So, last night, bwolf and I got into a conversation about photography as art. I know it all depends on the viewer (eye of the beholder), but I'm curious as to what everybody thinks about it.

In B's opinion, photography is only pure photographic art when it undergoes literally zero manipulations or adjustments.. meaning that simple sharpening and level/curve adjustments are too much and throw it into a different category, such as digital art.

I beg to differ, of course, since almost all photographers adjust their photos in one way or another, going back to the beginning of photography. Even most black and white film photographers adjusted their images a large amount through cropping, dodging, burning and other methods. The problem with classifying photography in the art world is that it can cross lines into other mediums easily.

What I'm asking, I suppose, is where is the line drawn in which photography becomes something else through means of adjustments?



Yes, I'm bored at work.



Edit: This is not a question as to whether or not photography is an art.

Better question:

What is art? How do you classify something as art?

Anything created with the purpose of stimulating the senses and/or intellect, imo.
But that's not the question here, lol.

Agreed, there is an "art" to using the software to enhance the photo.

You're asking if digital photography is art, right? So you can't answer that without determining what art is. Question is relevant, imo.

Incorrect. Read my first post again.
I'm talking about photography as a medium as opposed to digital art (digital manipulation) or other medium.

So you're asking when photography stops being photographic art and becomes digital art?

Oh...my question is more interesting

Bingo.


And lol, your question has been asked a million times before.

With no satisfactory answer

I think your def. is too broad. Surely there are things created to just stimulate the senses (drugs?).



To your question, why does digital photography have to be either/or? I think a both/and solution is perfectly fine. I don't see where the mediums have to be exclusive.

I totally agree. Being able to manipulate things digitally is an art in itself.

Who's to say that drugs and their effects aren't art? I consider culinary art.

That's what I'm asking!!
Curious that you only specify digital photography though.

i think the photography loses its art status when you begin shooting things with the idea, that "oh, I'll just photoshop this later" my 2 cents. it then becomes art of a different sort...if that makes sense.

Oh, the I agree with you (I guess).

B's wrong about the adjustment's piece. I don't think that matters. I think what removes digital photography from pure photographic art is the fact that it's (duh) digital, not that the image is adjusted after the shutter snaps. If pure photographic art requires film instead of a sensor translating the image into digital, then digital photography isn't pure photographic art.

But as our society starts to become more entrenched into technology, it's only a matter of time until it becomes a contemporary art form leaving traditional photography behind with other traditional medium.

Hi, Burt! It's more about the intentions of the photographer and not the method? Interesting.


What is the difference of an image being recorded through a digital sensor and one being recorded on silver emulsion film?

To me, an unprocessed photograph is nothing more than a poor representation of the subject material. It needs to be processed to counteract the camera's limitations as a tool since one will never properly create a picture that is accurate to what our eyes perceived.

To say that any type of manipulation disqualifies a photograph from being true photographical art is absurd. If that's the case, how can you differentiate between adjusting the white balance via the camera and shooting in RAW and then adjusting it in post processing?

Photo editing software should be as important to a photographer as the camera itself, IMO. Unless you're a photojournalist, that is.

To me, a photograph doesn't enter digital art until the picture has undergone some type of artificial editing (vectoring, replacing backgrounds, etc).

I think we've already passed that point. How many of your friends have darkrooms?

my buddy is a fairly known photog in DC...helped take pix of Obama's official portrait////while he uses digital manipulation, hes still an artist in the pure photographer sense////...its a wierd line...but he never seems to cross over into being a digital artist, if that makes sense....

see his pix here: www.cutraro.com

perhaps its the "journalism" in a photo, or the idea of "journalist" in his mind...that keeps it pure, and when thats tampered with...its then that a photo becomes something else, and a photographer becomes a digital artist.

Art is whatever the "artist" calls art. I could drop my glass on the ground and call that art.

why do you think this?

@ Jason


He does great work, for sure. <3 the Mike Rowe shot, lol.
Looking through his photography portfolio, I'd say his work is not digital art in that sense.

Definitely true but digital media is still largely a gray area in the art world hence your question. I agree with Jason, you leave the realm of photography once you start doing artificial editing and incorporating digital media. At that point the piece is no longer a photograph.


Yes and no. An artist also needs an audience.

how is a digital image not "digital media" no matter what changes have been made or not made? just not sure of your definition here.

so its not art if i paint something a never show it to anyone?

Because photography is still photography, regardless whether the image was burned onto film or recorded on a memory stick.

Other than that, I don't have a reason for believing it, I just do. A photograph is still a photograph until you've taken it and severely altered it in a way that makes it unnatural (as in, looks completely different than it did when it was taken). To me, a photograph should be a faithful representation of the subject matter as perceived by the photographer's eyes. In order to achieve that, you need post processing for the majority of pictures. I've got nothing against turning photography into another form of art, photography is the basis for the majority of forms of art anyway. How many painters take a photograph and then recreate it using whatever medium suits them best? I've altered some of my photographs to the point where I can easily say that it's no longer a natural photo, it's a lot of fun I think the point is that post processing is just as much a part of photography as a camera is.

Yeah, that confused me too.

I meant any other digital media such as 3D renderings and vector elements. Basically once you start adding far too many external elements, you start to lose the integrity of the photograph.


It's like the proverbial tree falling in the forest with nobody around to hear it.

good thread, lani. nice supplement to my one art history class in college, lol



problem is the tree actually makes a sound. can't stop physics. i think the audience in NRN's example would be the creator. If I draw a picture and I enjoy looking at it afterwards, then it's art, imo.

but the tree still falls.



well put

I think creativity and intention would draw the line between "Art" and just another photo. Sure I can take pictures all day long.. but did I put any thought into them is the question.. more so did I even take the photo with the intention of putting it on display for others to feel and react to..even if I am the only one that sees and reacted to my photographical artwork.

yeah..i'm bored at work too.

I had plenty of art history classes in college, but none covered my initial question.

Lani,
you should check the irc log from last night. I think we discussed this what is art topic for a good hour from about 2-3 pacific time.

But what about alterations to the image itself?


After I went to bed, eh?
The question here isn't 'what is art?'. I'm trying to find out what people think about alterations done to photographic images and when does it cross lines into other mediums like digital art or mixed medium. How would I find the log anyway, lol?

Well certainly.. any artist would put their "final touches" on a piece.. painted or not.

Precisely. It all depends on who's your intended audience. If your intended audience is yourself and you're happy with what you came up with then you've succeeded. Just as the tree in the forest will undeniably make a sound whether someone was there to hear it or not, a piece of "art" will exist even if nobody sees/hears/tastes/smells it but it still needs an audience to appreciate it in order to fulfill its purpose.

I'd would say the what is art question is the elephant in the room in regards to your question, but id say once you leave the realm of strict representation, its not photography.

I guess I see photography differently than some. For me, photography lies outside the realm of traditional 'art'. You talk about strict representation... how strict? Is sharpening and adjusting the white balance or levels of an image extreme alteration?

alteration beyond representation i'd say.

if it becomes unrecognizable as a representation due to adjustment i'd say yes.

photography falls into art very often. i would say that what most people think of as traditional 'art' is not really art at all, but a recognition of the sublime in a certain object.

I would also categorize artists as those who make art.
painter = not an artist
photography = not an artist
sculptor = not an artist etc.

instead I would argue that art is an enabler of communication, in very much the same way words enable communication. Art is a language.

Most 'artists' aspire to make art, but most of the time they fail. I would argue that even among the greatest artists, they on succeeded a small handful of times in their life at actually making art(an object that facilitates communication). If they succeed, they're an artist. If they do not, they remain a crafts person, or simpler terms a maker of objects.

Even the concept of the artist, is a relatively new one. Previously most people we widely consider artists, were actually calling themselves craftsmen. Now that we see more value in their work, we have elevated them to the status of artist, and their work to the status of art, and I see the same thing for photography.

There are a lot of photographers applying a craft. They make photographs. Once in a while a photographer uses his/her medium to communicate so purely and clearly, it gets elevated to the status of art and with it makes the photographer an artist.

HDR ≠ photographic art

I almost lumped HDR in with vectoring, but decided against it. It's just another tool in a photographer's bag to use. If used poorly, I would call it crap. If used excessively I think it pushes the picture beyond what I would consider "photography," but if used well I think it enhances the photograph. Examples of what I would consider good HDR:

I would think the very alterations you are speaking of are what make it an art.

The picture captured is altered by the camera settings and by the development process. This is true for both film and digital.

I would argue if the image presented came from a camera, even if altered it is photographic art.

The true test of an art is that it requires talent IMO. The more talent you have the better the output.

I hope to take technically good pictures that please myself but I do not have the talent to make the type of images I see on here. I never will because it cant be learned. I can learn techniques and imitate what I see but that is not the same thing, again IMO.

might as well just forgo the camera and draw those up in paint cause those are not photographic art

Meh, I guess that's why it's subjective. I thought we were arguing the point at which a photograph transcends to a different genre of art, and IMO those aren't even close to that line. Past the point of faithful representation perhaps, but not by much. One is strong on contrast and the other is a little strong on saturation, but otherwise they are probably very accurate. Now if the picture of the car had been taken on the street somewhere and then superimposed onto the backdrop of the parking garage I would agree with you. HDR is a new technology and is the current fad right now (which I'm guilty of), but once the novelty of it wears off it will be seen as the best way to properly expose a picture IMO.

FWIW, both of the people who took those pictures are professional photographers.

Edit: I should add that if you really start examining the picture of the lake, you'll notice that there are no areas of the picture that have crushed blacks or blown out highlights. The entire picture is perfectly exposed, from the log to the mountains to the sky. That is simply not possible to obtain without post processing. I think your idea of photographic art is flawed in itself because every example of a good photograph that you will find has been altered in some way.

my take:

photography (or digital media, or my tie, or anything else) is art when its form and content stimulate the observer in some way.

kim, I read your first post a couple times and for some reason I'm still fuzzy on the question. I believe you are asking when the art of photography becomes the art of digital media, right? if so, that's like asking when a bicycle becomes a seat atop two wheels. art is art.

maybe your question is when a photograph stops being a photograph and becomes a piece of digital media. difficult question. if one says that any sort of off-camera adjustments take away from an image's status as a photograph, then what of using filters on the lens? and if you allow the use of physical filters to modify an image pre-shutter, why not digital filters in post? why is one technique exclusive to the art of photography, and the other to the art of digital media?

you could make the defining line at the subject level as some have said. in that case, any processing that significantly changes the subject and content of the image pushes it outside the scope of being a photograph. but what if you could completely change the way a subject is perceived simply by cropping in, zooming out, or shooting from a different angle?

I think that, if a distinction is to be made, it should be done on a physical and chemical level and not an intellectual one. the art of photography involves shooting on film, processing, enlarging, and printing. the art of digital media involves shooting on media cards, processing on a computer and printing. there is overlap of course, but why wouldn't there be? is the art of oil painting completely unrelated in every way to the art of watercolors?

one last thing: art is not art until someone is willing to pay for it - but when they do, it ceases to be art and becomes commercial. that's my two cents anyways.


vic, while I do appreciate a perfectly exposed image (whether done in post or not), most truly artistic images I've come across have such a deep impact mainly due to their flaws (or as I like to call them, shadows and highlights lol). I don't like HDR for that reason. flaws add character, and removing the character of an image is never a good thing. like in the second photo you posted, it is absolutely beautiful no doubt, but I would prefer an image from peter lik or nigel turner. sometimes, blown highlights and lost shadows add to an image, not detract from it. that scene would be nearly impossible to properly expose using traditional means, but the composition and subject are ordinary. that photo without the HDR would be bland.

it's worth very little lol

Yeah, I thought the question was clear, but obviously I was mistaken, lol.

^This is what I'm asking for opinions on. Just curious.
Thanks for your input.

I think the answer to that would be when the image stops being representative of the object/event it captures and stands alone. Then it becomes media.

media does not always mean media, ned.

i think a photo becomes a peice of digital art when the photo reaches a point of looking almost surreal through editing. for example the 2nd photo posted by vic i would have to say is digital art, but the Volkswagen thats black and white is not.

I think it's impossible to make a distinction between the two. You're working with a digital representation of something, you can alter it as much or as little as you like, but that doesn't change the fact that you're working in the digital medium.

I think if a distinction is to be made, it should be between digital and non-digital photography. These are truly "different" media, with a different required set of skills, even if the outcome is similar. You could make two nearly identical paintings with acrylic and oil, but that doesn't mean you used the same method to achieve each painting, hence the distinction between the two. This is like the difference between digital and non-digital photography. You also could paint a very photo-realistic oil painting, or a very abstract, fantastical one. The outcome would be drastically different (digital photo vs digital art) but the same medium was used to achieve both.

I'm not sure if this answers the question as it was intended, but that's my two cents on the issue, if they're worth that.

lol at volkswagen

even dudes shooting on film can manipulate their photos