Scanning ethics ????

[jeffreyg]

Just adding my thoughts on the general topic:
Aren't we really image makers using the medium of photography? The true original is the negative or transparency. We make a print to share our vision with others and the the method which can vary should not be misrepresented. Ansel Adams used the technology that was available at the time and manipulated as he saw fit to produce a print of the highest quality. He also had assistants who printed for him under his supervision and to his standards as did other iconic photographers who perhaps never really printed their own negatives. I suspect that if he was alive today, he would dabble with digital. Both Adams and E. Weston even used color film and Adams didn't only use large format.
So it's fine to discuss "purity" but I feel it is the end product that counts.

http://www.jeffreyglasser.com/

 

[MattKing]

The ethics questions only arise:
1) if one employs the digital manipulation techniques available and then misrepresent the result; or
2) only in the context of uploads to APUG, one employs digital manipulation techniques that are outside of the more restrictive requirements of APUG.

The phrase I like to use is that one is only permitted to use those digital tools that emulate the tools that one is required to use when one prints in the darkroom (e.g. crop, adjust density, adjust contrast and, for colour materials, adjust colour balance).

I'll forgive a little bit of dodging and burning.

And as for dust removal - I'm a an analogue heretic - the clone tool is wonderful!

 

[removed account4]

last i heard and read ( even in this thread )
is does not go against " code " to scan or post
negative scans in color or b/w for inversion
minimal PS and display in the gallery ..

 

[anon12345]

I really don't mind that photographers scan their "finished works" (prints or chromes, etc) and present them as digital images for viewing and comments. But, I do take issue with the scanning of negatives and the digital manipulation that goes into creating an image that supposedly represents a photograph that doesn't exist. This is actually the only reason I don't look in the gallery here, because at one point I counted over 50% of the images that I was viewing were digital manipulations created from negative scans. And of course, I too have participated in the "negative scan trap". It's just too easy not to do it. I think that it would be in the best interest of any traditional photography online gallery to only allow digital images of "finished works". Especially a gallery that prides itself in being "mostly traditional".

Imagine an online gallery for oil paintings. Half the images in the gallery are of "completed" oil paintings. The other half were made from taking digital photographs of the preliminary drawings on canvas, followed by filling in the drawings with color using a computer graphics program. That might sound a bit silly, but that's generally how I view the gallery here.

 

[Ian David]

That might sound a bit silly, but that's generally how I view the gallery here.

Yeah, that does sound a bit silly. Whatever people upload to the gallery, you have to take their word for it being an essentially analog product. There is no way around that, because the APUG Police don't have the resources to visit members' homes and make sure that nobody is using Unauthorised Technology.

The APUG gallery is a forum for people to display what they are doing with analog photography. What they upload might be for the purpose of showing compositional ideas, process experimentation, finished products, or anything in between. Sometimes what they post is purely to show where they went on the weekend, which they captured on film.

Clearly, not everyone treats the APUG gallery as some kind of showroom for finished fine art products, so why insist on viewing it that way?

Ian

 

[stradibarrius]

I thought this would be a simple question with only a few responses!!!

 

[FiatluX]

So I shoot a negative, process it and end up with a perfect silver print just as I´ve envisioned it.. Then I want to show it in here and I scan it..
It then comes out of the scanner a bit well dullish crap scannerish like so I correct it to represent the original positive print as close as possible using levels, sharpening, dodge/burn and what not..

Does that make this particular image and process unethically digital?

 

[stradibarrius]

I think the answer is no. This is acceptable. The general consensus seems to be as long as you do not "create" in the computer what is not in the negative or the print.

 

[Q.G.]

So I shoot a negative, process it and end up with a perfect silver print just as I´ve envisioned it.. Then I want to show it in here and I scan it..
It then comes out of the scanner a bit well dullish crap scannerish like so I correct it to represent the original positive print as close as possible using levels, sharpening, dodge/burn and what not..

Does that make this particular image and process unethically digital?

No, it does not.
If so, i'd say showing anything at all on a computer screen is.

It doesn't become unethical either when you don't scan the print (flatbeds can only scan up to a limited, small size). but the negative itself.

 

[alexmacphee]

I would do as much as is required to produce a pleasing picture with the effect that it would have had I done it on paper. Sharpening is a feature that is often required in some measure as a result of the scanning process. It is not un-natural in the context, and is in any case the digital implementation of the well established unsharp mask process that has been employed in silver printing at the enlarger for three quarters of a century. Whilst understanding the rationale of the original question, one should be cautious of being a tad too moralistic here in how it's addressed.

 

[FiatluX]

one should be cautious of being a tad too moralistic here in how it's addressed.

Exactly my point!

 

[Vaughn]

Interesting that we are discussing how we arrive at the digital image that we post on an analog users' site -- just tickles me in a way!

We make the reproductions in order to share what we do, as accurately and as true as we can. Basically saying, "This is what the print/finished image looks like, or will look like when I print it." So it matters not to me how one created the reproduction -- rephotographed print or PS neg scan. Personally, I like to include how I reproduced the image in the post, such as "From a scanned 4x10 carbon print".

I just want to see what others are doing, to not have proof of what they are doing -- so I am fine with any way to faithfully reproduce our analog work for the computer screen.

Vaughn

 

[Ian David]

I just want to see what others are doing, to not have proof of what they are doing -- so I am fine with any way to faithfully reproduce our analog work for the computer screen.

Well said, Vaughn

 

[IloveTLRs]

I just straight-scan - that is, I pop the negs in and scan them. I don't have the patience to fool around with profiles, etc.

I use PS mostly to remove dust - the healing brush and clone brush are a God-send! Also I sometimes use Levels to adjust for large exposure mistakes (working without a meter 95% of the time) crop out borders when doing half-frame, or straightening photos from, for example, box cameras.

Other than that, I find adjustments unnecessary - such is the beauty of film

 

[anon12345]

. . . Clearly, not everyone treats the APUG gallery as some kind of showroom for finished fine art products, so why insist on viewing it that way?

Ian

Did I say that? :confused: Finished fine art products?

I meant to say "finished works". Meaning: Photographic prints or works that exist in the form represented by the digital image in the gallery. And to make my concern clearer: If the image in the gallery is a digital fabrication, does it really belong there?

 

[MaximusM3]

Did I say that? :confused: Finished fine art products?

If the image in the gallery is a digital fabrication, does it really belong there?

Well, then we wouldn't have a gallery at all because even the scan of a wet print is a digital representation/fabrication of the actual print which, by the way, could also be a crappy print that has been digitally corrected (you know, dodging, burning, curves, etc). It is unfair and unsafe to assume that every wet print being scanned and presented is unadulterated, while a negative is automatically seen as dubious. I could make the same adjustments to a scanned silver gelatin print and a negative. Once you have a digital file, there is no difference, as you are just editing pixels.

 

[Brandon D.]

When I scan a negative to post on the web, how much manipulation do you feel is ethical?

Ethical? I don't think it's a matter of ethics.

Anyone in your audience who cares about "ethics" should already be aware that whatever they see on a computer monitor is nothing more than a compressed, digital representation of the analogue version anyway. I mean, a wet print and a digital copy exist in two entirely different mediums altogether. And, each medium has its respective strengths and limitations. You can make the two version "appear" similar, but they will never "actually" be the same in spite of how similar they look. Who could you really be "fooling" anyway? Anyone who is highly familiar with photographic techniques will normally know if you've heavily manipulated a photo.

Spark notes: Apples will never be oranges, even though they're similar. So, don't sweat this.

When I shoot digital it is a different situation but when I shoot film I want the process to be analogue. But as we all know to share our film photography on line we have to scan a negative or a print.

As it has been said, simply do the best you can to make it look as close to the final [wet] print as possible. Since very few people I know of do straight wet prints of their negatives (i.e., without any post production whatsoever), it would make sense to make some enhancements to the scan just as you normally would with film under an enlarger.

Some "sharpening" seems to be necessary maybe some contrast???
What are your thoughts. Please accept this question in the spirit it is being asked.
When I post here I want to show my analogue skills and not my PhotoShop skills.

Sharpen if you want, but personally, I never find any sharpening "necessary" (not even when I'm using a DSLR either). I have full confidence in the native sharpness of all of my lenses and in my film scanner. And, IMHO, the more sharpening I see, the more "digital" it looks to me. I think Henry Cartier Bresson was on to something when he said, "Sharpness is a bourgeois concept."

 

[Jim Jones]

Some purists even include the rebate area of the negative in the print to show that their vision is so pure that no cropping is necessary. That is fine if photography is a performing art. However, if the ultimate goal is the best possible print, any manipulation and any printing method to achieve that should be permitted. In a forum like APUG, the restrictions others have cited above are appropriate.

 

[ic-racer]

I guess you have a valid point and one which brings me to again re-evaluate the notion that anyone who does not have the resources, time, space, to establish a traditional darkroom workflow, should just stop shooting film, hang it up and call it a day...or go digital. Am I correct? .

No, keep shooting film, there is a spin-off forum for that hybrid stuff. (Hybrid photo...)

 

[Sirius Glass]

I guess you have a valid point and one which brings me to again re-evaluate the notion that anyone who does not have the resources, time, space, to establish a traditional darkroom workflow, should just stop shooting film, hang it up and call it a day...or go digital. Am I correct?

No. I started developing the film and then scanning and printing with an ink jet.

I did not like the costs, constant replacement of ink and the results were not that impressive. I looked at other printers. For me the break point was that I could buy an enlarger, lenses and a drum drier for less than another photo printer. But the real break point was not money but room. I had the space to dedicate a room to become a darkroom. That is the real expense of darkroom work.

Steve

 

[fotch]

No. I started developing the film and then scanning and printing with an ink jet.

I did not like the costs, constant replacement of ink and the results were not that impressive. I looked at other printers. For me the break point was that I could buy an enlarger, lenses and a drum drier for less than another photo printer. But the real break point was not money but room. I had the space to dedicate a room to become a darkroom. That is the real expense of darkroom work.

Steve

In areas with basements, it us usually free space, more or less.

 

[Sirius Glass]

In areas with basements, it us usually free space, more or less.

But basements are rare in condo; there they are mostly deleted!

 

[MattKing]

But basements are rare in condo; there they are mostly deleted!

And even rarer in places that are at or below sea level, behind dykes!

 

[fotch]

And even rarer in places that are at or below sea level, behind dykes!

YIKES! :w00t:

 

[Erik Petersson]

The cost of a dark room in my area is at least 52,000 krona/square meter. For those abroad, that translates to for example 5,600 Euro or 7,000 USD/square meter. I am sure that wet printing is fun and rewarding, but I can't afford it. So I can't show you my pictures.