[Geysers] great APOD pic!--Faked!

[Sandra Nykerk]

Lee, there are many HDR images which I also find "jarring" and as they say in photo jargon, "overcooked." They are all over the internet, and many of their makers are quite famous. For me, less is usually more. But there are times I specifically opt for a more illustrative look in an image, and I would beg to differ that it is faked. Photoshopped, yes, everything is. Messed with? Definitely, yes. That would be the point. Should all "nature" photographs be exactly "as is?" Ahh, that's a long discussion. First, we need to define "as is," which more or less means defining reality. 

So I would invite you to a glass of wine and a continued dialog re your comment that "a camera image which does not truly represent what the eye sees at a given moment is faked." As you know better than anyone, that would include many historic photographers, as well as our contemporaries. Both Weston and Adams, as well as their predecessors, were known to scratch their negatives (plates) to add details, including clouds. Many historical photographers added skies because the emulsions were extremely sensitive to blue, which completely overexposed the skies. Faked? Burning and dodging in the darkroom? Also faked? Contrast filters and masks? A polarizing filter which allows me and the camera sensor to see color and detail below the surface of the water? Slow shutter speeds which render flowing water as a silky cloud? A fast shutter speed that freezes the sparkling droplets of Sawmill in mid air? My eye doesn't see either of those at the moment the image is made. Faked? Or a different interpretation? Are you saying that all astro photographs which use exposure stacking techniques are fakes? Is a 5 second exposure acceptable? How about 30 seconds, which allows many more stars to register than I can see with my bad eyesight? And, I cannot see with my own eye the beautiful Andromeda galaxy, but a detailed photograph that I accept on faith showing me what is there would not be possible without special equipment and software. Faked?

Red or white? Anyone else want to join us?

Sandra Nykerk

On Oct 22, 2012, at 9:08 AM, <Lee_Whittlesey at nps.gov> wrote:

> Well...after all of that labored explanation from several people, I still think that a camera-image which does not truly represent what the eye sees at a given moment is faked. And I agree completely with Paul Strasser when he made the comment that "this effort is awful."
> 
> The image is fanciful, created, unreal, "enhanced," photo-shopped, messed with, or (using the most simple term) faked. That's my opinion and I'm sticking to it. 
> 
> I guess I'm one of those people who simply does not care for this kind of work.
> 
> Lee Whittlesey
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> <graycol.gif>Sandra Nykerk <snykerk at mcn.net>
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> Sandra Nykerk <snykerk at mcn.net> 
> Sent by: <geysers-bounces at lists.wallawalla.edu>
> 10/19/2012 09:05 PM
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