If you edit your photos to look good, do you consider it as cheating or enhancement?

Contests will generally specify if they allow alterations or not, so read the rules carefully.

Do you think it's cheating to do any post-production work on a musical recording? Do you agree with the people who say that George Martin was the sixth Beatle or do you agree with the people who say that Billy Preston deserved that title?

I think that the MOST IMPORTANT PART of photography is getting it right in the camera in the first place, but I quickly add that using Photoshop to fine-tune an image is not cheating.

If Photoshop existed when Ansel Adams was doing his "landmark" darkroom manipulations, you can bet he'd be the first in line to buy a copy.

In the olden days, when film purists were all that there were (no digital = film purist), there were probably more books sold about darkroom technique than photographic technique.

Did anyone ever wonder where those tools in Photoshop with weird names like "Burn" and "Dodge" got their names from in the first place? These are basic darkroom techniques that I learned before I was ten years old. EVERYONE DID IT. Everyone still does. It's just that some do it with Photoshop and some still do it in the darkroom.

Photoshop to fine tune an otherwise acceptable image is not cheating. Even the best of our photographer friends remark frequently that they create the images and then pay someone to do the post-processing in Photoshop.

Putting your head on Carmen Electra's body and then posting that on MySpace is cheating.

See this question and read the answers: http://answers.yahoo.com/question/index;_ylt=AipFh...

IMHO, digitally "enhancing" images is no more cheating than "pushing" a print, dodging or burning in a section or any other darkroom "trick" available.

Is cropping an image cheating? There are purists, out there, that would consider it so. They believe that every grain of the negative should appear on the print.

So, "cheating" on photographs is a relative term and subject to all kinds of interpretation. There have ALWAYS been contests staged where certain darkroom tricks were expressly forbidden, such as double exposures and such.

To me, any measures taken by the artist to acheive the desired result are completely and unchallengably acceptable. Retake the photo? What, restage the plane crash? Ask the monster wave to go back and "do over?" Have the batter hit that home run again? Bring in the $200 an hour model to sit for just one more shot because the exposure was just a bit short?

Not really sure. I don't think editing photos would be

considered cheating. Cheating whom?

Maybe in photo contests it would be cheating if the

contest rules specified no Photoshopping allowed or

something like that. However if no restrictions are

given then maybe they are looking for creativity and

anything goes.

Before digital photography photographers used little

tricks like etching to enhance their photos.

Personal preference I guess

If you're shooting digitally it's certainly not cheating to optimize an image in Photoshop - cropping, adjusting density, balancing color, probably some sharpening - I don't consider that to be "editing," simply because most people think of editing as enhancing colors, messing around with filters, distorting, etc.

In fact, if you don't optimize the basics you're simply denying yourself to optimal quality of your original capture.

Photography is a process. Always has been. How far you want to take the process is up to you.

Digital photography is always a two-step process: capture and optimization.

The ultimate objective is to create work that can be shared - either as a print or a digital file.

Not knowing how to use Photoshop is no excuse. Hell, here's my very basic tutorial on optimizing. No bells. No whistles. No cheating. And no enhancement. Just the few basic steps that will ensure that your digital file is the best it can be.

As a committed amateur photographer, but one limited in funding, I don't always have the right lens or other equipment to create the image I have in my minds eye purely in my camera. Photoshop helps me create the vision I originally had, and intended to create. I don't consider a little cropping, or a little exposure adjustment cheating. You're just bringing about the image you originally intended to create. Now if you're cutting, and pasting, and adding things to an image that weren't originally there, and failing to inform viewers that the image was thus manipulated, then yes, to me that is cheating. Most contests I've read the rules on seem to put up with a little cropping, or exposure adjustment as long as you document your adjustments. Some even have an unlimited category intended for highly manipulated images. Of course I study,and practice,and try to get as close to my intended image in camera. But some images, nature stuff,or action shots are impossible to retake,and some are taken in the rush of a passing moment. Those images are either washed through photoshop,(or whatever photo editing software you use) or simply lost. I think then that the line is between creating the image you intended, and outright fakery. I don't know every trick to photoshop either, but I study, and experiment, and usually I can get it right.

I spent years sandwiching slides, enlarging through texture screens and doing all the "tricks" a darkroom photographer could. What I couldn't do was sent out to an air brush artist, a retoucher, for a Kodalith, etc. I am happy to have the control over my final image the way I always wanted. I feel Photoshop completes me as an artist, not just a photographer. Yes, I believe you have to start with a good image.

As far as contests, some will, some won't. The competitions I enter allow all kinds of treatment.

It is enhancement as it has been mentioned photographers have been using techniques in the darkroom for along time to make their photographs look their best, from controling the amount of exposure to the paper, burning and dodging in areas of a photograph are just a few. Getting a double image effect easy overlaying two negatives in the film carrier and then exposing them to paper, that little trick I did for a final project for a photography class that I had. Same types of things can be done in photoshop, you are just using a different method.

It is only cheating if there are rules against it, say in contests or forensics work, where as-captured matters.

I recently shot the interior of a B&B for a magazine. I had to create a high dynamic range photo from two photos because exposing for the stained glass gave me darkness in the surrounding woodwork, but exposing for the woodwork blew out the windows. ND film would have been impractical for these curved turret windows. The photo does not misrepresent the reality, but merely allows for more range than the camera has.

Photoshop is a digital darkroom.

Not using it is like not having all the proper equipment in a darkroom. Sure you can make prints, but you will not get the proper range of output without it.

Contrast adjustments, color correction, dodge, burn, sharpness adjustments are all things that the worlds greatest photographers(Ansel Adams, W. Eugen Smith, Helmut Newton just to name a few) did to their images after they came out of the camera.

Do you consider those photographers and thousands of other legends cheats?

It is considered enhancement in my opinion. Most of todays celebrities are made to look 10 times better than when they are just living their everyday lives. If it was considered cheating then makeup would be too? Either way, you are viewing the person and after a lets say a long good night with someone you just met, you wake up and they have their makeup taken off, would they change the way you feel about them? I dunno, just stuff to think about too...