Holger,
I know someone who was just doing a major photoshoot in Miami. Your son wouldn't happen to have the initials DB, would he?
Anyway, to continue with the next part of answering your question:
Here are a couple of old posts of mine from a different forums, which relate to your question, somewhat...
Question:
> Realistic bur frowned upon, or unnatural but the norm?
> Since the beginning of digital cameras and web-posting, I've
> noticed a trend toward posting more and more over-saturated photos
> with too much contrast. What's your honest opinion on this subject
> (see the two photos - I'm not interested in your opinion of the
> photos - they are just example snapshots). But I am interested in
> your opinion about the tendency of photographers to "over-process"
> their photos (IMO).
> Thanks for your input,
And my answer:
To begin with, I should note that I hypercontrast/hypersaturate most of my pictures. I started doing this for the pragmatic reason that (within the current nature photography market) hypersaturated pictures tend to sell much better than not-hypersaturated pictures. Unfortunately, my choices regarding this issue seemed to be (A) hypersaturate my pictures or (B) go find another job.
(By the way, I am not at all implying that hypersaturation, alone, is enough to make a nature picture sell; it is *almost* necessary, but--obviously--not sufficient.)
Over time, I actually grew to have a greater appreciation for hypercontrast/hypersaturation... at least in certain circumstances.
This began when (as I improved in my ability to discriminate with my visual observations) it became increasingly more obvious that there was no simple way to show things entirely "realistically". Shoot the same scene with two different digital cameras (say, for example, a Canon 1Ds and a Nikon D2X), and process each to look as close as you can get to the way the scene looked, and compare them, side by side. You'll see that, when looked at closely, they look rather different from each other. They'll have different color "palettes", different sensitivities, different dynamic ranges, different quantities and distributions of chroma noise and luminance noise, different hardware filters and different firmware filters, etc. The same would be true with two different types of film in the same film camera, or even the same type of film in two different brands of cameras (due to different manufacturers lens materials and designs). Even with just eyes, yours will see differently than mine do; heck, my right eye sees hue and contrast noticeably differently than my left eye.
It's not as though what my left eye sees is "realistic" and what my right eye sees is "unrealistic"; we each see a slightly different portion of external objective reality through our own recording instruments, and through our own filters. If our eyes were sensitive to infrared, or sampled at a slower or faster rate, or were evolved with a greater emphasis on night vision, then things would look different to us. I don't think that animals with these types of vision characteristics are seeing more or less realistically than I am. Though my camera records differently than what I see, I don't think it would be quite correct to say that the way I see is more "natural" than the way my camera records, or vice-versa.
The next step in my increased appreciation of (selectively used) hypersaturation/hypercontrast was when I became more precise in my photographic intent. For me, it is not so simple as hypersaturation=unrealistic/unnatural. Perhaps a more accurate way to put it than "unnatural" is "rendered toward a different data selection". Let me give you an analogy: Suppose an astronomer seeking a specific type of data filters out everything outside of the ultraviolet wavelength. Would you say the resulting observations and data were "unrealistic" or "unnatural"? I would be more inclined to say that the data realistically showed something that was specifically intended to be brought out, which was not as readily obvious in an unfiltered view. Similarly, increasing contrast heightens the separation of tones in a picture, thereby making the relationships of the tones in the scene easier to visually discern. I think that using post-processing tools such as contrast adjustments to articulate photographic intent can be within the purview of "natural" and "real".
To be clear, I am not arguing in favor of relativism. Also, I'm not arguing for "anything goes" in manupulating nature photos. If the end result is attempting to be strictly art, then "anything goes" is fine, but if nature photos are trying to show a recording of an actual incidence of light reflection, than an "anything goes" attitude is not well suited. Even so, there is some legitimate flexibility within the scope of straight nature photography to emphasize certain aspects of a scene in accordance with intent. There is more within a picture than meets the eye, and making subtleties more apparent does not necessarily mean deviating from "realistic" or "natural".
And my other relevant post...
Question:
> I was curious how many digital photos are photoshopped later on to
> change something about the photo that wasn't liked, ie colors, contrast,
> etc. Not drastically changing it though, ie adding in a new background.
> Do most professionals who use digital do this?
> Do wildlife photographers do it?
And my answer:
If, by "photoshopped", you mean minor curves adjustments for constrast, dust removal, and the like, then I'd say at least 99% of my pictures are tweaked from the RAW converter's default setting's. As others have noted, what you are asking is like asking what percentage of pictures are developed. In film photography, one has to decide what kind of film to use, what sort of chemistry, length of time, and temperature to use for developing, what kind of paper to print on, etc. Even with an aim of straight photography on film, there is no way to avoid making decisions which affect the look of the latent captured photo. In digital photography, a lot of these necessary decisions have been shifted to the RAW conversion stage (regardless of whether you do it yourself on the computer, or do it in camera through setting the camera to make jpegs). Many digital cameras, including mine (1Ds Mark 2) are purposely designed to produce pictures with lower contrast than what the eye sees, in order to hold as much photographic information as possible. Further, there are many fundamental differences between the way our eyes see and the intrinsic ways that cameras sense and record. Even to simply make an honest picture which looks as close as we can get to what our eyes see requires the type of "photoshopped" adjustments you are talking about.
Holger,
If I come up with anything more to add to this subject, I will do so. Also, if you have further questions about this, please feel welcome to ask.
Cheers,
Mike
