Dawn yesterday. By the time I pressed the shutter the trace of a rainbow had vanished. I doubt the photo would have been anything out of the ordinary anyway, so I played around in Lightroom, starting with an infra-red preset and this is what I came up with.
[24 April 2011, Panasonic Lumix GH1, 14–45 mm at 14 mm, ISO 200, 1/100 at f8]
All content © 2011 Pete McGregor
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4 comments:
So much more interesting than a standard, bland colour shot, Pete.
Thanks Avus. This photo got me thinking, because it's so different from the "actual" appearance of the scene. I don't believe literal representation is a necessary quality for a photograph to "work", but what I found interesting about this one was that it doesn't evoke what I felt at the time — it doesn't reflect my response to what I saw at that moment. Instead, it probably reflected much more what I responded to as I worked on the photograph. Perhaps that's at the root of so many objections to substantial post-processing: that it diffuses the response from the moment of being there to a far more drawn-out process?
On that point, Ansel Adams' prints often bore little resemblance to the "real" scene, but he claimed he visualised the final print even before he exposed the negative — in other words, the final print reflected his immediate response to the scene. I seldom see trenchant criticisms of his "post-processing", but I wonder whether that would still be true if he'd claimed to have "explored" his photographs while he was printing them?
I could get myself tangled in philosophical knots here, so I think I'll leave it at that ;^)
'I photograph, therefore I am'.........or 'I'm a photographer, get me out of here!'
RR, in a different context, I'm sure many photojournalists in dangerous situations (Libya springs immediately to mind) have thought that second part.
But getting back to the philosophical aspects: I do have a great deal of sympathy for those who say all that matters is the "finished" photograph.
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