice-over, describing the various triumphs and hardships in the daily life of sea-faring albatross, penguin, amazonian ant, or whatever creature they're looking at today. However, this puts a very human-centric slant on the whole experience.
Now, I think there's definitely some very good reasons for jazzing up reality just a touch. Staring at an ant on a leaf shot in some section of the Amazon, isn't exactly going to be high on people's "to do" list. So they need to make it a little entertaining in the hopes that people might watch and possibly learn a few things. The audience might not grasp the exact reality, but at least they'll have been exposed to a portion of it. I'm going to be blunt, documentaries, for all their flaws, often have more relevance to people's lives that half the rubbish people read in magazines and watch on TV.... just saying it like it is!
Heavyweights from both sides of the argument:
I've been lucky enough to go to some major photography events in Sydney and Melbourne and I've met a few of Australia's biggest names in professional photography. Peter Eastway, who is certainly not shy about using many (note that I did not say "any") means to improve a photograph. Whereas Ken Duncan is certainly a man more about getting it right in camera, and then leaving his images, largely... alone. I've met newer generation photographers like Alexia Sinclair who markets herself (quite accurately) as an "artist and photographer" because she makes amazing images by making complex, extremely high resolution artistic composites of disparate photo captures. Of course, these images are false, in a way, but I have to say. "Who cares?". It's a creative piece, it's not something you're going to base life-altering decisions on.
I strongly encourage you to have a look at the shots each have produced:
Peter Eastway's site: https://www.petereastway.com/
Ken Duncan's site: https://kenduncan.com
Alexia Sinclair's site: https://alexiasinclair.com/
Controversy and opinions in the photography world:
Perhaps the biggest crime in photography, is not to enhance, or even combine disparate images in to an amazing composite, but to take credit for other people's work. It amazes me that in this day and age, that people still do this, and expect to get away with it. With Internet access now reaching 4.4 billion out of 7.8 billion people, and now people have access to ever-improving search engines, finding "appropriated" images online has never been easier. Yet people enter other people's images into competitions, win them, become famous, only to have it all stripped from them within a year or two. What's the point?
The Australian Institute of Professional Photographers (A.I.P.P.) has had a couple of these events "go south" like this. Even when it doesn't, the winner might still find themselves in the centre of a controversy not of their own making.
In 2016, a photographer named Lisa Saad won the Australian Professional Photography Award (A.P.P.A), only to have Ken Duncan call it "an illustration, not a photograph". Cue tons of hateful online responses here. Arguments for both sides came out of the wood work, and you can find more information here:
https://procounter.com.au/2016/09/08/ken-duncan-appas-highjacked-manipulators/
Personally, if your ability to process images allows you to make masterpieces out of mediocre shots, then I'm sorry, that does not make you an award-winning photographer, but an award-wining digital artist. If however, your amazing shots, end up as really amazing photos, without extreme manipulation.. then you're probably an awesome photographer. Having said that, where the line that separates these two, is going to differ from one person to the next.
So ask, "What's your philosophy?". Is it so bad to be one or the other? Of course not, just enter the right sort of competition for your style of work. If you don't enter competitions, and don't influence people's important decisions with your images, then do whatever you like to your photos to make yourself happy. They are after all, your images, and it's your creative vision on how to make those look.
The importance of intent:
If you are trying to represent reality, truth, or empirical evidence in your work, then the heavy-handed use of editing is less than ideal at best. However, if you're just there to make a pretty image, entertain, or imagine what something could be like, then there's no problem with editing, manipulation, or even "making it up" entirely.
It also comes down to the application you put your images to. If they're to win competitions, then fine, follow the rules. When I say follow the rules, I don't just mean the letter of those rules, but the spirit of those rules... perhaps this concept is more subtle, yet often more important. Now I know the budding lawyers out there will make a case to use the letter of the law to define the spirit of the law, twist arguments around to suit their purposes, but if you put half that amount of thought and creativity into creating images in the first place, it's likely to be redundant.
If your photos are just to entertain, engender some form of curiousity, interest, or comment, then that's definitely more art than science, and you should be free to express yourself using whatever means you like (as long as you aren't running risks, breaking laws, inconveniencing anyone, or hurting anything).
Final thoughts:
I wish I could come up with something truly wise here, but good advice often sounds trite or obvious.. but here goes:
With such powerful tools aimed at editing photographs, seeing isn't always believing, and it's obvious that you shouldn't always believe what other people try to show you. I think doing a little digging, verifying facts, and getting second, or third opinions when it's appropriate is always a good idea. However, don't limit yourself and others by defining what "photography is" or what it "should be". Allow people to show you what's possible, their work, and their ideas. It doesn't always matter if it's realistic or not. Ask directly if you're unsure, and it somehow matters to you.
A challenge for you:
If you'd like to really test your skills, and perhaps learn something. Go through your old photographs, ones that didn't perhaps make the grade to be in your all-time favourites, but not bad enough to be deleted either. (All photographers have these laying around on a hard disk or memory card somewhere). Try running that picture through your software of choice, with the goal of making is better. Crop it, change the colour mix, run it through a split tone, try an unused filter, or plug-in. I call this, "searching for hidden gems", or "Picture mining". Going through the discarded pile and seeing what, if anything you can make of them. Great thing to do on a rainy day.. especially with a hot beverage, perhaps some nice music.
This teaches you a few things:
- To look at the potential of an older shot, not just what you envisaged at the time.
- To learn alternative means of processing your shots. Even if it doesn't work well every time, you might learn a skill or process to make other shots better.
- This is an unusual idea, but to see how new developments in software can bring old photos to life. I started using Photoshop roughly 18 years ago, and wow has the software improved since then. I also use other software like DXO's Photolab, Affinity, Aurora HDR, Photomatix HDR, Zerene Stacker, AutoPano Giga, the whole Nik collection, Topaz plugins and others because I've learned that Photoshop, while being the industry standard, is far from the best at everything. Whether you're using newer software, or different software altogether, you can process older images in ways that simply weren't possible, or perhaps use apps that weren't available at the time. You don't have to be God's gift at every program, but you're definitely able to get better results if you're able to use the best software for the task. Of course, "best" is subjective, so please don't take offense if you are a die-hard Photoshop zealot. Use whatever works for you.
Take care, have fun, and I hope this helps someone out there.
Ham.