Photographer or "Image Maker".....Which are you?

IMO, digital imaging and output is far enough removed from photography to deserve a distinctive designation. Traditional photography, in its many forms is based on photons and usually enlargers or contact printing. Digital capture and digital printing is based on electrons and computer hardware and software.

I'm not saying one is better than the other, just that they are different and deserve to be recognized and named so.

(Of course there is a hybrid work flow as well.)
 
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Micky D said:
FrankS,

What do you call a guy who makes "digital captures"?
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Probably a "pro". 🙂

Seriously, a photographer can use film or digital. It's the process and the output that needs to be differentiated. Certainly the workflow in traditional photography with wet printing is completely different from digital capture and digital post processing. Additionally, the outputs are different media.
 
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FrankS said:
IMO, digital imaging and output is far enough removed from photography to deserve a distinctive designation. Traditional photography, in its many forms is based on photons and usually enlargers or contact printing. Digital capture and digital printing is based on electrons and computer hardware and software.

I'm not saying one is better than the other, just that they are different and deserve to be recognized and named so.

(Of course there is a hybrid work flow as well.)
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I still see more similarities than differences, but certainly the process is different. I saw the graphic prepress industry change almost over night. A room full of light tables and 30+ year veterans (called strippers back then—not that kind of stripper!), ruby lith tape, exposure frames, etc. all that became a room with a handful of Macs doing basically the same thing without all the analog hardware. Those old guys learned Mac and layout skills, but they're not called strippers anymore. Maybe you're on to something (?).


/
 
FrankS said:
Digital capture and digital printing is based on electrons and computer hardware and software.
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I challenge you to print something with electrons and computer hardware and software. I also challenge you to use an enlarger without the benefit of electrons.

And knowing how touchy people are about their particular baseball teams, this is not an "attack". I'm posing a question and an invitation not to dismiss something that one is not familiar with just because one is not familiar with it but merely acquainted. 🙂 🙂 🙂
 
Gabriel M.A. said:
I challenge you to print something with electrons and computer hardware and software. I also challenge you to use an enlarger without the benefit of electrons.

And knowing how touchy people are about their particular baseball teams, this is not an "attack". I'm posing a question and an invitation not to dismiss something that one is not familiar with just because one is not familiar with it but merely acquainted. 🙂 🙂 🙂
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I did say "mainly about" photons and electrons, not totally with or without.
 
Gabriel M.A. said:
By your definition of "image maker", I guess I am.

My definition of "image maker" is that of someone who makes an image (i.e. photo montages, computer-generated imagery, etc)

I would say that the "image maker" you propose is really a "Photographer". A person who only takes a photo and doesn't care about the end-product (i.e. does not care about post-processing) is merely an Enthusiast.
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Not necessarily, (I am an enthusiast at the moment, student of photography) but I love my photos have as little done to them after the shot is taken as possible (not including dev of course!), i love the natural look of my photos and im sure other more skilled photographers like me are not just enthusiasts! (not that theres much wrong with that)


just that I don't like assumptions
 
Leighgion said:
I prefer to think of myself as a cow.

Seriously though, I find this kind of definition wrangling to be splitting hairs. It's great that you've become open to the possibilities of digital processing, but I don't see that this calls for any rotation of labels. Ansel Adams was a darkroom wizard in addition to being a dedicated field man that marched 8x10 view cameras into the wilds to get his shots. Cartier-Bresson said he had no interest in the photographic process, and left film development and print entirely up to others. They were both photographers. "Photographer," is not some kind of precision designation.

My interest in post-processing has waxed and waned in cycles, but that's just me changing. Photography is still called photography to me, regardless if I use jpegs fresh out of the camera's processor, or if I spend an evening massaging a RAW file to get it just right.
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I agree

+1
 
I am a photographer. I draw with light. I make images.

If i just "took" images, and didn't worry about it too much, I don't think that would qualify me for the title of photographer. Snapshooter maybe. But a photographer, in my mind, is an image maker... not one or the other.
 
Unfortunately, the post-processors have given us so many examples of kitsch and cheap manipulations that i disdain the hoopla PS has generated. Painting (with oil, acrylic, canvas) is still progressing in this day and age, while PS is generally regressing us into cave visualizations: simple, ugly, obnoxious, ... A bit of contrast and white balance adjustment with sharpening to make up for the limits of 20 MBs is all that can enhance any photographic capture.

So, take out the shadows and light poles, make the sky blue until you are blue: the picture will not become better than the real thing out there, as photographed at first in its true light and glory, should the pic have been worth taking, of course.

Who can improve on nature? Sci-fi stuff results if we do, pictures from Mars, maybe, so unrealistic, poooh.

Just improve our/your vision before taking a shot, not after the fact.

One fotog's opinion, no less ...
 
I think what the OP is realizing is a turning point in his personal voyage with photography, and that's exciting! I think we all are hoping for the best when we first begin to shoot, and our knowledge of post proceesing is limited to what we need to do to get a basic print. I learning processing, I've heard a lot of beginners say they hope their film "turns out all right," which connotates a lack of confidence and control in what they're doing. We all do that for a long time when starting, and then progressively as one gets more comfortable with shooting, one begins to assimilate other post processing skills that facilitate doing something more with your images, and once those tools are in one's bag, the vision widens and "seeing" differently is possible.

Whether it is chemical or digital makes no difference - post processing is a crucial step in the final realization of the image. Even "straight" images are not literal records of the World, nor should they be. They are photographs, and a big part of them coming into being is the whole big thing that happens after you have your negs or raw files or whatever, "on the table," and you go from there.
 
ryank said:
Not necessarily, (I am an enthusiast at the moment, student of photography) but I love my photos have as little done to them after the shot is taken as possible (not including dev of course!), i love the natural look of my photos and im sure other more skilled photographers like me are not just enthusiasts! (not that theres much wrong with that)


just that I don't like assumptions
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I think you're assuming that "not caring about" means "not wanting to" are the same in my sentence.
 
I started down this path as a photographer. I'm still a photographer.

Some of the tools have changed (when have they not changed?): even though I shoot the majority of stuff on film, it all gets digitally scanned and printed. I use Photoshop without any issue, but for me PS is essentially a transcription tool to get the most off that negative or slide. What others do with PS isn't of my concern: like any other tool, it can used well or badly (we've all seen enough of the latter). But I care enough to render some representation of what I saw, which admittedly means taking three-dimensional life into two-dimensional form, but no matter...I do what I can.

And, for me, it's photography.


- Barrett
 
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