Often after submitting my photographs on Flickr, Grayscale Website or elsewhere, people have questioned whether the photographs have been altered or manipulated on some image editing software like Adobe Photoshop or Corel Draw. A more common term used is “Photoshoped”. Often the correct answer is yes; almost every image has seen some modifications in Photoshop, but to me that is kind of necessary! Now, this entire discussion is about art photography and doesn’t deal with photojournalism where a much stricter code of conduct is required since the photo is depicting a real life story.
In the realms of Art Photography the entire idea is to capture an instant of time that would bring about exited emotions in people which would have otherwise been forgotten by the human eye. When Photography started then people used develop what was known as “Darkroom Techniques” where certain modification like exposure compensation, color correction were affected to photographs to make them look better. They did that using certain chemical mixtures while developing the photograph. Those techniques were however limited, not like the immense power of what today’s software’s can do! And thus we come back to initial question of what is considered ethical in photo – manipulation, a lot of people have different opinions on this and I have my own. The following is my “CODE OF ETHICS”, when it comes to photo manipulation.
1. Color correction, contrast, level, noise reduction, sharpening and gamma changes are always acceptable as some of these could be otherwise achieved by using appropriate filters and other techniques. This makes all the more sense when you use a camera that shoots RAW images; here is where one can max out the possibilities of RAW imaging. This also brings in the question of clicking images at different exposures and combining them (HDRi). Well, to me that again is acceptable but it should be mentioned that the image displayed is an HDR image.
2. Cropping, it often done. Sometimes minor modifications to remove unwanted distractions and sometimes major modifications to change the aspect ratio. To me again this is acceptable, because to know what the right span would be for a particular image, also needs an artistic eye and hence compiles a work of art. And once again if you are using a High resolution camera u might as well click images without zooming (digital) in as you can anyway crop them later on.
3. Removal distracting objects by airbrushing or cloning is a problem, I wouldn’t do it. However I sometimes do reduce their presence by blurring them, de-saturating them, darkening/lightening them; reduce them to the background detail. If all of this doesn’t work then I discard the photo!
4. Adding of additional elements is a strict no-no. Some people justify cloning by saying that since the element existed in the image so it’s justified to clone them. But I believe we should leave the images in their right places and definitely not play with their numbers.
5. Adding other effects such as effect filter, rendering lights, lens flares should also be avoided. Though one is allowed to play with the color, to make it black and white, invert, sepia or any other shade seems reasonable as they come under the domain of post-processing. One can also increase contrast by using the same images as on overlay or saturate by using hue/saturation etc.
Now, there are two things I need to clarify:
(1) I am not in any way trying to impose, or convince you that these should be your code of editing ethics. That is totally a personal decision, and you have to decide what you feel you’re comfortable with, so I was just sharing—not dictating or instructing on any level. And (2) I can’t defend any of my decisions listed above.
So I hope that these point help clarify your doubts on what we here at Grayscale consider the ethics of Photo Manipulation. Since Photography is an integral part of the teams functioning, we once again follow some rules though not limiting the creative expanse of Art Photography. It should also answer all those people who feel that “Photoshoped Images” are not authentic and should not be considered an art. So go on guys, happy photoshoping!
Further Reading: http://www.scottkelby.com/blog/2007/archives/693 :- Another blog on the same
