Digital BW, The Print

Good points Keith.

I think the distinction between manipulations/alterations "after the image
was fixed in the camera" (i.e. darkroom and or Photoshop) and manipulation
"before the image was fixed in the camera" (i.e. filters, film choice, point
of view, lowering the camera 6" to cut out the power lines, posing and/or
influencing the scene - Salgado waving his fist to stop people smiling etc)
is a false distinction.

I also think that photography has always told less of the truth than we
always liked to think. In fact I think a good part of the power of the
photograph is found in it's inherent ambiguity.

I'll see if I can find a post I made on this topic in a LF photography
discussion.

As for the "straight" (factual?) photograph, I got my technical start in
photography doing Scenes of Crime photography - what you might consider as
one of the most "straight " forms of photography out there. And yet the
photographs were never allowed to stand on their own - they always required
supporting testimony from the Scenes of Crime Officer as to their accuracy -
which is why digital is now allowed - it always needs the statements of fact
to go with it. It's accuracy can never be assumed. Even choice of lens tells
the story differently.

As one famous Roman said - "what is truth" - something that could easily be
said about photography - photography tells the truth about something far
less often than we would like to think.

tim