Manipulation - to be or not to be, that is the question?

Hi Everyone,

I have been struggling of late to get any decent images due to this bad weather (Driving rain and gale force winds being the main problems for me) and I have to admit its driving me nuts. I’m getting out at times but the images are all noisy due high ISO’s, camera shake (caused by the wind and the sidekick/ball head set-up) and the occasional burn highlight.

Now I’ve never really gone down the manipulation road preferring to get it right in camera and having an almost basic workflow. I usually do it something like this;

First I open the image in Lightroom, crop (but never too much), exposure, highlight recovery (if needed) and alter the blacks.

Then over to Photoshop, levels, contrast, hue, colour the USM.

Save As.

With my last post, layers was brought in to play with NR on the BG and USM on the subject. Is this classed as manipulation? I used to think it was and shied away from this kind of work.

Many thanks,

Hi Paul,

Got to be quick as I have ended up extremely busy..

Try to get as much of the image adjustments done when you convert the image, there is less destruction of pixels then. Exposure is the same as the highlights slider in levels... Black is the same as the shadows slider.... Brightness equates to the mid tone slider.

The first thing to do is set the colour balance correctly as this can effect clipping levels.

When you open in PS you should do the minimal needed, you shouldn't have to use levels and contrast... in fact avoid contrast like the plague it is so crude... same with hue and colour you should get these right on conversion... I always save a master file that hasn't had any final sharpening and if I have used layers, with all layers preserved, again if you are using one of the CS versions do any adjustment using adjustment layers.

As for your last question I guess it is manipulation, but is a common part of most peoples workflow I think it would be hard to argue that it shouldn't be done.

HTH

Phil

Paul,

The topic of manipulation has been discussed many times on this forum and has lead to the following being added to the rules.

"
Entries to the forum should convey the essential truth of what the photographer saw at the time it was taken. All radical changes, or additions, to the original image, particularly to the primary subject, should be disclosed. The removal of blemishes or distractions is permissible but in presenting images members are requested to declare any deviation for routine* manipulation in an informative way for the benefit of other members.

*Routine manipulation includes adjustments to parameters such as levels, brightness, contrast, sharpness, saturation, shadows and highlights, the removal of dust spots etc. These changes need not be mentioned. The cropping of an image is also seen as routine but members are requested to indicate – as a percentage - how much of the original captured image has been left in the final image presented.
"

The above text is meant to indicate that as digital is a new(ish) technology we would not like to curtail any advancement associated with it but that said we also don't want to be seen to be duplicitous by presenting something that clearly was not natural without saying so.

Photography has always had its abstract and well as objective proponents but it has to be said that historically, therefore what the public expect as the default position, is the objective result.

There are certain highly advertised cases where some noted photographers have added or moved the primary subjects within a frame, whilst I would say that it created publicity for them I am not an advocate of "no publicity is bad publicity" - quite the contrary in my mind.

It is also worth noting that in terms of reportage photography some noteable tabloid/editorial photographers have lost their jobs by cloning out minor distractions from editorial images as these where seen now not to be, essentially, the truth at that time and they did not declare so - harsh but true.

The bottom line is photographers on UKNP are trusted not to deceive with our images but the photographer is not the person who decides if a deception has occured - the rest of us are.

Personally I think your previous Gull image and repost was totally acceptable.

T

Thanks for the heads up on my workflow Phil - I'll be having a look at that later.

Tom thanks for the in depth reply its great, just what I wanted to know - Cheers!

Paul

I too have struggled in a similar manner and infact still am interesting question and answers.

Barry

Eastbourne