Archived posting to the Leica Users Group, 2003/08/25

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Subject: Re: [Leica] Re: Leica photograph
From: Eric Welch <eric@jphotog.com>
Date: Mon, 25 Aug 2003 18:57:02 -0700

As a long-time photojournalist, I disagree. Tilting the frame has  
nothing to do with ethics. Who's to say that one crop of the world is  
more or less valid than another? Eugene Richards is one of the greats,  
and he often tilts his frames. But it's not an affectation. He shoots  
with very wide lenses very close to the subject. And sometimes to get  
the part of the photo you want in the frame means you tilt. That way  
you can crop things out you don't want, and leave things in that  
wouldn't be there if you kept the horizon perfectly horizontal.

It takes good sense and good tastes to not overdo it. Way too many  
people do it because it's fashionable. But every once in a while, it's  
the right thing to do.

On Monday, August 25, 2003, at 08:36  AM, Ken Firestone wrote:

> On Sun, 24 Aug 2003, Ted Grant wrote:
>
> <SNIP>
>
>    Now now John boy be nice :-) as the angled effect here doesn't do  
> anything
>    for it at all and only makes it look like it was an accident.
>
>    However, I'll concede to you, that sometimes if one is shooting for  
> an artsy
>    fartsy art magazine or one of these over trained exotic vision art  
> photo
>    editors, tilting, twisting and all the composition rules in the  
> book are out
>    the window!
>
>    But in my book of photojournalism there's no such such thing as  
> screwing
>    with a picture by tilting and twisting it, any more than I'd condone
>    photoshopping in a person or pyramid being moved.
>
>    Like it's ethics!
>
> Well spoken Ted! Its like they are very deliberately trying to prove
> how cool, casual and detached they are that they are above technique.
> Anyway, if you have to try hard to be cool you are not.
>
> ======================================================================= 
> =====
> Ken Firestone, W3CAT     | For every problem there is one solution
> kenf@speakeasy.net	 |  which is simple, neat, and wrong.
> ken@firestone.net        |   -- H. L. Mencken
> ======================================================================= 
> =====
>
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>
>

Eric
Carlsbad, CA

http://www.jphotog.com

"Clichés are like analogies. At the end of the day, you're just beating  
a dead horse"

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