Photographic Representation (Slides 258 to 300) Flashcards
Representation
it is defined as the use of languages and images to make meaning of the world surrounding us.
just as the languages we speak have rules that guide how we express and interpret meaning, so does photography!
The Decisive Moment
Taking photographs is putting one’s head, one’s eye,
and one’s heart [all] on the same axis, according to Henri Cartier-Bresson.
The Decisive Moment is thought to be the foundation of photojournalism.
Photography is realism.
All forms of photography is thought to be more objective than painting and drawing; choosing what to capture is the only objective part about it. Everything else is rather automatic and therefore requires little from one personally, is mainly objective.
Connotative/Denotative
Denotative meaning refers to the literal, and it will always be the same
Connotative meaning refers to the subtext, depends on the ideas and values of the viewers culture, and may be different.
Ethics
issues of verifiability
and manipulation are especially significant in photojournalism
and documentary work.
Responsive Photography
an act of photographic documentation
cannot be separated from the perceptions it raises.
Manipulation
photographic news images that are manipulated have the same deleterious effect upon the credibility of
journalism that a written story with made up quotes, sources or events would have.
Effectiveness
depends a lot on whether or not a viewer thinks the images they are looking at are real and untouched (factual).
Staged
Most of the iconic images of the past were staged.
From the 1850s to the 2000s
technology was too primitive to capture subjects which would typically be moving at speeds too fast. So, most symbolic images were staged to be captured.
American Civil War Photographers
often moved bodies into positions
that made for a better composition. They would even go as far as putting uniforms on bodies that didn’t originally bear none.
Documentary Photographs
carries the full meaning of the episode.
The Myth of Photographic Truth:
Could it be that the children’s positioning was an exaggeration, as they reacted to the photographer moving in closer for this exposure?
“Photo Opportunity”
Virtually every image you see of a candidate on the trail is contrived…Someone on staff had to set up those
scenarios and beckon the photographers over for
the shot.
“I’LL GIVE YOU A SHOT.”
Digital Editing Software
it’s been around since the 1950s.
The duty to record
justifies the depiction of death and brutality, unpleasant facts in images.
Decision Making: Ethical Positions
UTILITARIAN: The greatest good for the greatest number of people! (Photojournalism provides information critical to a democratic society. Photography might show the horrors of war or the hardship of poverty. Without them, there would be voters who could not properly informed decisions.)
ABSOLUTIST: The right to privacy exceeds the public’s need to know!
THE OTHER GUY: Everyone else is doing it. We don’t want to get scooped. (Photojournalist who swear by this rule of thumb compare their actions to a perceived industry standard. Whether or not the taking of the image is right or wrong is irrelevant.)
The Cheerio Test
is a way of making the decision whether or not a image is suitable for general viewing by asking the question, “Would the average person want to observe this picture doing breakfast?”
Job as a Human Being Outweighs Duty to Record
According to John Long, former Chair of the National Press Photographer’s Association ethics committee, “If you have placed yourself in a situation where you can help, you are morally obligated…Your job as a human being, so to speak, outweighs your job as a
photojournalist.”
“Not Too Beautiful,” say the critics.
There is a thinking that documentary images should
not be “too beautiful.”
“. . . photography that bears witness to the
calamitous and the reprehensible is (in some
circles) much criticized if it seems ‘aesthetic’;
that is, too much like art . . .” - Susan Sontag
Ownership
Legal copyright of a photograph generally belongs to the
photographer or organization which assigned the work.
But once the image has been used as “news” or some other form of documentation, ethical questions have been raised about ownership. “Consider Dorothea Lange’s photograph Migrant Mother . . . a widely recognized icon of the Depression . . . individuals such as this woman gained no economic benefit from their loss of privacy.
The Dark Room In Your Pocket
The apps and filters available to treat, enhance and correct images are astoundingly nimble, making it deceptively simple to emulate or even invent photographic processes and looks, useful for abstractions and for simulations of vintage and
vernacular nostalgia.
