Archived posting to the Leica Users Group, 2010/02/25

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Subject: [Leica] What is a photograph?
From: thurmanphoto at gmail.com (Wendy Thurman)
Date: Fri, 26 Feb 2010 06:20:10 +0430
References: <6a7544a61002251722k5b7465e0w8a7dcf974b5ac388@mail.gmail.com>

Larry-

An interesting and thought provoking article; the last sentence reminds me
that reality, whatever else it is, is certainly subjective.  The making of a
photograph is the planning and execution of a mental construct subject to
manipulation by the photographer; painters have done this for centuries.
Note Vermeer's classic The Little Street:
http://www.rijksmuseum.nl/images/aria/sk/z/sk-a-2860.z  The windows in the
center are set impossibly close to the building's corner, for example.  I
suppose the question is "How much manipulation is acceptable?"  While peer
review may attempt to answer that question, the outcome of that review will
evolve.  Using the painting analogy once again, it's amazing the
Impressionists weren't drawn and quartered given the nastiness of the
reviews they received when they debuted.

Personally, I don't care to engage in drastic manipulation (such as "move
that car from here and place it there" sorts of things); I believe that
reality, as subjective as it is, presents the careful observer with
endlessly interesting opportunities.  Those opportunities are what I am
looking for.  I gave up photography in the mid-90's as I thought it was too
limiting a medium of expression and started drawing and painting.  My
thought was wrong.  Even though I don't engage in wholesale manipulation
with the computer, the only limits reality, as I see it, presents to me are
imposed by my imagination.

I'm not not terribly articulate, I know, but...

Wendy

On Fri, Feb 26, 2010 at 5:52 AM, Lawrence Zeitlin <lrzeitlin at 
gmail.com>wrote:

> David Pogue, tech columnist for the New York Times has a must read article
> on the limits of photography. It touches on many of the items we have
> considered on the LUG.
>
>
> http://www.nytimes.com/2010/02/25/technology/personaltech/25pogue-email.html?8cir&emc=cir
>
>
> Larry Z
>
> _______________________________________________
> Leica Users Group.
> See http://leica-users.org/mailman/listinfo/lug for more information
>


In reply to: Message from lrzeitlin at gmail.com (Lawrence Zeitlin) ([Leica] What is a photograph?)