I recently had a reader email me and ask my opinion of digital manipulation.  He considered himself a “purist”, that is he shot film, and he was concerned about the apparent limitless control the digital shooter had regarding his/her images.  My first impulse was to request that he allow me to comment on sex, religion and politics, they are far less controversial.  Technology has always gotten a bad rap and I doubt seriously if my comments will change anyone’s opinion but I hope that at least those that disagree can see some logic in the following:

Historically speaking, photography has always been the subject of controversy.

At the advent of the Daguerreotype a Parisian newspaper lambasted these images as against the will of God.  That man had created images so closely duplicating the work of God had to indeed be blasphemous.  So it should come as no surprise that we are still arguing the topic of manipulation centuries later.  My point of view is that the present debate is not about manipulation but the degree of manipulation.

Frank Hurley, probably the most famous Antarctic photographer in history was regularly creating composite images at the beginning of the 20^th century!  Doing the same thing in Photoshop is hardly breakthrough technology.

Ansel Adams, long considered the icon of film purists would have embraced Photoshop had he been born 50 years later.  Adams spent hours manipulating his images in the darkroom.  The man would have been a Photoshop guru!

I am also of the opinion that black & white photography is blatant manipulation.  I love black & white photographs but I see in color and manipulating the color spectrum into gray tones makes me wonder who is fooling whom about manipulation.

The camera you choose, the lens you use, the type of film you shoot with are all forms of manipulation.  How you shoot your subject matter is also manipulation.  Eddie Adams, the Pulitzer prize winner, for his shot of a Vietnamese officer executing a Viet Cong, was a shot he regretted to his dying day.  The shot was completely out of context.  The VC had just been caught brutally butchering the wife and family of the officer’s best friend.  I don’t want to argue the ethics of the shot or the situation but simply demonstrate a degree of manipulation.  Photojournalists have their own ethical conduct to deal with but it’s all about manipulation.

Arthur Ashe, the brilliant American tennis player was once asked to comment on the introduction and legalization of oversize tennis rackets.  He felt it diminished the purity of the game but now that they were legal he said you were a fool not to use one.

Could there be a parallel in the world of photography?