
This image reminded me of simpler times, when you played all day and into the night, with few worries. But, this image is a “fabrication”, a composite of six different photos merged to create a visual image of distant memories. The sky was taken 45 years ago in South Dakota. The dead tree is from Ankeny, Iowa. The landscape is from western Nebraska, and the kids are three separate sculptures from Sedona, Arizona.
Digital technology has taken photography to new heights … or lows depending on your view. Some people believe that “real” photos only come straight out of the camera, and that any adjustments, no matter how minor, make it a “fake”. Others believe it is perfectly acceptable to digitally alter the raw image, the same way negatives were manipulated in film processing. Digital technology allows you to go beyond just correcting exposure, contrast, cropping, etc. It also allows you to easily “cut and paste” like I’ve done here and here (4 photos), which is also possible in the darkroom, just not as easily.
So, how far does digital manipulation go before you start to feel uncomfortable? One of the most famous landscape photographers of the film era, Ansel Adams, might have an answer.
Thought for the Day: You don’t take a photograph, you make it. Ansel Adams.
No wonder it’s hard to discern what’s true and what’s not.
Sherrie
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