Followup About Faked Photography

As a followup to the previous post, two items: first, Oren reminded me that the Met Fifth Avenue had an excellent show in 2012–13 called "Faking It: Manipulated Photography Before Photoshop." A pretty extensive selection is still online, with writeups, but unfortunately many of the illustrations are reduced to thumbnails. (Museums can be very fastidious about the rights to their holdings, as you might know if you've attended museum photography shows with "No Photography" signs scattered about. Which always struck me as funny, but then I tend to see the world with humor and an eye for ironies.) The book is still available, although it's pricey. I wish I had it, but I am flat out of room for books. Didn't Richard III, as the last of the Wars of the Roses raged around him, cry out, "Shelving! Shelving! My kingdom for more shelving!"?*

[UPDATE: A reader who wishes to remain anonymous wrote to point out that this show and book were "made possible" (i.e., underwritten) by Adobe! In his words:

Once one knows that, all of the summary copy for the exhibit reads like it was written by Adobe’s PR department: See? Photoshop is nothing new or scary. People have ALWAYS manipulated photographs...

 

...Ignoring the reality that (as the images in the Met/Adobe book/exhibit immediately make clear) the scope, quality, and nature of photo manipulation is worlds different in the Photoshop era than it ever had been before.

 

In other words, the exhibit and book set out to score points in Adobe’s favor, but they ended up proving the opposite (i.e., that the crudeness of the historical images’ manipulations inadvertently made the point you made in your post).]

The other thing is that I should mention that my own closest allegiance in photography is to the traditions of photojournalism and documentary photography, mainly through the practices of photojournalists working like artists or artists working photojournalists, for example many of the Magnum photographers. Even in art photography I tend to like people whose work tells it like it is, from Jacques Lartigue when he was a boy to Lee Friedlander** to Vanessa Winship. I already mentioned that I like old snapshots, which tend to be unmanipulated only because they don't reach for that level of sophistication. I also think there is a lot to be parsed between photography which is honest within its limitations, vs. photography intended to deceive, which a lot of people confuse. There is absolutely nothing at all dishonest about black-and-white photographs per se.

But I'm on the way to the funeral of one of my best friends here, feeling rushed as always when I have to get out of the house on a timetable (schedules and writing do not go well together and that is just that) and I don't have time to elaborate. As ever, more anon.

Mike

*He did not. To avoid spreading more misinformation on the web, which already has enough of it, he actually said, "A horse! A horse! My kingdom for a horse!", or at least he did in Shakespeare's play, Act 5, scene 4, line 13. Unhorsed and at the mercy of the enemy, he died that day. Do you get this stuff on other photography websites? You do not.

**For all the massive number of Friedlander books—with which his house is stuffed, by the way—there's been no good one-volume introduction to his work since Like a One-Eyed Cat, a book I love.

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Featured Comments from:

John Taylor: "I saw 'Faking It' in DC; wonderful exhibition, and I regretted not getting the catalogue then. Years later, in a Santa Fe used bookstore that consists of stacks upon stacks of seemingly unsorted books everywhere, quite literally I found a copy by chance. I did not hesitate a second time."

Moose: "Hmm, just got back from the Peabody-Essex museum in Salem, Massachusetts. The exhibit 'Conjuring the Spirit World: Art, Magic, and Mediums' is full of faked photos."

Lothar Adler: "The more I think about the modern possibilities of manipulating photos and, moreover, in combination with AI, the more I realize that this is not just a photographic / documentary problem, but with far greater significance a problem in the political and social sphere! If the boundaries between documentary image (in the sense of evidence) and reality can be unrecognizably blurred, then those who possess the knowledge of the elite and the associated technologies have the power over what we experience as reality. We humans form our construct of reality on the basis of the information we receive and can also be directly manipulated politically at this point without us being aware of it. I recently saw a TED talk by the head of AI development at Microsoft. She was pleased to report that almost all Microsoft software products would soon contain AI functions, even if the user would not notice them. In recent years, the degree of perfection of possible manipulation and artificial generation in the field of photography and language (including voice) has developed to such an extent that recently AI has even been able to generate videos that are indistinguishable from traditionally generated videos. Simply by writing a prompt (i.e. writing a small description).

"Again: from this level of perfection, a problem with much more significance arises in the social and political field than in the area of fine arts."

Niels: "I am surprised you haven't linked to this post of yours from 2016. I think this controversy was the final straw that completely killed my interest in enjoying photography on its own merits when it's of digital origin. I now can't really get immediate enjoyment of a photograph unless I already know that it originates from the photo-chemical process, like a Friedlander photograph for example."

richardl: "i luv [sic] conspiracy theory...."

David Comdico: "There was a huge shift from darkroom manipulation to digital and Photoshop, and now AI. No sophistry will change that. And the proof is the negative. It’s as simple as that."

Hank: "I think that the recent Framed book might be the closest thing to an 'overview' of Lee Friedlander as there is."

Terry Letton: " I just want to respond to this thread to point out that there is photography that is not journalism. Sure we don’t want to see a health guru’s face cloned onto a corpulent politician’s body touting the health benefits ofGMO filled cupcakes. (Hyperbolic example.) Photography can also illustrate mood and emotion, which often is more effective using some or all of the techniques you decry. I just received my latest issue of Black and White Photography magazine [which I used to write for —MJ] and the opening Editor's column addresses this very issue. Much of my own photography is in this mode. Truthfully I have no qualms about using Photoshop in any possible way that helps make my photo look the way I want it to and hopefully convey the meaning I hope to share."

Comments

[Robert Roaldi]

I like the term "fauxtography", can't remember where I first saw it.

[Martin Pallett]

Richard III was the last English king to die in battle, taking the fight to the Tudor usurper, Henry (who had about as much right to the throne to that I have!) and only survived because he was surrounded by body guards, the killing blow was alledgedly dealt by a Welsh man. It is true that history is written by the winners - or in this case by a Tudor lick spittle of a playwright!🤓

[JTK]

"there's been no good one-volume introduction to his work since Like a One-Eyed Cat, a book I love."
That's it, you've done it now...I shall be singing 'Shake Rattle and Roll' all day today, and quite possibly all weekend. Expect a letter of admonishment from my wife.

(I have the book BTW.)

[Nick Davis]

Regarding Richard the Third, Mike, you could also add, Ended underneath a car park in Leicester!!!

[hugh crawford]

I thought that that Richard the Third quote was something about unreliable transportation.

[Moose]

". . . my own closest allegiance in photography is to the traditions of photojournalism and documentary photography"

Whereas mine is to creation of art, a thing that creates emotional affect inside the viewer. If it were up to me, the term photojournalism would not exist, it would be illustrated journalism.

Manipulation in order to change the camera capture to something closer to what the photographer saw, literally, emotionally, etc., seems to me an acceptable approach to photography.

I was just working on an image of a small river, meandering through a marsh and into the ocean. The image out of the camera was simply not what I saw, just a few hours ago. I made it look more as I had seen it.

That might go a ways toward explaining why I am not as upset as you are by manipulated photo images.

There is also the problem of differences between how humans see and how film and digital sensors see:

Many consider my photographs to be in the "realistic" category. Actually, what reality they have is in their optical-image accuracy; their values are definitely "departures from reality." The viewer may accept them as realistic because the visual effect may be plausible, but if it were possible to make direct visual comparison with the subjects, the differences would be startling.

—Ansel Adams, The Negative, from the Introduction

Jacques Lartigue
This raises an interesting, to me, question about subject manipulation. It's OK, but digital darkroom manipulation isn't?

And portraits! What the heck are they? Not journalism, not documentary, seldom art . . .

[darlene]

My definition of "manipulating a photograph" involves altering it from its original latent state on film. Techniques like dodging, burning, cropping, and similar adjustments all introduce changes.

While some may argue that techniques like dodging, burning, or cropping are part of the standard photographic process and not inherently manipulative, these adjustments still modify the original capture. Whether or not these changes are considered manipulation can depend on one's perspective, but they undeniably influence the final image beyond its untouched state.

[James]

Maybe digital manipulation is taking us back to an even earlier era when all visual representation was assumed to be manipulated and there was no expectation that pictures held truth. We had a special term for pictures in those days. They were called paintings :-).

[Benjamin Marks]

I would go bit farther and argue that photographers like Jerry Unselman's work had a "hook" to it precisely because his blending of negatives ran counter to the (then) assumption of verisimilitude that photography carried with it. Others, like Ralph Meatyard manipulated reality, but then photographed the staged results with great rigor. I think that reality is strange and ironic enough without being manipulated, but judging what the AI-bots are putting together, I am on the trailing edge, not the leading one currently.

[Bob G.]

I think it’s a foregone conclusion, no, an obvious understanding, that photos have been manipulated, retouched, changed, etc. since like, from the beginning of photography and before with any recorded images set to photo media, canvas, stone, pottery, cave walls, etc. I know I’ve done quite my share. There is no real real. It’s where one draws the line to say what the finished product should look like or represent.

[Bob G.]

I’ve been thinking more on the “line of truth” in photographic manipulation as being “honest within its limitations”

This demarcation is flexible. One may apply several additional techniques to enhance the outcome of an image at a beginning. Even if a photographer ends their manipulation at a certain point, the further existence of the image can be changed by its usage, environment, life span, or media in which it exists. Some of these additional stages of the images’ life may be out of the originators’ hands. I would think image stability, growth or degradation depends on what happens after the photographer’s work ends. So, the actual “truth” of the image may be set in a range of its existence. What may start out as a real, authentic image may be not be perceived as such later.

[Vijay]

Mike - You might be interested to know that one of Apple's product leaders has a somewhat traditional view of what a photograph should be. I won't quote here but it's interesting to see that even among the phone makers, there is some consideration of how far things should go in terms of generative technologies. Link to Dpreview article: https://www.dpreview.com/articles/1085774699/apple-ai-photography-celebration-really-actually-happened-google-samsung-iphone