APPA : Ken Duncan finally says what a lot of us have been thinking

[wayn0i]

My guess is the older the photographer the more they lean towards minimal post processing (and start waxing lyrical about the excitement of seeing an image materialise on a sheet of paper ).

Mate thats hilarious, gold


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

[John King]

My guess is the older the photographer the more they lean towards minimal post processing (and start waxing lyrical about the excitement of seeing an image materialise on a sheet of paper ).

That's me ... .

I try very hard to photograph something that exists IRL. IOW, if someone else goes back to that spot, they will be able to take a somewhat similar photo to the one I have taken.

I also try very hard to achieve accurate colours.

Thanks for the link - I'll read it shortly.

[EDIT]

Read it. A clear perspective on the subject IMHO.

[ricktas]

Ok so how much PP 'manipulation' (i can hear the screaming already) is acceptable for an image to be a photograph?

Loving this thread Rick!

It depends...

No seriously, it does!

Whether you are playing with manipulation for fun, entering a competition, creating an abstract, or taking a photo for the news, how much manipulations depends on the reason for photo in the first place.

News photos have very strict guidelines about editing, so the editing of a photo for news is entirely different to the editing of a photo in a photo manipulation competition for example. There is no guideline that can apply to all aspects of photography.

What Ken is saying in his FB post is that there should be a line drawn for the APPA Photographer of the Year as to what defines a photo for that competition, nothing more.

[Cage]

So can I come out of the naughty boy's corner?

I believed my photo was all about the subject and I wanted to show that as cleanly as possible. Instead of changing the background I could have spent many, many hours cloning and blurring and smudging and not come up with something I was pleased with.

[JDuding]

From the moment I purchased a camera that could produce a RAW image, I have been trying to improve my PP to a level that can produce an image that is a truer representation of the scene than what the "grey balance" in camera JPG processing does.

Recently I have turned off the RAW/JPG setting for my second memory card and it is now only used for overflow.

I feel that My photo requires Me to process it. (But due to time constraints and efforts required in excecive processing of an image, I'd still like to improve my skills so that my images actually require less manipulation. )

Now... regarding full on manipulation.
I love it.
Been manipulating images for much longer than I've been photographing them.

And I feel that any image we take for the purpose of presenting/displaying for others is art and any level of manipulation required to achieve the results we want is acceptable.
Whether it be removing a power line or a dead leaf to the extreme of exchanging backgrounds and adding additional elements to the image...
... as long as it's within the rules.

If the rules of a competition are adhered to. then all is fine.


With the subject of this thread and the competition in question, I'd agree that the rules should be altered to better reflect the title of the competition or the title adjusted to suit the judges desired scope of eligible images.

[Nick Cliff]

Rick I agree it is really photo manipulation taken to extreme levels, some is inspired certainly, however a lot of this level of photography can feel very arty and cold, I would not want to look at it every day, I imagine a lot of this work is fine for adds or scientific photography.

[MissionMan]

So can I come out of the naughty boy's corner?

I believed my photo was all about the subject and I wanted to show that as cleanly as possible. Instead of changing the background I could have spent many, many hours cloning and blurring and smudging and not come up with something I was pleased with.

I still think the main difference is you are enhancing a photo, rather than building a photo from 50 different photos. What the photographer has done in this case is a collage.

I have no issue if a photographer photoshops in sky, but what we see with the winner here is an image that was created rather than taken. There are no enhancements to an existing photo, it is an image (not a photo) that was created from multiple photos, with no definitive single image being the subject. You can't call something a painting if someone has stuck together 50 different paintings into a collage. It's not a painting. The individual pieces might be paintings, but not the final result. No one is arguing it isn't art, a painting and a collage are both ART, but a painting isn't a collage and a collage isn't a painting. I also think people aren't arguing about the quality of her work, she's obviously an incredible artist, but being an incredible artist isn't the same as being an incredible photographer. I think someone hit the nail on the head when they said "If you showed this to the public and told them it won photographer of the year based on this image, they would be confused". The definition of photographer needs to be clear enough for the public to get it. If you have lost the public, you've lost the new photographers coming in and you've lost people like us. What we don't need is a set of judges that are so up their own asses that they become like some of these art critics that rank films high that the public hate.

Incidentally, I don't blame the artist who won, the rules were clear and I don't think its her fault, but I think the AIPP needs a serious wake up call.

[Kym]

Incidentally, I don't blame the artist who won, the rules were clear and I don't think its her fault, but I think the AIPP needs a serious wake up call.

Which in essence is what Ken wrote.

[MarkChap]

So you are saying that a collage of 2 elements is okay.
But a collage of 50 is not okay
So where do you draw the line 2, 3, 4, 10, 15 ????

I have no issue if a photographer photoshops in sky, but what we see with the winner here is an image that was created rather than taken.

As soon as you add in an extra element you have created and not take the image
You can't add in a sky and the claim to have "taken" the image, when in fact you "created" the image.
The very process that you don't believe should be allowed ??

I still think the main difference is you are enhancing a photo, rather than building a photo from 50 different photos. What the photographer has done in this case is a collage.
I have no issue if a photographer photoshops in sky, but what we see with the winner here is an image that was created rather than taken. There are no enhancements to an existing photo, it is an image (not a photo) that was created from multiple photos, with no definitive single image being the subject. You can't call something a painting if someone has stuck together 50 different paintings into a collage. It's not a painting. The individual pieces might be paintings, but not the final result. No one is arguing it isn't art, a painting and a collage are both ART, but a painting isn't a collage and a collage isn't a painting. I also think people aren't arguing about the quality of her work, she's obviously an incredible artist, but being an incredible artist isn't the same as being an incredible photographer. I think someone hit the nail on the head when they said "If you showed this to the public and told them it won photographer of the year based on this image, they would be confused". The definition of photographer needs to be clear enough for the public to get it. If you have lost the public, you've lost the new photographers coming in and you've lost people like us. What we don't need is a set of judges that are so up their own asses that they become like some of these art critics that rank films high that the public hate.

Incidentally, I don't blame the artist who won, the rules were clear and I don't think its her fault, but I think the AIPP needs a serious wake up call.

[MissionMan]

So you are saying that a collage of 2 elements is okay.
But a collage of 50 is not okay
So where do you draw the line 2, 3, 4, 10, 15 ????

As soon as you add in an extra element you have created and not take the image
You can't add in a sky and the claim to have "taken" the image, when in fact you "created" the image.
The very process that you don't believe should be allowed ??

Yup. Exactly what I am saying. If you change the sky, the overarching theme of the photo doesn't change. It's still a photo of someone running through daffodils or whatever the photo was. Wedding photographers have been doing it for years and most people looking at the photos wouldn't know. Maybe it comes down to the percentage of the image that changes. Can you even tell what the original image was in the Lisa's case? I doubt it. In fact most of the average people in the street wouldn't even know it was a photo collage due to the extent of the post processing.

Personally I'm not a fan of drastic changes like this, partially because I'm very lazy when it comes to post processing, so I maybe do it once or twice a year if I find an image I really like. But even then, if we are going to confine competitions to show the best "photographer", then I think the majority of categories should be confined. But if we don't draw the line in the sand somewhere, where do we go to next? Before you know it, everything will be done without actually having to take a photo.

[hanro]

I am also with Ken 100%.

King regards,

Peter

[ameerat42]

Well, it just goes without saying... - so as Slim Dusty sang...

[MarkChap]

It is either a collage, therefore created
or
It is a photograph, therefore taken

You can't have it both ways

Yup. Exactly what I am saying. If you change the sky, the overarching theme of the photo doesn't change. It's still a photo of someone running through daffodils or whatever the photo was. Wedding photographers have been doing it for years and most people looking at the photos wouldn't know. Maybe it comes down to the percentage of the image that changes. Can you even tell what the original image was in the Lisa's case? I doubt it. In fact most of the average people in the street wouldn't even know it was a photo collage due to the extent of the post processing.

Personally I'm not a fan of drastic changes like this, partially because I'm very lazy when it comes to post processing, so I maybe do it once or twice a year if I find an image I really like. But even then, if we are going to confine competitions to show the best "photographer", then I think the majority of categories should be confined. But if we don't draw the line in the sand somewhere, where do we go to next? Before you know it, everything will be done without actually having to take a photo.

[Glenda]

I just went and scrolled through the Ken Duncan post and was reading some of the replies. One stated that the winner's entries received really high scores in her category, which was advertising, and she had followed all the rules within that category. Therefore her portfolio received the highest marks overall when compared with the portfolios from the winners of other categories, and so she was awarded the title of Photographer of the Year. If that is the way it works, rather than the judges comparing the winning photograph of each category and choosing what they considered the best photograph, then she deserves the title. I agree the title Photographer doesn't fit the winner's entries but changing it to the Photoshopper of the Year wouldn't either if someone from a documentary category had the highest portfolio points.

[Hamster]

Yup. Exactly what I am saying. If you change the sky, the overarching theme of the photo doesn't change.

What if it's a mediocre sunset and the sky is swapped. Surely that's significant?
Whatever the reason for the sky change it must be significant for the photo, or why do it? The line is a very hard one to draw.

[John King]

Ham, that's why I tend towards being a total purist. Getting it as right as possible in camera is my approach. If you cannot aim for this at least, IMO one is not even playing at being a 'photographer'.

[MissionMan]

What if it's a mediocre sunset and the sky is swapped. Surely that's significant?
Whatever the reason for the sky change it must be significant for the photo, or why do it? The line is a very hard one to draw.

It's significant and as I said, it should be categorised separately but it's an interesting line. For example, the brenizer technique is a method of combining multiple photos. Would you still consider it a photo? Most people would. But if you combined multiple photos to create a picture of a person via a mozaic, is that a photo? Same thing, different outcome.


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

[feathers]

Oooo !.. l love the brenizer method

[agb]

Not much exif data to be extracted from most of the images in the awards. You would be hard pressed to get a raw image for any of them.

[Hamster]

Ham, that's why I tend towards being a total purist. Getting it as right as possible in camera is my approach. If you cannot aim for this at least, IMO one is not even playing at being a 'photographer'.

That's the easiest, but even that's not clear. How much saturation, highlight, shadow, contrast adjustment. Only global adjustments allowed, or local like dodging and burning. If dodging and burning, then surely localized saturation, contrast, sharpening is also ok. Can you clone out a distracting spot of white bird poo on a foreground rock? Before you know it there's masks and layers and you're getting accused of not being a photographer.
Even if you say you try and replicate exact conditions you saw, that can be tricky to get right back at home as memories are pretty poor and trying to exactly reproduce the tone of the sunset is impossible.
And what about dynamic range? The camera can't capture what your eye saw, so bracketed photos combined in layers are needed in many cases.......etc
What is "pure"? No need to answer, because really it's whatever you want it to be, within limits already mentioned in answers by Ricktas and myself and also that article I linked to.

It's significant and as I said, it should be categorised separately but it's an interesting line. For example, the brenizer technique is a method of combining multiple photos. Would you still consider it a photo? Most people would. But if you combined multiple photos to create a picture of a person via a mozaic, is that a photo?

Agreed. For me I'm looking at art unless the purpose is education/documentary.

I could even argue with Kens point of manipulating pixels not being in line with the original Greek meaning of drawing with light.
There's always been an intermediate stage between light hitting a sensitive medium (film CMOS sensor, whatever) and light hitting your eye from the display medium (paper, a screen, whatever).
The intermediate might be chemical or digital but the final image is still a manipulation of something to once again make photons hit your eyes in a specific way. It's till drawing with light.

Bottom line, I reckon follow your own rules to produce what makes you happy, and if you enter a competition, be bound by the rules others have decided on.