Photoshop- the right amount or too much

[Peakbagr]

Thought I'd ask the outdoor photography folks for their opinions.

Sometimes photoshopping photography is necessary to 'rescue' an otherwise spectacular or special photograph. But when does altering photos cross the line from photgraphy to art?

With the explosion of digital photography the last few years, I've seen some gorgeous outdoor images. Sometimes modifications have been done with such a light and subtle touch that it's impossible to tell if the photo has been altered. Othertimes I've seen beautiful photos that scream 'Photoshop' when I look at them. They are beautiful, but they don't look like anything that the camera lens or human eye captured.
This has led me to wonder where the artistry behind the lens stops and the digital alchemy begins. I like all outdoor photography but sometimes wonder if a little 'P' should appear in the bottom corner of photos to denote that post photo processing was heavily at work.

 

[Neil]

Each camera with all of it's various settings has already "shopped" the image as it wrote it onto the memory card as a jpeg file.

Every image you see today, no matter where, has been digitally altered between the camera's lens and your computer screen.

It's not unlike a well-endowed woman. Fake?

It seems that most coffee table books nowadays are over-shopped. Where to draw the line?

 

[Kevin Judy and Emma]

Photoshopping...

one of the greatest photo-shoppers of all time was Ansel Adams...

KDT

 

[DougPaul]

It's a matter of opinion--for the photographer, it all depends on what he wants. The same applies to the viewer, but their preferences may differ.

The artistry starts before you even open the shutter. (Artistic vision, viewpoint, focal length, exposure (ISO, time, and F-stop), depth of focus, lighting, etc.)

Once you have tripped the shutter, the camera records a RAW image which is not usable as is. It has to be interpolated (typ Bayer interpolation) and multiplied by a matrix just to get a basic RGB image. A lot more needs to be done to make it into a nice image and put it in a convenient format (eg JPEG). So all digital photos are processed to some degree.

For many images (and many photographers), the in-camera processing is adequate. (Many cameras also give the user some control of the in-camera processing.) No photoshopping required.

So it comes down to what the photographer wants. Does the final image match his vision? If not, can photoshop fix it?


IMO, the final image should look natural to me--if it looks processed, it is overdone. Others may have different notions of too much.

Doug

 

[DougPaul]

one of the greatest photo-shoppers of all time was Ansel Adams...

Back then they called it printing...

But yes, you can also process an image in the darkroom or retouch a negative or print. Digital methods are simply easier, faster, and more versatile. And dryer, too...

Doug

 

[Peakbagr]

Thanks Doug Paul and Kevin, Judy, Emma.
I think DP summarized what I was getting at:
"the final image should look natural to me--if it looks processed, it is overdone"

 

[Chip]

"the final image should look natural to me--if it looks processed, it is overdone"

That's how I feel. Really ruins the effort, to me, if it looks processed, regardless of the inherent digital processing that occurs by default now.

A friend went to a well known School of Visual Arts and "photoshopped" pictures 30 years ago by painting them to enhance colors/aspects. He was told in no uncertain terms by professors to stop, that what he was doing was not art. He continued, as he generally liked the results of his efforts, but kept them private.

 

[Tom Rankin]

That's how I feel. Really ruins the effort, to me, if it looks processed, regardless of the inherent digital processing that occurs by default now.

Sometimes I take a shot with the P/S camera that comes out different than what I remember. In this case, I will attempt to re-create what I saw. This is usually only partially successful. But that may be because I only use a free-photoshop-wannabe program. I was actually thinking of showing some of my pre-processed shots of the big mountains out west. Some of them are extremely bright snow fields with dark forests down lower. What to do? It seems like you can't have both, even though your brain remembers it all looking so good!

 

[Peakbagr]

Tom,

Was just wondering what members thought about the photos that look so altered that they don't look natural. Many are often interesting and arresting to look at, but they look more like art that began as a digital photo.

 

[DougPaul]

Sometimes I take a shot with the P/S camera that comes out different than what I remember. In this case, I will attempt to re-create what I saw. This is usually only partially successful. But that may be because I only use a free-photoshop-wannabe program. I was actually thinking of showing some of my pre-processed shots of the big mountains out west. Some of them are extremely bright snow fields with dark forests down lower. What to do? It seems like you can't have both, even though your brain remembers it all looking so good!

Your eye can alter its "exposure settings" to match different parts of a scene, but a camera has to use a single setting for the entire scene. Back in the darkroom days, we used to "burn in" or "dodge" a region while exposing the print to alter the local exposure. One could also use print papers with different dynamic ranges.

In the digital world, one may be able to improve these pictures by altering the density (intensity) scale, perhaps by altering the gamma or perhaps with a more complicated mapping. The next step would be masking (selecting) the regions which need altering and changing their density scales. Both of these techniques work best if you start with a RAW image--RAW can contain more dynamic range than a JPEG. Also large sensor cameras tend to have more dynamic range than small sensor cameras. http://www.clarkvision.com/photoinfo/#part_4

Beyond that, there are High Dynamic Range (HDR) techniques which consist taking the same picture at multiple exposures and combining them. See http://www.vftt.org/forums/showthread.php?t=38342 for more info, however, given your question I suggest that you not consider HDR at this point.

Doug

 

[DougPaul]

Was just wondering what members thought about the photos that look so altered that they don't look natural. Many are often interesting and arresting to look at, but they look more like art that began as a digital photo.

It depends... It is easier to comment if you ask for comments about a specific picture which you think may be overprocessed.

Some examples of over and improper processing:
* Over-saturated colors look garish and unrealistic
* A foggy mood picture has low dynamic range (DR). If one expands the DR, it may make the scene clearer, but it destroys the mood which may be the main point of the picture.
* Over-sharpened images become noisy and show extra bands next to and parallel to strong edges.
* Improper color temperature (illumination color) compensation can give unrealistic colors.

I suggest that you take some of your own images and try over/mis-processing them to see what it looks like. For me, sometimes initially overdoing some effect and then scaling it back makes it easier to set it correctly (according to my taste).

One other thing that is often ignored by amateurs--monitor and printer compensation to remove variations in monitors and printers. (Scanners should also be calibrated.) Proper calibration requires special equipment and software, but there are some simplified techniques that one can do without special equipment: see http://www.vftt.org/forums/showthread.php?t=18939

Doug

 

[Peakbagr]

I've tried some digital manipulation and so far have only done little touch ups. I think there are enough over processed digital photos around that I'd rather not call single out anyone's photos....except mine of course.

 

[DougPaul]

I've tried some digital manipulation and so far have only done little touch ups. I think there are enough over processed digital photos around that I'd rather not call single out anyone's photos....except mine of course.

I don't use my image processing programs very often either. Mostly just density scale modification, some cropping, and occasional sharpening.

I generally just shoot directly to JPEG, however the external processing can be useful now and then.

In some situations (eg high dynamic range scenes), I'll shoot to both JPEG and RAW and choose based upon the results.

Doug

 

[JohnL]

But when does altering photos cross the line from photgraphy to art?

Photography is art. There is no line to cross.

Photoshop is to the darkroom as a jpg is to a slide.
Before photography there was painting. Was "Washington Crossing the Delaware" art or documentary? Were the impressionists overdoing it compared to the realists?
Many documentary photographs were 'altered' for various reasons but I don't think those images would be considered 'art' in the context you mean.
If you look at enough images and if you have seen a lot of different kinds of light, it's pretty easy to tell what is altered, what is not and what is "overdone", though overdone is a subjective term. This is art you're talking about, after all. Sometimes the intent of the image is to overdo.
And, don't forget, there are other digital darkrooms besides Photoshop. And some of them don't begin with P. What do we do then?
I understand your dilemma but where do you draw the line between P and no P? As soon as you draw a line in the sand, the tide comes in to wash it away.
It's art. Which means you can choose to like it or not. Enjoy.

JohnL

 

[Peakbagr]

John,

It's hard to offer any disagreements with your thoughtful post. Photography is art. Wanted to start a dialogue about when photographs are so altered from what the photographer's eye captured in the field.

 

[DougPaul]

John,

It's hard to offer any disagreements with your thoughtful post. Photography is art. Wanted to start a dialogue about when photographs are so altered from what the photographer's eye captured in the field.

I'll admit that I was also tempted to post something along the general lines of what John posted...

From a photographer's standpoint, the final image is whatever he wants it to be (or as close as feasible to the envisioned image). Nothing says it has to represent the original scene in any realistic way. Similarly the viewer is free to like or dislike it however much he wants for whatever reason he wishes. It's art...

I think your original question is aimed at realistic or quasi-realistic representation of scenes. People often enhance (ie process) their images to improve their appeal, make elements more visible, and/or to emphasize certain elements. Perhaps it's art, perhaps it's recording, perhaps it's both... (I'd argue that the physical approach has elements of both and it becomes more a question of the intent of the photographer.) But again, the viewer is free to have his own opinion about whether he likes it image or not and whether it does a good job of representing the scene or not.

So while the "judges" may tend to agree or disagree, there are no hard and fast lines. And the criteria for judging may not even be well-defined, either.

So have fun--as a photographer and/or as a viewer whether others agree with you or not...

Doug

 

[Elizabeth]

Interesting thread. I like seeing more "natural" looking shots; but have certainly been guilty of over-using certain manipulations myself, especially saturation-boosting. I'd have to say, though, that I have saved some otherwise throw-away shots by purposeful over-manipulation. (My shots are mostly just for my own enjoyment, so it doesn't really matter anyhow.)

Take these two white-dog-in-the-fog shots:


Salty on Mt. Monroe in the fog by Elizabeth W.K., on Flickr
In the original you could hardly see the dog. I decided to go with the vintage postcard look by boosting the saturation way up. Not great; but kinda fun, I think, and I would otherwise have been without documentation of Salty's peak-bag.


14. Balance by Elizabeth W.K., on Flickr

In this one on Mt. Adams I used extreme de-saturation. I think that this is actually closer to what I saw than what came out of my camera.

 

[DougPaul]

It is pretty easy to make Salty jump off the page with just a bit more density scale adjustment and just a touch of sharpening.
Orig:

Enhanced:

Doug

 

[Elizabeth]

Doug,

Thanks. I might try going back to the original and playing with the density scale adjustment. I've never worked with that before.

Elizabeth

 

[roadtripper]

I'm a bit of a purist, so personally I only appreciate photographs that are natural.

Some things I am OK with:
- cropping
- darkening or lightening the entire image...but only slightly (equivalent of 1-2 stops)
- taking a color picture and making it greyscale

I really do not like when people mess with colors or contrast. I really don't like filters (either on camera or digitally) as well. For example, I don't like a lot of Galen Rowell's photographs because they are so very far from being natural.

Of course this is just my preference for my own photographs. I have absolutely no right in telling you what you should or should not do to your own photographs

PS: I do love shooting waterfalls w/long shutter speeds, which makes the falls look unnatural. Seems like a double-standard, eh?