Art Photography vs Press Photography

1.       The main differences and similarities between art and press photography;

Press photography or photojournalism is taking pictures essentially to record and convey news or events; while, art photography strives to transfer the artist’s emotions and feelings to the audience rather than news. Moreover, taking an artistic photo needs an artistic vision and creativity. Also press photography is normally taken as an evidence or support for the specific news.

Additionally, according to National Press Photographs Association (NPPA) there are rules that must be followed by photojournalists (NPPA); whereas, art photographers do not follow those rules.

However, as the nature of the two genres of photography is about taking photos, there are sharing many commonalities. They both capturing a moment using the same tool which is camera. Furthermore, both of them convey and tell a story to the audience: one portrays news, and the other tells story about the artist’s emotions and feelings, or pictures people’s lifestyles. Yet, I believe despite all the differences that art and press photography might have, a press photography also needs to be artistic to be the most effective.

2.       Is it ethical and acceptable to alter art photographs? Why? Why not?

Yes, post-processing techniques and manipulating photos in order to beautify and add more to them have been used by photographers long before the invention of Photoshop and the digital era, in fact, it existed since photography was born (The Metropolitan Museum of Art, 2012); hence, it is not something new. Therefore, in my opinion, art photographs can be still altered as much as the artist would like to do so. However, photographers should be honest and let audience know about the changes they have made on photos to avoid misleading the audience. For example, nowadays, there are many software and applications that can be used to alter a photo to the point that it does not look like a photo but something else such as painting, and some may take advantage of this and introduce themselves as a painter other than a photographer.

    

3.       Is it ethical and acceptable to alter press photographs? Why? Why not?

I believe when a photo is reporting an event which later will be on the news and media, should not be altered because the artist might change the photo in favor of a group or party, or alter the photo in a way that it shows what he or she wants to be seen and not the pure truth. However, moderate editing should be allowed as long as it does not change the message that needs to be delivered. The editing must be limited to color, brightness, contrast, etc. to improve the quality of the picture

                                                                          PRESS

                                          Toronto, Santa Clause Day 2010

                                          Toronto, Ice Festival 2013

                                                                             ART

References:

"First Major Exhibition Devoted to History of Manipulated Photography Before Digital Age Opens at Metropolitan Museum October 11 October 11, 2012-January 27, 2013." The Metropolitan Museum of Art, 14 Aug. 2012. Web. 6 Nov. 2015.

"NPPA Code of Ethics." NPPA Code of Ethics. NPPA. Web. 2 Nov. 2015

Photography and ethic: You as a photographer who edited/altered images

The first photo is taken in a farm located in the north of Iran with one of the very first Canon digital cameras around ten years ago; the quality of the camera was 3.2 mega pixels. When I saw the cow, I thought she had posed for a photo. However, back then I did not know much about Photoshop and never thought to edit any photos including this one. When I got more familiar with Photoshop, I decided to learn how to transform a photo into painting because I always wanted to paint; the expensive material and the fact that paining needs space stopped me from further pursuing. I started reading about it and watched many tutorial videos, and finally I got a bit information how to do so. The first thing I did in this photo was to mix the background color using Photoshop’s brushes and adding some colors of my favorite such as purple and yellow. After I was satisfied with the background, I started working on the cow itself. I again used the brushes to mix the colors and added some touches of green to harmonize the cow with its colorful background. At the end, I took advantage of one of the Photoshop’s exceptional tools, layers. I added a dark layer with a minimum visibility to my work to darken it a bit since it had become too bright.

The second photo is taken in Punta Cana beach with Nikon Coolpix digital camera almost five years ago. What made me to capture that moment was the loneliness of those chairs. To make it even lonelier, I got rid of the people swimming, when I was editing the photo. To edit this photo, I only used Corel Painter, which is a great tool for those who love to paint; it gives you a lot of brushes that are capable of moving on your canvas just like a real brush. In this one, again, I mixed the colors by one of the brushes and removed unwanted subjects out of it. Then, I added a layer that had a greenish fabric texture with medium visibility and made the photo a bit greener than the original one.

I Believe that these images can certainly confuse the audience since they more look like paintings than photos. Especially, the image of the cow is very different from the original one, and can simply mislead the audience and make them think that it is a painting and not a photo. However, I do not think that it is unethical to edit photos and transform them to paintings or other arts as long as we are not hiding the fact that they are reproduced from a photo.

Below are some of my other work samples using pretty much the same techniques. 

A Splash of World

Below photo was taken 2 or 3 weeks ago on a hot day after a quick shower. 

Wiarton, Ontario - July 2013

I took this photo in Wiarton; the most beautiful sunset that I have ever seen. I hope you like it. 

The Very First Post

Hi everyone, My name is Saeed, and I am a student in business administration, marketing major in George Brown College graduating in December 2015. Photography is my greatest passion after soccer, and I normally take many photos during a week especially when I need to free my mind of some unnecessary thoughts. In this weblog, I will share some of those photographs with you, and I hope you will like them.