Asher,
Remove the color from some images and they work better in B&W than they did in color and some become damn near useless. Sometimes they are just as good but the message or story they tell is either a different "story" or they tell the same one in a slightly different way. The same is true of images that are changed from B&W to color.
My objection is not to this part of your argument, only your fiat that your statements of
immutable truth exhaust possible exploration and insight, and that is unacceptable!
To repeat what I clearely enunciated above, I can write it no better at this moment,
I'll be conceited enough to say that this post effectively ends this thread because what I have said in the two paragraphs above are an immutable truth.
Bob, what you have said is
not an immutable truth*. In any case, if I say, for the moment I understand completely what you infer by the words "immutable truth" I would say yes you are mostly right, however the
gap is so important, that the idea that you have completed exploration is indeed conceited, mistaken and perhaps even delusional.
When there is no room for discussion we enter the realm of the dictatorships. Those stifle thought since their dictums, are merely that.
Conceit or not, like it or not that is the truth and that truth is immutable.
See above~!
Many of the arguments/talking points in your post are applicable to art from the viewpoint of aesthetics, but again like it or not, not all photographs are art much less fine art that lend themselves to a discussion of their aesthetic appeal.
The photography for news reporting is discussed under that heading. Same with forensic, medical and other documentary work. We have discussed that here and you will see in the section, "UPTOWN" discussions of altered news reportage. Essentially you will come to know that I am vehemently opposed to any alterations of images to move structures, change the meaning as opposed to developing the pictures sufficiently for it to act as honest evidence for what would be observed by any other camera or eye in that position at the particular time.
However, outside of that I personally despise references to truth in pictures! One can only approach transmision of the unstable "vision". This vision of the photographer changes all the time until the picture is completed. This is how it works: T
The photographer imagines the latent and potential picture. This happens before, during and after the shutter is released and then throughout the iterative developement of this conceptual vison as the real picture is developed and made outside his mind on a piece of paper or on the screen.
So being an honest news reporter and being an otherwisew honest photgrapher cannot be equated just because they both use cameras. There are two totally unrelated processes! In the first, there must be no cognitive modulation of the view captured for documentary evidence or news. It is in fact essential to our standards of ethics. It is only mentioned as some newsman, just a terrible few, have been seduced to the dark side of deception.
In any cases, what we discuss here in all other photography, even sports, is the
desired and necessary clarifdcation, modulation and enhancement of what we see so that it is more meaningful and evokes thought and so moves us. Here, the works, therefore, must be judged to some extent by esthetics.
In documentary work, esthetics must be looked at with great care and suspicion since there can be dishonest context and therefore manipulation. This once more calls to mind the nature of
libel per quod, a defamation by virtue of the context within which an image is placed. However, here it may be dishonest by virtue of induction of emotion with images showing just one side of a story. So here, the word manipulation, is fitting.
Manipulation is not a fine word. It connotates cheating and dishonesty. It cannot, however apply to
image processing in work that is not intended to be documentary. Otherwise we would have a problem with ladies wearing makeup or even clothes if it makes them better looking than otherwise.
All ideas of so called "truth" here is not just out of place it is delusional, destructive and constraining to art. It is an affliction that especially strikes news photographers and others who have been guided by ethical principles as they should in documenting things or events. These photographers instead of taking their uniforms off (when leaving the world of the objective worker who releases the shutter and properly delivers an exposed and in focus image to contain the information required of the objective work) mistakenly wears that same uniform of objectivity like a straight-jacket for other non-objective casual or decorative work.
In regards to manipulation of the elements of an image by techniques such as softening the focus or changing a color, forgive me but I must not have been very clear in regards to distracting color in the photograph. There is no need to play with the red and yellow drills because they are part and parcel of the image and are not distracting in the least.
Also my journalistic background gives me a very strong aversion to the unnecessary manipulation of images. What constitutes unnecessary? Any change to an image that changes the truth of the image is unnecessary and unwarranted. That said, I do not have a problem with a change that makes it a better photograph or better represents what the photographer saw through the viewfinder or on the ground glass as long as those changes do not change the truth or the editorial content of the image.
But we are not discussing journalism here, just non-objective photography! No need to bring in the ethics police since it is all untrue anyway!
I am not trying to be either a prude or holier than thou-ish, but I feel very strongly about this. When a photographer performs significant manipulations to an image, at some point it becomes a work of art produced by the photographer by photographic means. That includes landscape photos taken through graduated color filters for effect.
If the photographer does not imprint his/her vison on the dumb scene recorded by photosensitive material then either he/she has created a perfect scene or stalked a perfect scene and has a miraculous emotional bonding with the CMOS/CCD chip. the algorithms in the software or the chemical in film to produce with one click of the shutter what he/she saw at that moment, excluding any emotional content or other values the phortographer brought to the scene.
Now that would be a miracle and I doubt it has happened but rarely even with the greatest photographers of all time!
By contrast, a great photograph is the result of a process of give and take between the image in the brain, always incompletely formed, and the work of the photographer's hands during the process of making the final image for presentation.
During this time, the photographer does not manipulate, just as a lovers do not manipulate. They flirt, suggest, make tentative movements, dance a while, wonder, walk, talk, so on. It is this
process which must occur in making a great photograph. It must never occur in news photography!
A soccer picture might not merit more than a short amount of work and the result will be mainly documentary but with pizzaz and a flare.
A portrait might take hours to print. Wrinkles might be less obvious, the eyes leas weary and that bruise gone altogether. A single picture of trees might need weeks of consideration and darkroom work. That one negative or RAW file may be revisited afresh time and again to re-explore and interpet asd if for the first time. We can dig further and express something new by altering tonality, color, sharpeness, contrast, revealing or hiding and more. None of this must ever be called
manipulation. To do so is is at the least distrespectful but also shows limited insight in the dynamic creative process which can have no borders since it represents the imagination.
I am very sorry, but the manipulations from your first to your second color image are unnecessary and destroy their truth and usefulness from a strict journalistic standpoint.
But the image was not
journalistic in that sense but more a
journal of a journey meeting people with some humanity and nature. Antonio is treasuring and highlighting the lives of working craftsmen not proving that they are working in some documentary.
Nevertheless, the second image is a much better illustration for a how-to-do-it feature than the first, and the two together are an excellent illustration of the point you were trying to make.
Thanks.
An again thanks for presenting arguments that make me think more about the creative process.
Asher