I have a camera and I'm not afraid to use it. These are the pictures I still don't hate.

 

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And now, a rant:

 

Every photo is manipulated. Every single shot is a distortion, an interpretation or at best an approximation of the scene that was in front of the camera when the shutter was released. Where do we draw the line between what gets labelled "photograph" and what gets called "photo-manipulation"?

 

Even before you choose any camera settings, the very basic act of looking through the viewfinder immediately forces us to interpret things. Most people are binocular. Two eyes give us depth perception. Looking through one lens removes this and forces us to start emphasising elements in the frame by choosing what is and is not in focus. And then it forces the frame itself on us.

 

Without a single bit of processing I can choose whether or not someone appears in my shot and where they appear in the frame. You can do a lot to the mood and tone of a photo by careful framing. Take one step forward and a bit to the side while framing the shot and the happy couple smiling at each other becomes a single person smiling at you. Step back and grab a longer lens and people who are metres apart can appear to be right next to each other.

 

Choose a wide aperture and you can pick a lone object out of a crowd, making a group shot about just one thing. With the right shutter speed, everyone is speeding... or no-one is. Is it light or dark out? Who cares, set the Ev you want and you've got as much light as you need. Add a flash to brighten something you want people to notice. Add two flashes, a whole studio full. The advertising set looks too staged with all those lights? Crank the ISO up to eleven and give it a hint of realism with some grain.

 

Is that dishonest? It's photography. These are choices we make every time we pick up a camera. Is that "photo-manipulation"? It can't be if you don't use Photoshop.

 

Sure it can't.

 

All of that happens in-camera, but every bit of it is "photo-manipulation" because every choice we make in making a photo manipulates what the viewer will see of the scene. The viewer of your finished image does not see anything but that image. They do not see the view through the viewfinder, they do not review the list of choices you made or the reasons you made them. Nor do they see anything that is done between the shutter closing and the presenting of the finished work. It's all a closed-off process to them. A black box. Light goes in, photo comes out and all else is a mystery. Why should the set of choices made before opening the shutter matter less than the choices made after?

 

Even after the shutter has been released and the image prepared for viewing, even if there is no dodging or burning or cropping or even white balancing, there is still more manipulation. Do you show your viewers every frame you expose? No. You pick and choose and show the ones you think are worth seeing. Henri Cartier-Bresson thought it was worth his while to show us a man jumping a puddle. He did not show us a man standing ankle deep in water cursing the rain and his lack of run-up nor did he show us a man happily walking away with dry feet. We're manipulated into feeling what we feel when we see that image because we are not shown the rest of the story. Cartier-Bresson not only cropped the frame to remove an inconvenient fence, he cropped a narrative to show a moment.

 

A viewer who asks "is that image manipulated?" has no clue about the process. They might have biases and prejudices but they clearly lack the background to fully understand that the only honest answer the question can ever have is "yes". Photographers know this. They take the steps, they make the choices, but whether they think it or say it is another matter.

 

The matter is not whether an image is altered. All images are altered by the very choices we all must make before we press the button. The matter is how the image is presented to the viewer. Do you show them your image as a representation of something real and true or as an image, a piece of art in itself, independent of any external reality that might have contributed elements to its making? Whose fault is it if they think it is real? They might not know what goes into making a photograph, but you do. If you tell them your image is not manipulated, no matter how you might hedge that with weasely words like "interpretation", you are lying to them and maybe also to yourself.

 

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