Photography – as an art form – is about mastery of light and form.

Image manipulation is about collage, or graphic design, or some other process that takes advantage of the tools available in Photoshop or similar programs.

It’s always going to be a tricky line to draw … but there IS a difference.

I can’t define it exactly. But let’s just say I know it when I see it.

Each of us chooses our mode of expression and the tools we will use. And as long as we use them with skill and integrity, we can call it whatever we want to.

I’ve heard some say it is not part of the art of photography. I happen to disagree. And all of their saying, “Not!” isn’t going to change it. We have to process our photos somewhere. We have to balance the colors of the camera technology with the printer technology with the ink technology. Where else will you do it except in an editing program?

Trying to do photography without an editing program today is like trying to do film photography without a darkroom. Just what does a picture look like when it’s undeveloped and still inside the film canister? If you let the film photographer develop film, you must let the digital photographer develop the print.

Edit: AA did make great pictures in the camera and then he “processed” them in the darkroom to tweak them to the image he saw in his mind when he first viewed the scene. From one of the sites I list: “Ansel Adams developed the zone system to cope with this situation. His technique was to carefully study a scene, visualize the final print, then determine the correspondence between portions of the scene and tones in the print. He would then meter, expose and develop the negative accordingly.”

It does however tie into what photography has become, and into graphic design.

Speaking about photography, I think darkrooms, manual cameras and chemicals, safelights, filters, and fu_k-ups.
But as digital as photography has become, it is pretty amazing on an artistic level what people can do with programs such as Photoshop and I’m all for it as an art form.

On the other side of the boat, I 100% agree with what the guy above me said. Manipulating photos to make them ART is amazing, manipulating them to make the subject look better is complete sh_t and is NOT photography, nor does it mean a person is a photographer, nor does it mean they deserve any credit (spammed comments of some girl with procelain skin and eyes the color of the sky blue crayons, on myspace IS credit) for the “art” they created.

Real photography is about taking an interesting and meaningful photograph with your CAMERA. The problem is that people already depend WAY too much on image editing and manipulation. They manipulate the colors or use lame gimmicks like selective coloring to try to make a dull snapshot look more interesting than it actually is. Look on the Photography catagory and see how many questions you will see, asking “how do you make a black and white picture with one thing in color?”

I saw a question from one girl who wanted a critique of her pictures. Of course, she didn’t really want an honest critique and constructive criticism. She just wanted a dozen people to say “kewl pics!” But every single one of her pictures were just dull snapshots, which she had manipulated on a computer to try to make them look more interesting. There was one picture of her shoes, and all she did was just manipulate the color temperature and saturation until the picture looked completely orange. If it wasn’t for all that, it would just be a snapshot of her SHOES. Wow.

So here’s my question…if you were to take away all the doctoring you did to a picture on a computer, would it still look interesting? Or would it just be a snapshot? That’s the difference.

Also, when most people edit pictures on a computer, and adjust the contrast, color saturation, color temperature, etc, they don’t understand what those things mean on a basic, conceptual level. They’re just clicking buttons and moving sliders until the picture looks “cool.”

For example, a lot of people like to use vignetting, but they have absolutely no idea what it really is. They don’t understand that it’s an optical DEFECT, caused by a lens not lining up an image correctly on the focal plane in a film camera. Most photographers would try to AVOID it. A lot people add that effect because again, they just think it’s “cool.”

There is nothing wrong with editing and minor adjustments to IMPROVE a picture. But the problem is that too many people use image manipulation as a crutch to cover up a bad picture. Or they think that Photoshop can “fix” anything. Look how many questions there are on YA asking “how do u photshop a blurry pic?”

So, NO, photo editing is not part of real photography. Making minor adjustments to improve a picture is fine, but you shouldn’t have to depend on it. Now, graphic arts is an entirely different thing. If someone wants to create a computer generated image and call it “graphic arts” that’s ok. But just don’t call it “photography.”

And like I said, I know I’m going to get voted thumbs-down. Go right ahead. But I love photography, especially landscape photos. I take pictures with a completely manual film camera. I develop my own film and pictures and I DON’T NEED to edit my photos.

*****

EDIT: Joe, you are completely mistaken about Ansel Adams. His pictures were already good to begin with, from the camera. Otherwise, why did he put so much care into using large format view cameras, using apertures as far down as f/32 and long exposures to get the sharpest landscape photographs possible. He may have improved his prints by using contrast filters and “dodging” and “burning”…but he did NOT “seriously manipulate” his pictures. Look at Ansel Adams’ landscape photos. They all look natural. Whatever darkroom work Ansel Adams did to his prints was absolutely nothing like the rediculous “photoshopping” of digital images that you see today.

Ansel Adams believed you had to start with a good picture to begin with. You had to have a good negative. He wrote a lot just about that…including the books “The Camera” and “The Negative.” If all he had to do was “photoshop” his pictures, then why did he take a large format field camera to capture beautiful landscape photos when he could have just taken some cheap point and shoot camera and “photoshopped” his pictures??

Ansel Adams is often misquoted and people wrongly try to use him as an an example of image editing. And frankly, I’m tired of it.

I think it helps to have a Wacom board, too.

But if you are referring to trying to turn a bad photo into a good one, then I don’t think it is.

Good luck!

I have also heard great things about Picnik, but have not tried it myself:
http://www.picnik.com/

If you need something that does more than basic photo fixes, such as cutting people out of backgrounds, doing text overlays, etc., nothing can compete with Photoshop.

Gimp > http://www.gimp.org/downloads/

Paint.net > http://download.cnet.com/Paint-NET/3000-2192_4-10338146.html?tag=mncol