Digital BW, The Print

On 5/9/03 9:23 AM, "Tim Atherton" <timatherton@...> wrote:

>> Some like compositing clouds from one image into the dull sky of another
>> image; some like straight photographs.
>> 
>> I like straight.
> 
> Jim, but that's the whole point - I bet your "straight" photograph isn't
> actually "straight"!
> 
> tim

Hi Tim,

I do alter contrast and density when I print.

I think Photoshop is a wonderful program, and computers make it easy to
produce bad work. I once saw images by a photographer who had transfered
cloud portions of some of his images into some of his other landscape
photographs. I thought the result was dramatic  --  and corny.

I don't dislike photo collages. I just don't like fabrications that are
passed off as realistic.

Images by photojournalists Salgado, Bresson, and many others are art without
altering the content of the image. The art was in seeing and feeling the
moment, the pure moment ­­­­ photography's forte.

Sure "the camera is just a tool." But if someone uses the camera as only an
adjunct to a process, then the result is less of the kind of art that I call
photography. I could take the lens off the front of a view camera, remove
the ground glass, and pour paint through the camera onto canvas. The results
might be wonderful, but I would call it a painting, not a photograph.

Just my opinion.

Best, 

Jim