Lets Try....

[David H. Bebbington]

Two points:
1) As I have said many times before, Photoshop makes NOTHING repeat NOTHING possible which has not been possible since photography was invented 170 years ago. It simply makes things easier.

2) The generation of photographers concerned has now passed into history, but I can remember the older pictorial guys who would as a matter of course print clouds into their landscapes from other negatives or, if they fancied their skills, would paint clouds directly onto negatives using a dilute red masking medium called photopaque and even add other features. It was not usual for the photographers in question to draw attention to this explicity (or to deny it). Was this dishonest too? (I readily recognize there is a much stronger intent to deceive in the train/animals picture).

 

[bdial]

If those photos with painted clouds, etc. were presented as depicting reality, I think it's proper to call that dishonest, otherwise no. I guess the cructial difference is whether the image is meant to document a situtation, or to present the photographer's interpretation.

It was also common then, and now to retouch wrinkles and blemishes in portraits, for the most part, I don't think anyone calls that dishonest, though it's certainly over-done sometimes.

Certainly, all work, documentary or not is colored by the photographer's, writers's, artist's interpretation though, so the difference can be a very fine line.

 

[JBrunner]

Two points:
1) As I have said many times before, Photoshop makes NOTHING repeat NOTHING possible which has not been possible since photography was invented 170 years ago. It simply makes things easier.

2) The generation of photographers concerned has now passed into history, but I can remember the older pictorial guys who would as a matter of course print clouds into their landscapes from other negatives or, if they fancied their skills, would paint clouds directly onto negatives using a dilute red masking medium called photopaque and even add other features. It was not usual for the photographers in question to draw attention to this explicity (or to deny it). Was this dishonest too? (I readily recognize there is a much
stronger intent to deceive in the train/animals picture).

If altered pictures are presented as journalistic documentation, then it is the worst kind of deceit. The context that photographs are presented under is the crux. I can sit down at a photowanker workstation and produce almost any "reality" I want. Presenting the product to the world as truth is a different story.

If you are an artist or doing things for fun, have at it .Technology has nothing to do with it, except that modern tech makes it easier.