How can you tell a good image that hasnt been altered to a great image that has been photoshopped?

Question

Personally (if i can tell) i dont like photographs that are Photoshopped. Either you have it or you dont.

Answer 1

being a photgrapher I agree. photoshoping pics is lame. but it all depends on the pic. some use repepition some hide objects with other objects or completely cut out things.

it just depends on the pic but they are fairly easy to tell, most of the time.

Answer 2

It depends on the goal of the image in question.

If someone's using photoshop to accomplish something just because they don't want to or can't figure out how to do it without, then yeah, that's fairly lame.

But if the photoediting is enhancing an image beyond what is possible with camerawork, it's a different story. Stuff like that usually requires a lot of skill, and should not be dismissed merely because the artist took the untraditional route and did something digitally.

Answer 3

I have to agree.  

Not too many years ago we shot all our images using transparency film ... it had NO latitude, so your exposure had to be on the money ... and editors did not like it when you did not fill the tiny 35 mm frame with the subject ... cropping was a no, no.

Now days it seems that all the new camera operators think that the image is created by using the most expensive camera they can afford or the ones they saw a celebrity using, a so, so or even bad image and "saving" them using a photo program and ending up with "professional looking" images

.

Answer 4

You forced me to give Perki a thumbs up. She is 100% correct. There is your Best Answer!

Every element involved in creating a photograph manipulates the image. When you decide to take a shot and visualize what you want the finished image to be, you should have done so based on all the tools you have available. That has never changed, only the tools have changed.

I prefer to know and use the tools, and take my images from concept to public release using only my own personal abilities. That is the way I did it before digital and that is the way I do it now. The only exception is for commercial images that will fall under the control of an art director. In that case, I will relinquish some control with final approval. Maybe not as productive as just being a camera operator, but it has worked for me.

---edit---

Maybe you could explain how you would prefer a good image over a great image? That's rare.

Answer 5

In my opinion it really just depends. There are somethings you can do in photoshop that can also be done in a darkroom. It is really just a matter of processing the photo. I, personally think that photos that are good with no help are better but photoshop takes a different skill and is somewhat of  a different art than photography.

Answer 6

It depends on what you shoot.  I agree with Perki, there has always been photographic image manipulation.  Photoshop is simply the new age tool for doing what photographers have done for near a century.  I grow sick of "old skewl" photographers griping about how much they hate modern photography, digital cameras, and new fangled computer software when I wonder how many of them depend on digital manipulation to enhance their own work (that is, if they still work).  They've been complaining about "modern, uneducated photographers" since the 60's when the instamatic 110 cameras came out.  

Very few people get it right in the camera anymore.  Why would you?  That's what they put the LCD on the back of the camera for.  h**l, I went down to my local camera shop to pick up a few rolls of Ilford B&W film (I still shoot film for lack of anything better to do with my spare time) and got a lecture from a veteran photographer of 40 years on why I shouldn't be shooting film anymore and why he's no longer stocking it.  Then he asked me which version of photoshop I used.  Sure, a manipulated image can sometimes wreak of over-editing - but it's all relative.  You see it all the time in advertising, so it's not isolated to the digital manipulation era noobie photographer........and just in case you need another perspective - photoshop has been around for over 20 years.  So, this is nothing new.

Cry me a river.

Answer 7

Before Photoshop there was dark room manipulation. Saturation, contrast, dodging and burning,texture screens, toning, solarizing, etc. Ansel Adams was the king of dark room manipulation! In a PBS documentary on him before he died he said he thought photography was going "electronic". He also stated that he hoped his negatives would be available for people to manipulate in whatever new way came about. Now if Ansel Adams felt like that, how can anyone have an elitist attitude about photo editing?

I can agree you might be opposed to editing which is poorly or overdone in the hands of the general public, my bet is any image you see in a magazine has been edited, whether obvious to you or not.

Answer 8

As a portrait photographer, Photoshop is a necessity.  No one is going to purchase pictures of themselves with acne, excessive wrinkles, baggy eyes (sometimes brides with black eyes...don't ask), etc.  I agree that your exposures still have to be on the money.  However, when you shoot on location, you sometimes have to deal with what you get and fix it later.  

When it's done correctly, a good picture becomes a phenomenal, soul-moving piece of art.  You can't rely on post-production to "make" yourself a good photographer.  You've got to have "it" to begin with!    

Answer 9

I agree with you 100 percent.  The best pictures are ones that were taken right the first time, with the camera, and NO editing.  Too many people depend WAY too much on Photoshop and other editing programs.  They think that a computer can magically "fix" any lame, horrible picture and turn it into a good photograph.  It just doesn't work that way.

I'm tired of seeing all the lame pictures here and on MySpace and Flicker, etc that are horribly over-edited and manipulated, to the point that they don't even look real anymore.  That is NOT photography.

The key is to get the right lighting and get the right exposure with your camera.  Photography is all about creativity, skill, and experience...getting the right exposure, and knowing how to frame your subject and compose your picture in an interesting way.  If you really know what you're doing, then you do NOT need Photoshop.

It's okay to make some minor adjustments to improve a picture, like slightly adjusting contrast and color temperature, etc.  But most people completely overdo it and depend way too much on editing.

As for me...I use both digital and film cameras...but 90 percent film.  I don't even have Photoshop on my computer.  I don't need it.  I use completely manual film cameras and just use the "Sunny 16" rule.  I don't even need a light meter most of the time.  I've gotten to the point where I can usually judge the light for myself.  The only editing I do for most of my pictures is just crop them and resize them to upload them online.  I try not to edit my pictures, or I edit them as little as possible.

EDIT:  We all know the difference between "editing" or "adjusting" a picture slightly to improve it...and "photoshopping" a picture.  Yes, Adobe Photo Shop is a proper name for a specific image editing program, but "photoshopping" has become a catch phrase now.  To me, I think of a "photoshopped" picture as one where someone has taken a horrible, grainy, underexposed picture (usually a MySpace emo kid with a cheap point and shoot digital camera) and "photoshopped" it to death on their computer.  They change the color temperature and saturation to where everything looks orange, then they say "check out my kewl pic!  What do u think of my photography??"  Then you have the lame selective color thing...every single day on Yahoo answers, at least 3 or 4 times a day, someone will ask "how do you make a black and white picture with one thing in color?"  (Again, it is usually the MySpace kids).  That is SO completely overdone and it's a cliche now.  I'm sure anyone who is on Yahoo Answers regularly has to be sick of that question by now.  This is what I mean by over-editing a picture to the point that it doesn't even look real anymore.

If you really love photography, I just don't see how anyone could like a picture that has been changed orange.  Get a grip.  Do a random search on MySpace or Flicker and Photobucket and looked at the "photoshopped" pictures there.  People take quotes from Ansel Adams completely out of context.  He was a master landscape photographer.  He would shoot with large format cameras with the aperture at f-32, using a long exposure, just to get the absolute sharpest picture with the best depth of field possible.  He didn't take mediocre pictures and then edit them.  He knew how to use his cameras.  No, I don't think Ansel Adams would like the photoshopped pictures one bit.  In fact, I think he would be crying if he saw what has happened to photography.

So, yeah maybe Ansel Adams would be the one "crying a river."  

And apparently, it just depends on the time of day and who posts comments on a question.  Because with a very similar question to this that is open right now, about image editing, everyone had a completely different opinion than all the Photoshoppers here...that pictures should NOT be edited.