Joanna, sorry, but I don’t think “manipulated” applies to your photos. What you did was adjust the image so people could view what was there. Had you moved the rock to the right, THAT would be manipulation, and wrong.
As I see it, what you do is bringing out the information that was captured in the scene. You’re enhancing the reality, not creating it.
Everything you showed WAS captured in the original raw image file, so those contest rules would leave you free and clear. Noplace did they say the image had to be captured as a ‘jpg’, and if they wanted the original, you could have simply sent them the raw file.
Anyway, that’s my opinion, and obviously the contest rules aren’t adequate as written. A raw file captures more than a jpg. An infrared file captures things the human eye can’t see.
If you deliberately made your print much darker, to hide something you didn’t want to show up, that would be different, and you would, and should, be disqualified. But all you are doing, is bringing out all the detail captured by the camera as a single image, and a single file.
Maybe I’ll write them and ask about this.
I would love to have the skill to be able to do what you do, as well as you do it. I’m getting closer, so I’m happy about that, but you are much more of an artist than I ever will be. I ain’t never gonna catch up with you!!! …but I’m getting better just from trying.
Then they would have found out that I “deleted” my friend Helen, who I didn’t spot, taking a photograph from in front of the vertical rocks under the left of the house
But then this is an art photograph, not a factual record.
I always used the waist level finder with the M645 and took many images less. Not because a WLF is more difficult to use, but because it makes a difference to look down at an image instead of looking at a sight through a device. The WLF introduces a level of abstraction that helps in many ways.
I lost track of what we were discussing, but I do know and understand what you mean. I know it is somehow “different” for me to view things through the optical window on my Leica, or the huge window on my DSLR, and I think you just explained the reason why. With the DSLR, the resulting file will likely be exactly what I viewed in the viewfinder (unless I warped it in the camera settings) and the Leica, just like with my ancient film cameras, was sort of an approximation of what I would capture. Viewing the world through my Leica is like seeing it with my eyes, no manipulation, no enhancing, since all it is, really, is a window.
I actually do have a WLF for my Nikon F2 - I was looking it over yesterday. Maybe part of the reason I enjoyed film so much, was that there were just a set of mechanical controls, and a button to capture the image. With the WLF, isn’t composing the image similar to what one might do on a ground glass screen on a view camera? It’s been so long, I don’t remember…
@mikemyers
When you talk about rules et al, you are only allowed to use a camera with roughly 47° viewing angle.
But the ‘manipulation’ starts with …
the subject you choose
the moment you choose to take the picture
the excerpt (window), distance and camera position you decide for
the aperture you choose (f2,8 vs f8 …)
the exposure time you dial in (longtime exposure vs 1/50 sec)
the use of filters
available light vs artificial illumination
etc.
Then you develop your ‘true’ pic with software, like PhotoLab.
And the moment you …
crop
change exposure
change color temperature / tonality
change contrast
brighten / darken parts locally (gradation, control points, using masks)
convert to B&W
you continue to ‘manipulate’. – So, what do you expect in a forum about photo software?
Enjoy what YOU do, but relax. This is no contest, no photoclub …
Personally, I don’t see PL4 as a “raw converter”. To me, it’s an image editor. Most of my involvement in PL4 and this forum, has been the way I’ve learned how to use the tools to create better photographs. I know it can do much more than that, and I agree that learning how to manipulate things will improve my ability to edit images into what I want to show people. I would love to be able to do what Ansel Adams did, and I figure I now have the tools to do it, I’m just lacking in the mental area knowing what to do, where, and when. I’ve got my own borders between photograph and photo illustrations, but that’s just something personal.
One of the first things in that link is:
“My name is Blaise Arnold and I am a photographer. I have worked for 35 years in advertising as well as for magazines.”
Everything else follows. Photography for advertising and magazines is very different from photo journalism. Anything goes, to get across some kind of message. Noting I have posted here applies to either field. Most magazines, and especially advertisers, are free to do anything they want to make photos look better, to get across a message. People’'s bodies get modified, details get added or removed, and so on.
The places, and people, and web sites I was involve in while growing up were 95% about photojournalism photography. Many (most?) magazines are expected to manipulate images however they wish. Those modified images would not be accepted by newspapers, or photo contests such as the one that was posted earlier.
Me? I’ve been wearing a cap that says “photojournalist” for almost my whole life. I did find a way to escape, just by using the term “photo illustration”. With that small change, any and all my inner limitations vanish, and I can paint with light however I wish to.
Maybe, starting today, I will change hats, and enjoy the fun that all of you are having, without my old shackles. From this new point of view, much of what I’ve posted in the past few days becomes irrelevant.
Pl is a raw converter. Programs like photoshop are called ‘image manipulation programs’.
The converter delivers the image, other programs do the manipulation. Boarders are not strict.
Good link to Bourke.
Reality used to be future and is history now. Any record of reality is an interpretation.
Taking a digital shot interprets reality as a three-dimensional bunch of numbers. Making that bunch look good implies two interpretations: a) technical and b) taste.
All of the above (abilities) can be acquired, all except reality that is.
I find that different to accept.
Instead of “is” I would have said “could be”.
For an artist, I agree with you.
For scientists, and criminologists, astronomers, engineers and others, the goal is to capture, not interpret. Interpretation comes later.
A photojournalist is recording, not interpreting.
Not so for an artist. Artists, by definition, are interpreting.
At least as I see things…
And yet what the eye sees is “interpreted” by the brain, otherwise we would perceive everything as being upside down
PL is definitely a raw converter. You can choose not to use it as such (by only editing jpeg and other format files) but that doesn’t change its nature
every transition of a energy form is a interpretation. The transition of reflectionlight and direct light by the camera in this case is the first interpretation. (no tool is the same) and so many human eye’s so many interpretations by the same many brains. it’s a fact of science.
It’s thus true that a artist sees things different and want to export what he sees differently. But the calibration of measurement tools is also a interpretation of us human knowledge there fore the out come is a interpretation.
i disagree, he’s Recording what he’s thinking the truth. (example he’s photographing with a telelens a gun fight from a distance and thinks he records a murder… but in fact it’s a street shoot of a action movie he witnessed. so he interpreted the scene with the knowledge he had… wrong…)
in my mind you just stuck to rules made up by others to prevent too much image’s who are misinterpreted or can be misinterpreted by the viewers. Journalism is also biased because it done by humans. The balance is in the numbers of different interpretations. one lighting ball hits a tree so every lighting does strike trees? no we calculate the risk by millions of lighting strikes so the truth is it’s https://agrilife.org/treecarekit/after-the-storm/understanding-lightning-associated-tree-damage/
So my honest advise stop restricting yourself by rules of others and make your own rules.
your free to meander around creating a story you like to tell. Use DxOPL as it is ment, a developing program. Or just stop using it and shoot out of the camera jpegs and call it the day. then it’s only your skills on the camera who “interpreted” the “real” world. (because your view of the world is also a interpretation…as in mine and everyone elses).
I don’t know about anyone else, but I am using my own “rules”, but I would call them “guidelines”, as I’m free to do whatever I feel like doing at any given moment. Those rules/guidelines came from myself, from Sportsshooter.com, from the University of Michigan, from all the photography magazines I used to get, from feedback from other people, and from the various places and publications that I sent my images to. Now I should add this forum to the list, as I tend to follow what I read here even if I don’t (yet) understand it.
As for the two choices you have given me, I don’t want to be limited to one of those two extremes.
I shoot in raw because it captures more information, giving me a lot more flexibility in creating my final photo.
I’m not using any programs lately other than PL4, so yes, it is my developing program, as well as every other tool I need or want, all rolled into one package. It replaced Lighttroom for me, which in turn replaced Photoshop long ago.
My process is to capture an image based on what I think I’d like my final picture to look like, and then use PL4 to make that happen.
Having already made the decision to replace my other image editors with PL4, one of my current goals is to learn it thoroughly, so I can get the best use out of it. One of my ultimate goals is to make better photographs. Another one of my goals is to enjoy what I’m creating, before, during, and after, and to have fun. Photography is the one single thing that has constantly been a part of my life since I was 7 years old, through today. As I see things, I’m already doing what you suggest I do, or maybe it’s vice versa. The more I can learn, the better. So I should say a “thank you” to all of you here in this forum. What you have been saying here is becoming a part of who I am and what I do, and how.
Ok point taken, , from my more technical view it looked like ,the “rules” where ,started to be, more important to discusse then the possibilities of creating a good looking image.
And by good looking i mean it should looked when i remembering the hole scene but carefully enhanced to what it could look in a perfect circumstance.
Enhance a image isn’t cheating it’s what almost every (landscape,portret) photographer does.
What i am doing often when i have a potential 5 star rated image, is create a image to a point it’s almost finished.( only the toning and final finetuning isn’t done.)
Then create a few VC’s and push(go as far as i think would look nice) in one color up, in an other the sharpnes, in an other the crop type, in an other the exposure balance and so one visualizing possible idea’s. Then export them named as color, sharpnes, contrast, (the pushed type) and watch them on my smart tv. Take a mental numbering of what looked nice to me and go back to pc and compare those again in more detail. Just to see if it hasn’t any problems as in artefact’s , mis coloring and such.
Then i choose my end path and delete the worst VC’s. (take a few day’s to reset your mind before reviewing.)
Go back to the master and start building from the idea’s given by the VC’s and blend them together using small steps.
(often i re-edit a image after some time because new insight is improving the endresult.)
Did you looked at my “exersizes”? Those are sometimes how i treat a image before i return to a “normal” view. Helps to push boundery’s , gain editing knowledge, widen my view of possibilities in a image.
Ok, enough writing about this, all points are made i think.
Have fun with the way you proceed using PL.
, from my more technical view it looked like ,the “rules” where ,started to be, more important to discusse then the possibilities of creating a good looking image.