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Ethics in Digital Photography
Philosophical discussions often arise when you lock a bunch of photographers in the same space. The debate on where digital is manipulating the truth or simply artistic expression, or both, came up with Winston, Leo, Charlie and Peter Krogh. Based on photojournalism some of us argued photography has been manipulating the image since its beginnings. The same can be said of any art.
Before the image gets into Lightroom or Photoshop the photographer has chosen a particular framing, lighting, perspective, etc, to express what what they see. I think it was Charlie who said we are expressing what we feel.
Take these two images. Certainly not photojournalism, however they are what I had seen in my mind's eye. These scenes had no blue; The bush was shot as tungsten under daylight and the blue pano was painted in with local area correction. The key word there is "painted" which suggests an artistic license. Let's not even mention cloning out the mobile phone towers.
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Adventure 2008
No matter what, those images are beautiful. Who wants to look at mobile phone towers!
I do think you should invite an amateur photographer along next time. I'm available for the next trip! I'm serious.
I think that if the image is successful at evoking an emotion intended by the photographer, then therein lies the truth.
I feel there are 2 disparate photographic worlds: documentary photography and artistic photography. As the names imply, documentary photography should strive to capture as much real-world accuracy as possible, even down to the framing, lighting, perspective, etc., while anything goes with artistic photography.