The ethics of digital to B&W conversion

[Sonnar Brian]

I've got a Pop Photo article from the 70s on printing Color Negatives to Black and White paper. I used to do that myself in the 70s. It comes out a bit contrasty.

The modern twist is the chromogenic C41 process film. Monochrome negatives run though a color process, printed onto color paper.

A monochrome Digital camera will produce higher-resolution, and will not have color-aliasing as occurs with mosaic filters. But it is certainly a technical difference, not an ethical difference.

 

[polaski]

Ansel Adams was a master of photographic manipulation. He even told everyone else how to do it. He pushed photo technology of his day to its limits..

 

[kipkeston]

Interesting to learn this. I didn't know a digital photo could become a fine art print.

 

[BillP]

Interesting to learn this. I didn't know a digital photo could become a fine art print.

Why should it not?

Regards,

Bill

 

[peterc]

Interesting to learn this. I didn't know a digital photo could become a fine art print.

Check out Pete Myers' work. He has used both digital and film for B&W.

 

[tripod]

I remember a time when museums and art galleries would only accept colour photographic prints if they were made by dye transfer or Cibachrome since they were concerned with archival-ness.

 

[Spider67]

The Art world will also or already is creating a sve haven for BW-photographzy thanks to the fact that "traditional" prints heve become something "crafty" in their eyes (thanks to the fact that BW prints exist for more than 100 years) when compared to othe prints which are "only" made by using computers (thus forgetting the abilities of the person who does the work)
Unethical?
It would be so if you sell something to a museum or a buyer stating it to be a limited fien art print whereas you curb it out by the dozen. Happened to an american guy who bought two Bugattis in Germany that happened to be extremely well made Argentinian replicas

 

[BigSteveG]

If the digital photos were being sold as "fine art" they should be less expensive than traditional prints. There is a time consuming craft to creating an individual silver based print and that calls for a premium. Digital, while also requiring manipulation can be identically re-produced en masse once the changes are made. Other than that, it really doesn't matter as long as the photographer is honest about the photos' creation.

 

[amateriat]

Galleries don't care how images are produced. They don't care whether it is digital or film, color converted to black and white, selenium toned or toned with coffee. What an odd thread.

But they might care about how the print was made, depending on who you're dealing with: there are various ways to spray ink on paper, and in some circles (at least up until relatively recently) any of these forms was looked upon with a bit of suspicion, mainly on account of issues surrounding print longevity. Some galleries will be extremely interested in knowing what materials were used in making the print, dye versus pigment vs. carbon, clay-based surface versus swellable polymer, and so on.

So far as how the image itself was made? Outside of basic curiosity, why should it matter?


- Barrett

 

[Bill Pierce]

Most curators will be concerned if they think an inkjet print will be prone to early fading (and some of them are). But the photographic curator of one of the most important museums in the world has said he would accept black-and-white pigment inkjets that have been treated with a protective spray.

Bill

 

[kipkeston]

Why should it not?

Regards,

Bill

I'm not saying it should not be, It's just that it never occurred to me. I just assumed fine art print meant individually hand made. But I see that's no longer the case. If museums are cool with it, then I guess I am too.

 

[Nh3]

You guys are not making it easy for me.

In traditional dark room the photographer spend a lot of time until he finally got what he wanted. in Photoshop it takes seconds and everything is automated. How can these two methods be compared or made relative is beyond me.


I posted this thread because I have a lot of my digital shots turned into b&w and I was feeling sort of guilty about it... But judging from this thread it seems an overwhelming majority of those who responded have no problem with doing the same thing.

But I should mention that I'm still not totally convinced and I need to explore this issue a bit further... I just feel that digital images turned into b&w don't have the same "artistic integrity" as a shot made with b&w film...

 

[peterc]

I just feel that digital images turned into b&w don't have the same "artistic integrity" as a shot made with b&w film...

Isn't the "art" in the composition of the subject and the interpretation of the negative?
Whether you use a P&S digicam or an 8x10 view camera to get the "negative" shouldn't really make a difference.
And it can take as long in PS as it does in a wet darkroom to get just the right print.

 

[Nh3]

Isn't the "art" in the composition of the subject and the interpretation of the negative?
Whether you use a P&S digicam or an 8x10 view camera to get the "negative" shouldn't really make a difference.
And it can take as long in PS as it does in a wet darkroom to get just the right print.

... But photography is a craft before it can be considered an art. A photographer should know what his doing and he should know how to control his pictures. Just shooting and leaving the hard work for photoshop is not photography but digital imaging.

We live in a lazy age where everything is expected to be easy, but if its easy then its not art or craft.

 

[peterc]

Just shooting and leaving the hard work for photoshop is not photography but digital imaging.

I'd have to disagree here. If we're talking art, and your skill (or craft) is in Photoshop, what is wrong with doing the heavy lifting in PS? The "artist" might start with an imperfect photograph and bring it all together in PS.
This is no different than the photographer who takes a couple of shots of a scene at different exposures to preserve highlight and shadow detail and combines them in the darkroom to make a perfectly exposed print.

 

[craygc]

I've spent years learning to use Photoshop and editing photos with it still takes longer than "seconds." There is a lot of difference between using Auto Levels on an image and spending hours at times carefully burning, dodging, color correcting, sharpening and toning an image in Photoshop.

Absolutely...

...the real benefits of digital editing are the degree and accuracy of control, in conjunction with the decoupling of those control processes from their traditional time constraints (which includes being able to reverse actions).

 

[peterm1]

Unless you were entering a competition (say) in which you were asked to use only film, why on earth would there be any ethical issue? What matters is the end result of the creative process (apart, that is from any pleasure that the photogrpaher might derive from the process of making the image itself.) All that digital does is give the photographer more creative control over the final outcome.

 

[kuzano]

A slightly different answer... Maybe

A slightly different answer... Maybe

Art is not about the work it takes to make it, nor is it about the medium in which it is presented. It is about having the courage to present an item as art and letting the public eye determine both it's collectability and value.

The same is true of marketing any item in the arts markets. By my estimation, some truly horrible work is deemed desirable and collectable by the public, while other very worthy work languishes in the closets of the people who created it, because of the lack of courage to present it to the world, or a sense of privacy of some sort.

As far as ethical questions raised by curators... wrong people to make ethical decisions. Ethics is way down on the list of duties on a museum creators job description. First comes decisions about how the work will enhance the image of the museum in terms of collectable work and increases in value.

If you are attempting to imply that digital capture and digital imaging is any more perverted or incorrect than cave art and petroglyphs, you are waging an uphill battle and missing out on a lot of image and photo capture time.

 

[DaveSee]

Here is a scenario:

A photographer using a DSLR shoots RAW, processes the files in photoshop CS3. He makes large prints of his work and goes to a museum curator.

How would the curator respond?

Reject the work outright because of digital manipulation or consider it as he would any other images taken with B&W film?


I basically wish to discuss the ethics of conversion to B&W and digital manipulation and I would like those who're concerned to delve deep into this and lets see if we can come to an equilibrium. I also would like to emphasize that please don't compare digital post processing with darkroom manipulation because in darkroom you could not turn a color negative into a b&w one.

thanks,

If the viewer, "museum curator" or your uncle saw a bad picture, likely not the fault of image processing... oh, and this is not to say a well crafted "wet" print makes a better picture.

Process is amoral, like house pets: its what you do to get the meal. If this curator later finds you've taken change from coffee-bar tip jars to finance your work, well, if it draws interest to your work...

Speaking of which... isn't work displayed in coffee-bars more likely seen than in museums these days? If so, I'd tip well... you've already paid for the software 😉

rgds,
Dave

 

[tripod]

Cibachrome is a positive to positive process. You make the print directly from a positive transparency. (slide) I still have several prints that I made, oh, 30 years ago. A great guy, Ted Zuber, was my instructor for that college course. Permanent diazo dyes IIRC.