Philosophy

Photographic Truth

In general I’m looking to create images that are as “moving” as possible. Although some people claim photography is about showing reality, I have no problem to:

• take the image at the right a time of day (or year)
• wait for the right expression or pose of a person or for the best position of a moving subject or subjects
• rearrange the scene a bit — clean up trash, reorder static objects
• clear up dust spots and other imperfections in the digital image
• crop, change white balance, exposure, contrast, saturation
• alter the color or apply dodging and burning in order to emphasize or downplay certain areas of the image
• etc.

I can allow myself these alterations because my objective is Art. I do understand that a photojournalist would probably frown upon some of my choices.

Image Quality

I strive for the best image quality that I can get. That’s why I chose an SLR camera over a compact and that’s why I have several specialized lenses instead of one super-zoom. So it’s only natural that I shoot in raw — the image format that gives me the highest quality and greatest post-processing flexibility.

I also believe that one takes the image with the camera, but one makes the image during the post-processing step. So when I shoot, I’m only concerned with composition, light quality, proper focus and optimal histogram. I set the colors and tonal range of the final image in the raw processor and fine-tune them in Photoshop.

Post-Processing

Many photographers seem to believe that if they don’t get great images right out of the camera, they either need a better camera or they are not good photographers. In fact, great images don’t come out directly from the camera. Not a single image from Ansel Adams was published as a direct print from the negative.

I believe that if a photographer abstains from post-processing, he is giving up some tremendous opportunities to enhance the impact of his images. I really don’t see this as manipulating the truth, but rather as taking advantage of the additional creative opportunities that digital editing offers. Or to paraphrase Alain Briot: “yes, I use filters, yes, I manipulate colors, and yes, I use Photoshop.”

For those who still disagree, let me just say that my images do not show the world as it is, but my vision of how it should or should not be.