Not allowed.

Jetty, Scotland 2006

In a vain attempt to produce some kind of American credibility, I recently became a member of a photo organization. How joining these makes you a credited professional is beyond me, but I thought I should at least be part of something photo based other than a gallery or agent.

As with most organizations there are yearly competitions, so naturally I had a look at the landscape category. Having been aware of the organization for some time I was surprised to read this;

“It is NOT allowed to add or move elements by cloning, healing, patching, content-aware fill, liquefy, or similar tools. No in-camera file stacking will be allowed. The originally captured image (in RAW or jpg) must be available if requested”

Although perfectly suited to one such as myself (as all I do is scan a negative and correct the color), looking at the past entries its pretty clear to me that every single image has one or more, if not all of the forbidden do-not. And therein lies the problem with the future of photography. Every photo lies, as does the photographer. Don’t get me wrong, I have no issue with any of this removal, cloning, whatever, and have on occasion done just that, albeit with digital files. But I also have no problem with admitting it either. But in the end, who really gives a stuff.

To make a point that it can be done, the image above was shot on a large format camera using film and hand printed (around 2006). The scan was made from the work print which was 8/10”. Nothing was added or taken away…. So there!