Archived posting to the Leica Users Group, 2007/04/17
[Author Prev] [Author Next] [Thread Prev] [Thread Next] [Author Index] [Topic Index] [Home] [Search]At 07:17 PM 4/17/2007, you wrote: >I will have to spend some time pondering if removing a distraction >from a photo that does not alter the truthfulness of the image is >wrong. A removed set of stray legs or a telephone wire does not >seem to me as a way of changing the truth. Something to think about >for awhile.... John - The problem is "What is truth?" That's a question I don't thing we will answer in our lifetimes! ;-) I know what I think. For photojournalism, I think it's o.k. to crop, to adjust levels and color balance and a very few other things that you could do in the darkroom. We greatly admire the documentary photography of Eugene Smith and it has been proven that he inserted a saw handle --and a hand to grasp it -- into the opening picture of his photo essay on Albert Schweitzer - all in the darkroom - before any hint of digital manipulation. Did Smith alter the photos to present his idea of the truth? I have no doubt that Eugene Smith would be fired from any newspaper today for his manipulation of photographs. If the photographs are intended for news or documentary, the only manipulation acceptable today should be cropping, color balance, and levels. Maybe spotting out of dust or smudges that are on the sensor and not in the original scene. No removing of legs or wires or inserting of basketballs or clouds of smoke or hands holding saws. On the other hand, if the photo is intended for an art gallery or stock - anything goes! Take out feet and wires and change from vertical to horizontal and change that shirt from red to black and take out the logos on that kid's t-shirt and add two people or take two people out. Everything is permissible in art and stock. ;-) Tina Tina Manley, ASMP, NPPA http://www.tinamanley.com