Is This Really a Photograph?
Take a look at this photo. It’s in focus and well-exposed, but is it technically a photograph?
For the photo purist the answer is no. This is a frame grab from high definition video. Increasingly, our photo staff is covering assignments with video cameras now that our main emphasis has switched to the web. Then, almost as an afterthought, we are asked to produce a photo for the paper. You probably didn’t see this photo in the paper because it was buried in the features section as a one column black and white image next to the ads.
Every time technology makes it easier for us to make images, the purists have protested. Long gone, thankfully, are the Ansel Adams days of setting up a 4 x 5 camera and waiting for the perfect light to shoot that one perfect image. Auto rewind, auto focus, auto exposure, digital images - all have made it easier to make good images. And now comes frame grabs from video. No more waiting for the “moment”. Just shoot everything and “grab” the photo later. Is it really a photo? What do you think?
Learn more about the history of PICTURES
For us duffers, sure, if you like low res photos.
For photo journalists who can’t even use camera raw? no.
An image can’t be edited.
With high def video, no editing means no image.
right?
Although video quality is getting better and better, so does the quality of the images produced through photography. Even though we can pull images from video good enough to use as a still image, the advancements of photography equipment will make photos obsolete to video stills.
One of the main reasons we purchased hi-def video cameras to use here at the Post-Dispatch was so we could pull “frame grabs” from the video to use in the paper. We have successfully reproduced five-column photos that look quite good. Lighting and exposure have to be right-on, and in some situations (low-light, for instance) pulling that frame grab that doesn’t have subject movement can be difficult.
So, some editing of the images is possible, but it can’t be done in every case.