[Leica] integrity ?

[abridge at gmail.com (Adam Bridge)]

But Ric, it's in the boundary conditions that we really test theories
and determine what is real and what is not. By exploring them we
require ourselves to deal with the gray area - something "we"
(speaking as an American) are loath to do. It's the little choices,
made repeatedly, changed, extended, that lead from truth to
interpretive fiction.

For the news we need to demand accuracy and a lack of manipulation.
Once we give way then it's back to H. G. Well's "When anything is
possible, nothing is interesting." When we don't know what is true,
unmanipulated, who can trust it? We have enough reasons not to trust
in things as it stands already.

To me Tina has the right of it - you just don't manipulate the
situation for the sake of a good image - not if you're making news.

Perhaps it's a trip to late night in the dorm - but  I think it's
really more. Today we work these issues with still photography but
video is ready for these same questions. We have to ask them and
remind the photojournalists behind the lens of the need for truth and
accuracy.

Adam

On 4/17/07, Ric Carter <ricc@mindspring.com> wrote:
> This really is an impossible discussion with no answer. You must (in
> journalistic photography) not LIE.
>
> But, when you try to nail down the exact edge of lie/truth, it
> disappears.
>
> The very action of deciding on what lens to use, what direction to
> point the camera, what goes in or out of the frame, at what instant
> you press the shutter all distort reality and truth. Photographs
> neither tell the truth nor lie--they simply record what the
> photographer chooses (if the shooter talented and lucky).
>
> What an audience pays for with a good photojournalist is to see the
> world through his (her) eyes--that photographer's interpretation of
> reality--not see reality itself. Perceiving full reality is not even
> possible with being there yourself--filtering always runs.
>
> The ethical calls are sometimes easy, but when you reach the edges,
> they can just as easily be total BS or personal opinion or ignorance.
> It is so much 3AM dormitory noodling.
>
> Ric Carter
> http://gallery.leica-users.org/v/ricc/
>
>
>
>
>
> On Apr 17, 2007, at 8:39 PM, Tina Manley wrote:
>
> > 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....
> >
> > An interesting article about truth in photographs:
> >
> > http://zonezero.com/magazine/articles/mraz/mraz01.html
> >
> > What do you think?  Does previsualization mean that the photograph
> > was manipulated subconsciously?  I don't think so. I might imagine
> > a photo that I would like to take of a family in Central America,
> > but that would only mean that I would only look for situations to
> > take that photo.  I would never move people into position or change
> > circumstances to make the photo happen when it wouldn't have
> > without my being there.  Moving people into position or suggesting
> > situations or adding lights or manipulating photographs in the
> > darkroom goes way beyond previsualization, to me, and would not be
> > acceptable for documentary or news photographs.  I think many so-
> > called documentary photographs today should be reclassified as art
> > photographs if the situations were manipulated or directed by the
> > photographer.  That is not documentary or news photography.
> >
> > Just my 2 cents.
> >
> > Tina
> >
> > Tina Manley, ASMP, NPPA
> > http://www.tinamanley.com
> >
> > _______________________________________________
> > Leica Users Group.
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>
>
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