Week 4: Pictures

So, no more rolls of film, no more dark rooms, no more developing photos. Just shoot, click and upload. And then if you want...photoshop.
Christine Rosen, who is senior editor of The New Atlantis (a journal of technology and society) says:
           Photoshop has introduced a new fecklessness into our relationship with the image. We tend to lose respect for things we can manipulate. And when we can so readily manipulate images--even images of presidents or loved ones--we contribute to the decline of respect for what the image represents...
But manipulating photos goes way back, prior to the age of digitalisation. Back near the beginning of the 20th Century, Joseph Stalin used to manipulate his photos so that, if he was in a photo with someone he didn't like or someone who he had killed or had removed or even just for propaganda, they were just taken out of the shot. For example;

As simple as that. Now you see him, now you don't.

Susan Sontag, an American Essayist, vehemently protested against manipulated images in her 1977 book On Photograhy. She says; "photographs, which fiddle with the scale of the world, themselves get reduced, blown up, cropped, retouched, doctored and tricked out".

There are  many people that object to the use of photoshop as it falsifies the photo and in most cases people seem to have less respect for digital manipulated images than those that are 'real'.

There are many cases where photographers have manipulated the photos and caused much controversy. In 1982, National Geographic published a cover where the photo was manipulated to move two of the Egyptain pyramids closer together so that they would fit on the vertical cover. It sparked much debate about the appropriateness of photo manipulation in journalism.

National Press Photographers Association (NPPA) have set out a Code of Ethics that promote the accuracy of published images. It advertises that photographers "do not manipulate images [...] that can mislead viewers or misrepresent subjects."

Then there are the photos that alter body image and appearance, especially the photos in magazines, that are seen to contribute to self-esteem issues in men and women. 

They are creating these false body images of models and celebrities that are in no way achievable in reality. And people try to model themselves on these fake figures.

thechive.com/2012/03/20/one-tiny-hand-ill-leave-it-at-that-25-photos/ 

(It may take you a second, but she has one tiny hand!!)

But photoshop can be used for some great fun, like this picture in a series of Tiny hand pictures. Its hilarious!

So is photoshop an evil manipulation machine or just a tool to create some funny photos?