Label for Genuine Photographs

Nick Hermanns · Feb 17, 2010

JBrunner said:
....

I have a certain appreciation for the effort here, but in all candor it seems to me half baked...

The real issue here is not what is genuine or not. ...
The real issue and what we should all be concerned with:
Provenance

The most basic and actually definable criteria for any form of finite visual pattern is the provenance. .....

Insisting on clear provenance of work presented, while admittedly difficult these days, at least carries a clarity that is not easily weaseled out of by those who seem ashamed to clearly identify their artifacts.

The droves of amateur "photographers" calling inkjet prints "giclees" need not concern the professional working in any medium, including ink. ...

"J Brunner-Toned cyanotype on Arches Platine" or "J Brunner-genuine photograph". Which would you buy?

Accuracy or truthiness?

Jason, I struggeled with your text... it won...

Seriously: a lot of your thoughts made me think about our topic.
I also see the problem with that "Genuine"-thing. I whished I had a better term.
I'm thankfull that somebody like you at least tries to understand what GPO's goal is. And it's surprising for me that most of the people here are just trying to let us know how unimportant and silly such ideas are... there must be a reason for it...?

I think (as a matter of fact it's a bit more than only thinking) that more than 50% of the pictures we see in galleries (online or offline) are digitally altered. I'm not talking about gamma-corrections or desaturating colors. I'm talking about planting trees where no trees have been, adding new dramatic skies to a landscape, removing ships from the sea and adding a nice little saling boat, setting some pretty seagulls in the sky, eliminate light posts and so on... that is in my opinion not a "Genuine Photograph" any more.
How does provenance help to deal with these things?

Of couse you can say: forget that crap and do your own thing. But I just would like to know if a photograph shows reality or fantasy. Fiction or non fiction - in literature this differentiation is common.

To come to an end: Giclee: I see that like you do.

J Brunner-Toned cyanotype on Arches Platine" or "J Brunner-genuine photograph: I'd buy the cyanotype especially if it's a Genuine Photograph ;-)

The question about your work matching "GPO"-standards is already answered. I also would have said it does.

Thanks for your thoughts,
Nick

http://www.nick-hermanns-photography.de

Rolleigraf · Feb 17, 2010

Q.G. said:
No difference. You are judging whether a photograph is genuine or not.
(...)

Do I really have to repeat myself? Please reread my post, think about it, note the difference I have outlined in that post.

I have the feeling you are not familiar with the concept of definitions and/or formal logic.

An example: Physicists use the word "barn" to describe a very small area in nuclear physics and high energy physics (roughly said, it is used to compare cross sections for interactions of particles, for example). So, they might say that an atom in a given reaction has a cross section of 2 barn. This does not mean that this atom is about the size of 2 average barns which are used, for example, to store hay. They defined - in the context of nuclear physics - the word "barn", and use it accordingly. We are not doing anything different from that.

Rolleigraf · Feb 17, 2010

Q.G. said:
Na, Jan. Auf Deutsch wäre mir auch ganz recht.

But even in English it must be quite obvious to you that you cannot claim not to want to attach labels while proposing a label and setting out the ground rules for when it may and may not be attached.

Gut! Dann lass uns diese Diskussion aber per PM o.ä. austragen, um den Rest hier nicht zu langweilen.

Gruß,
Jan

Rolleigraf · Feb 17, 2010

PKM-25 said:
Do you ever read news, watch movies, pay bills, buy books, search for recipes, fill out surveys, join Facebook groups, download pirated music, type letters, check stocks, send invoices, write, make digital movies, digital art, digital music, clone your old girl friend's face out of a family photo, ebay, twitter, blog, skype or email with your darkroom?

Didn't think so…

My life is fleeting, my life is a photographic life. And if there is one thing I don't need, it is photoshop to fully realize my ability as a passionate and talented photographer. What I saw is what you see in my images and would have seen had you been there and looked with my eyes, not trough my lens or monitor..

Life is too short to do everything on a computer...My life, my journey, my images are art but they are real.....and boy does this world need more that is real...

After using photoshop since 2.0 and digital since 1994, I have concluded that it is not what I consider photography and really want as little to do with it as possible.

But I am not sure I need to label it as such, I need to show great work, then answer those questions later..

But yeah man, I want nothing to do with computer generated photography if I can help it.

I second many of your ideas mentioned in your post.

Nobody says you´d have to label it. By the way, I currently do not use the logo on my photographs - I use it on my website along with two little sentences: "All of my images are unmanipulated photographs according to the standards of Genuine-Photograph.Org (GPO). For more information on GPO, visit Genuine-Photograph.Org."
If anybody wants to put it on his pics, ok, no problem.

Since I show my work regularly on several places in the web, I especially use the label there (by adding a simple link to GPO to the description). This eliminates any unneccessary discussion whether the sky or whatever is photoshopped or not. I suppose these discussions do not occur here an APUG, but this is rather unique. People (especially thos who are not so familiar with photography) tend to assume that images are photoshopped nowadays. And from my experience I can say from my experience that people appreciate it when a photo has not been photoshopped. I like it if people like my work, although I do it mostly for myself. And I like it even more if they like it even more when they notice that my images are not photoshopped.

Shaggysk8 · Feb 17, 2010

Just one question, what do you have against photoshop? just wondered really

Paul

Nick Hermanns · Feb 17, 2010

Shaggysk8 said:
Just one question, what do you have against photoshop?
Paul

Nothing.

Rolleigraf · Feb 17, 2010

Nick Hermanns said:
Nothing.

Nothing which works ;-)

It´s not about the program, and it´s not about photocomposites or rendered images. It´s about composites and rendered images being called photographs, or being compared with photographs. You would also not compare an oil painting with a photograph.

Nick Hermanns · Feb 17, 2010

mono said:
To me it´s a dispute about nothing!
Go out and take photographs!

Hey Folker!
It's too cold to go out and take pictures ;-)
Geht's Dir gut?
Lieben Gruß,
Nick

markbarendt · Feb 17, 2010

Rolleigraf said:
You would also not compare an oil painting with a photograph.

Why not?

When I go to a gallery to look at or for other people's work (where I'm seeing the art from a customer's point of view) I don't care how they make it as long as it is good. If I don't like it I don't buy it.

I'm sure the artist cares but as a customer I don't. No label can convince me to buy something I don't like.

News is different, police work is too; people don't like being lied to.

Even in news and law there is room for hand drawn work, in courtrooms here in the USA sketch artists create the pictures that get used in the news. These drawings are absolutely composites meant to portray the whole interaction rather than individual moments.

The idea is similar to this contact sheet which is meant to give a feeling for a trip I took. http://www.flickr.com/photos/30056819@N00/4152133895/in/set-72157622919050322/

There is no lie in my composite, it is absolutely genuine, it is absolutely a composite.

Similarly this idea applies here http://www.flickr.com/photos/halophoto/3381858811/sizes/o/in/set-72157594327205876/

Rolleigraf · Feb 17, 2010

markbarendt said:
Why not?

When I go to a gallery to look at or for other people's work (where I'm seeing the art from a customer's point of view) I don't care how they make it as long as it is good. If I don't like it I don't buy it.

I'm sure the artist cares but as a customer I don't. No label can convince me to buy something I don't like.

News is different, police work is too; people don't like being lied to.

Even in news and law there is room for hand drawn work, in courtrooms here in the USA sketch artists create the pictures that get used in the news. These drawings are absolutely composites meant to portray the whole interaction rather than individual moments.

The idea is similar to this contact sheet which is meant to give a feeling for a trip I took. http://www.flickr.com/photos/30056819@N00/4152133895/in/set-72157622919050322/

There is no lie in my composite, it is absolutely genuine, it is absolutely a composite.

Similarly this idea applies here http://www.flickr.com/photos/halophoto/3381858811/sizes/o/in/set-72157594327205876/

Mark,

for you, you are 100% right. From an artistic point of view, the only thing which counts is if you like it or not - period. I do not see myself as an artist or as a storyteller, by the way, I see myself as a photographer. You say, an artist may care how his images are being made. I also do. That´s why I trying to tell everybody who is watching my images, how I work. I could write the whole stuff down on my website. But since my friends Ulrich and Nick feel the same about that thing, we set up this dedicated website. Maybe (!) someone else also shares our opinion.

Of course your composite is not a lie. A rendered image is also not a lie. But a rendered image, or some composites suggest that they are photographs of a real scene. And if someone shows an image of a sailing ship near the coast and claims that he has shot a photograph of a sailing ship near the cost, but did in fact shoot only the coats and added the sailing ship later, this person is lying. Not the image is lying, but the person who states he had shot this photo.

Edit: Our label was not created to be a sales argument. The customer may care or may not care how the image has been made.

PKM-25 · Feb 17, 2010

Shaggysk8 said:
Just one question, what do you have against photoshop? just wondered really

In short, read my post above.

The use of it is nothing special, nothing unique, nothing artistic. Most of what is done on it is sickening, HDR, "I am a software developer on my lunch break wannabee artist" garbage. I live in a town filled with the arts, filled with famous artists and NONE of them make the lame ass excuse of "I don't care about how it was made, only the art matters". NONE! It matters to them when it comes to lumping this POS computer program into the hard earned art world.

That is SUCH a typical cop out of a struggling artist, "Who Cares?" what a freaking JOKE!

I recently covered the ESPN Winter X Games for several local clients, an annual job for me. This is largely a young crowd, so I decided to conduct a survey of sorts, asking if the heavy handed use of Photoshop to attain a given look was still a photograph. Over 3 days, I had interviewed 68 people age range 15-28. 54 said they did not consider heavily photoshopped imagery a photograph any longer, 21 said that they did not even consider it art because a computer had been used, something anyone can do and is used for practically everything now days.

Three weeks ago, one of our better known local galleries had benifet show for Haiti. There were 5 photographers, 4 had used digital output, three had shown heavily shopped work, I had showed darkroom printed work. I sold two of the four pieces shown, none of the giclee prints sold.

By and large, what I find in my line of work as a full time, well respected photographer is that less and less people consider Photoshopped / CGI altered photographically derived work photography. Sorry to say this, but unless the CGI you do is incredibly exceptional, this perception is not going to go away since we do everything on a computer nowdays, nearly anyone can "juice it up" in photoshop, so it is really not what most would consider unique or art.

For the record, the only time I see CGI defended is by photo enthusiasts or struggling "artists", not by people who's lives are not photo-centric or actually buy photography to hang on walls. This is especially true in the higher echelons of art, thank GOD!

That's what I have against photoshop, the same thing other people do, I don't consider the use of it photography or art. I use it strictly for output, press ready professional imaging needs, not to realize my final image. It's an envelope, not the letter it self.

It's art in, garbage out.

Q.G. · Feb 17, 2010

Rolleigraf said:
Do I really have to repeat myself? Please reread my post, think about it, note the difference I have outlined in that post.

By all means, no!

What you should do instead is read what you write yourself.

I'll repeat myself: you cannot claim not to want to attach labels while proposing a label and setting out the ground rules for when it may and may not be attached.

Your label is intended and used to set a group of photographs ("genuine" ones) apart from another group of things that do not hold up to whatever you say distinguishes between the two groups.
Yet you believe that you are not "judging whether a photograph is genuine or not"...? The entire Genuine Photograph Manifesto is one big judgment.

Rolleigraf said:
I have the feeling you are not familiar with the concept of definitions and/or formal logic.

Quite the contrary, Jan. Quite the contrary.
That must be why i do understand that your scheme is seriously flawed.

Q.G. · Feb 17, 2010

Rolleigraf said:
Nobody says you´d have to label it.

That must be the reason why you thought it a good idea to create a label?

Q.G. · Feb 17, 2010

Rolleigraf said:
Of course your composite is not a lie. A rendered image is also not a lie. But a rendered image, or some composites suggest that they are photographs of a real scene. And if someone shows an image of a sailing ship near the coast and claims that he has shot a photograph of a sailing ship near the cost, but did in fact shoot only the coats and added the sailing ship later, this person is lying. Not the image is lying, but the person who states he had shot this photo.

I watched some of your group's photographs.
Couldn't help notice how the caption of one says that a lot of "darkroom voodoo" had to be employed to make it look like it does.

And that's where your scheme really falls flat.
You are allowing "voodoo" to change the image to what you think it should look like, but won't allow "voodoo" to change an image to what someone else thinks it should look like.
There is no fundamental difference between your genuine photographs and those you will not recognize as such. Both are 'dis-genuine'. Any difference between the two is a difference in degree only.

Ulrich Drolshagen · Feb 17, 2010

Q.G. said:
I watched some of your group's photographs.
Couldn't help notice how the caption of one says that a lot of "darkroom voodoo" had to be employed to make it look like it does.

And that's where your scheme really falls flat.
You are allowing "voodoo" to change the image to what you think it should look like, but won't allow "voodoo" to change an image to what someone else thinks it should look like.
There is no fundamental difference between your genuine photographs and those you will not recognize as such. Both are 'dis-genuine'. Any difference between the two is a difference in degree only.

The picture in question is "Rainy Day Version III". It has been discussed to some extent (there was a url link here which no longer exists). If you have access you may have look. It's normal dodging and burning. I've made a version in 16x16 lately so from my darkroom notes:
Base exposure 36s Grade 2,0
white cloud left and space in clouds in the middle - 25%
right and left edge + 25%
sky (upper edge) + 100%
space in clouds + 50%, grade 5
lower edge up to the water line + 150%, grade 5

Nothing to write home about for an experienced printer but for me, doing straight prints mostly, it's indeed darkroom voodoo.

Ulrich

Q.G. · Feb 17, 2010

The point, however, is (and i'll keep it short) that you intervened (and how could you not?).
You put yourself between the scene and the final image.
Not "genuine".

PKM-25 · Feb 17, 2010

Q.G. said:
The point, however, is (and i'll keep it short) that you intervened (and how could you not?).
You put yourself between the scene and the final image.
Not "genuine".

Yeah, I'm not buying that at all. That would mean forensics images are not genuine which is wrong. That would mean my images are not genuine, which is again, wrong.

Got any work we can see? I see a lot of talk by you on here...but no photography.

Ray Rogers · Feb 17, 2010

PKM-25 said:
The use of it is nothing special, nothing unique, nothing artistic.

This is pretty much the way artists felt when photography first began to breathe. They felt threatened. Despite the fact that some had already long embraced certain drawing aids, the fear of a loss of "distinction" between their hard earned skills and the rather skill-less pushing of a button was a real issue for them, just as it is for some of us today.

What goes around comes around.

The core premise that photography requires less skill than traditional art, or, similarily that digital photography requires less skill than traditional photography... remains unresolved.

As long as we feel that it is easier to push or click the right button than it is to draw a good solid line, we will continue to think that the artist bzw. traditional analog photographer has attained a more advanced set of "skills".

While to the casual observer there may be no difference in the finished product, there is a huge difference to those whose skills appear to be suffering a "devaluation" in the eyes of society.

When Kodak helped the clueless Joe become the instant artist ("You push the button, we do the rest.") they lowered the skill set needed at the time to produce pictures.

The digital revolution continues this devaluation...

Just in front of us is a door...

"You unlock this door with the key of imagination.

Beyond it is another dimension
A dimension of sound
A dimension of sight
A dimension of mind
You’re moving into a land of both shadow and substance.
Of things and ideas-
You’ve just crossed over into… The Twilight Zone"

Consider the "replicator" on Star Trek... just speak the name of any food or drink you want and there it is... is the person who says the name of a favorite food or drink as talented as the person who cooks or brews from scratch? Whose set of skills is larger?

Isn't the answer obvious?

PKM-25 · Feb 17, 2010

Still not buying it, computers are changing everything right now, the level of change is unprecedented in human history. Just by sheer numbers, the amount of computer art is staggering....it's nothing special to me, and I have been a pioneer of the computer's use in photography for nearly two decades.

Life's short, I am over it, want as little to do with it as possible. And just so no one thinks I spend a lot of time on a computer, between my last post and this one, I shot a roll of Kodachrome and some black and white film on a magazine assignment, time to soup it.

JBrunner · Feb 17, 2010

Lets try to keep this centered on the discussion, and avoid descending into a strictly d vs. a debate that is to my thinking only peripheral.

markbarendt · Feb 17, 2010

Rolleigraf said:
I do not see myself as an artist or as a storyteller, by the way, I see myself as a photographer.

You have totally confused me here. Don't get me wrong, I enjoy the technical bits of photography too but if you aren't creating art or telling a story in the end, what's the point?

Following this thought a bit further;

Rolleigraf said:
Edit: Our label was not created to be a sales argument.

If your label isn't for honest storytelling (news, history, portraits, snaps of family)...

If your label isn't for honest art (something pretty for the wall)...

If your label isn't for marketing (you aren't trying to make a buck)...

And if your label isn't for news...

What's the point in your label?

removed account4 · Feb 17, 2010

well, i am glad that you have created a label for your work.
i won't be using any labels for my work ... even though my work fits most of your criteria.

i don't really need an agency to stand behind me to
suggest that my work is genuine, or unphotoshopped or authentic.
i know what i do and i am able to educate the people who are interested in it
( as i have the last 25 years ).

my questions regarding outdated film that has shifted massively so it renders the real world in unreal tones was never answered.
i imagine it would not have "passed" your criteria to be genuine, even though
it was shot with film, souped in chemistry and printed uncropped without the aid of a computer

... oh well ...

john

Ray Rogers · Feb 17, 2010

JBrunner said:
Lets try to keep this centered on the discussion, and avoid descending into a strictly d vs. a debate that is to my thinking only peripheral.

True, that debate is peripheral because the same thing can be done by analog means... Jerry Ulesmann (sorry if I missed the spelling) has already been given as an example, but there are many many more appropriate examples as well.

I take it that the group wish to include both a & d works under their label if they do not misrepresent the "found" scene... beyond a point where the representation represents an essentially different original scene.

Is this correct?

Ulrich Drolshagen · Feb 17, 2010

Ray Rogers said:
I take it that the group wish to include both a & d works under their label if they do not misrepresent the "found" scene... beyond a point where the representation represents an essentially different original scene.

Is this correct?

If I understood your wording right here, this is indeed correct.

Ulrich

Rolleiflexible · Feb 18, 2010

Rolleigraf said:
But of course, "Genuine Photograph" works better - why? Because there somehow DOES exist fake photography now, if you are asking me. A digitally rendered image is a fake photograph, It is not a "light painting."

After so much dancing, isn't this the heart of the matter? FWIW, this strikes me as an awfully biased and capricious judgment.

If you run into this much resistance to your idea in APUG, what can you possibly hope to achieve in the larger photographic community? Did pencilmakers fight so hard against typewriters?

Label for Genuine Photographs

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