Does JPG count as PP?

[schmik]

Originally Posted by georgweb

You know I'm no PP, yeah you know me...
" " " " " " " " " " " " , cause I got a K100D :-)

Hey Mike,
regarding your complaining about dubious out-of-the-camera labeling, you probably know this by checking EXIF-data, right? If in doubt, check the EXIF .-)
I am using that label (flickr-tag) often, cause it's giving me better control over were I want to get to: An out-of-the-camera JPG which is already near perfect (no RAW if not necessary, i.e. daylight outside conditions). In theory this would also keep your film skills sharp, like Lowell mentioned.

Here's my "no PP" tags, which have some cropping involved mostly (if not then it's also 'OOC'): Flickr: geobeo's stuff tagged with nopostprocess. This is always sliders neutral and image: normal (not: 'bright'). I shoot almost only manual lenses in AV-mode and sure enough your initial remark about lens-bragging does apply to me also.

I can check the EXIF but never bother... too much work. I did think that this would make an interesting discussion and it has.

I also aim for the best result with no PP but do it in raw. So far i only have the K100d body so file size in not an issue and OS X displays PEF files natively. I will have to re-read Lowells post. Wouldn't getting a perfect RAW keep your skills sharp? Or is it mentioned for JPG because you have less room to PP. Surely on film the camera can not adjust contrast, saturation etc?

mike

[georgweb]

Mike said:

Wouldn't getting a perfect RAW keep your skills sharp? Or is it mentioned for JPG because you have less room to PP.

Yes and no. I'd use RAW all the time if the cam was not that slow in RAW (SD-card is fast enough). Room for PP is OK with RAW.
As it is, I'm shooting JPG in daylight (WB: daylight) and RAW at night (WB don't matter but it's always: Tungsten). The K100D is
said to have an excellent JPG engine aside from the WB issues.

Best, Georg (the other)

[simico]

Originally Posted by Lowell Goudge

My argument is that if you shoot JPEG only, this is not post processing

That's what I'm saying too Looks like there was a slight misunderstanding

[foxglove]

Originally Posted by debbie

I cant see any difference in getting your camera doing the raw conversion instead of your computer.

Neither can I - in either case, after the image data has been captured and processed, it's converted into jpg. You can let your camera do it, according to whatever presets you like, you can have your computer do it, again with whatever presets, or you can have your computer do it, and fool around with settings. It all comes after the inital processing of data. But that's just the way I see it, obviously others differ! But I like your point, there's little difference between camera conversion and computer conversion except the size of the processor doing the work.

Julie

[simico]

Originally Posted by foxglove

Neither can I

It is like ordering a "hawai pizza" from the restaurant or cooking it yourself the way you like it at home

[foxglove]

Originally Posted by simico

It is like ordering a "hawai pizza" from the restaurant or cooking it yourself the way you like it at home

That's the difference if you muck with settings when you do the conversion on your computer. If you just let the software do the conversion with presets... well, I suppose that would be the difference between getting the hawaiian pizza cooked from the pizza parlour, and getting it raw and cooking it at home. Darn it, now I'm hungry! This is the problem with food analogies...

[schmik]

Originally Posted by foxglove

Neither can I - in either case, after the image data has been captured and processed, it's converted into jpg. You can let your camera do it, according to whatever presets you like, you can have your computer do it, again with whatever presets, or you can have your computer do it, and fool around with settings. It all comes after the inital processing of data. But that's just the way I see it, obviously others differ! But I like your point, there's little difference between camera conversion and computer conversion except the size of the processor doing the work.

Julie

Let me get this straight.... some of you believe that shooting raw, changing settings and then converting to JPG is not PP.

mike

[debbie]

Originally Posted by schmik

Let me get this straight.... some of you believe that shooting raw, changing settings and then converting to JPG is not PP.

mike

No, I belive that the statement *no PP!* is extremely pointless.

[foxglove]

Originally Posted by schmik

Let me get this straight.... some of you believe that shooting raw, changing settings and then converting to JPG is not PP.

Obviously I was unclear in my earlier post. Let's try this again in point form, if only to keep it clear in my own head!

• shooting raw, changing settings in your computer software, and converting to jpg is PP.
• shooting raw, using presets in your computer software, and converting to jpg is PP.
• if you shoot jpg, the presets are applied and conversion occurs in the camera rather than your computer
• there doesn't seem to much difference between the last two, other than the size of the processor doing the work

All of which makes the concept of "no PP" rather meaningless, as Debbie points out.

This of course assumes that you agree that the main processing is the conversion of incoming light into the raw data, leaving everything else to be "post". I suspect that some of the strong opposition to this notion comes from the feeling that there is some form that the image takes that is the true, objective representation of reality. Bollocks. As soon as you frame a scene in the viewfinder, you are imposing your subjective view on it - that's the point, isn't it?

All sorts of things affect the image. Let's jump back into film-land briefly and consider different types of film: I was recently reminded of how much I liked Fuji Superia for its rendering of blues and greens, and I always disliked the warmth of Kodak films. If I took two photos, one on each type of film, they would look quite different. Which one is the "true" representation? This isn't to say that photography is all fakery, just that it isn't as objective as it first appears. Obviously, if you're adding or removing things from an image and claiming it's an accurate representation of what you saw through the viewfinder, then you've crossed a line, but a photograph is always a subjective view of reality. However you set your camera up to handle jpg conversions, it's imposing some sort of interpretation or preference as to how the final image should look.

Okay, rant over, I've just been thinking about this a lot lately, and as alway, these are just my cranky, uninformed opinions... And I figured I'd better clarify, seeing as my point came out completely opposite to what I'd intended!

Julie

[simico]

Let's try a different (not technical) approach.

Let's say I shoot all my photos directly in JPG with the factory settings. I do not alter/modify them at all, they rest on my hard drive in exactly the same state as the cam wrote them to the SD card. Let's call these "original" pictures.

Now let's say I select a nice landscape pic and create two copies of it (with simple file copy).
Copy #1 is uploaded to my website as it is.
On copy #2 I darken the sky to very deep blue, light up the trees a bit, crank up saturation and contrast to get a surrealistic picture, and finally upload it to my website.

Are you saying that there's no difference between the pictures, they are the same? If no, then what is the difference? Maybe the difference is that one of them was modified, it became different from its original state? How do you call the activity of modifying an (original) image? Is it called "post processing"? If yes, then how can a non-modified, original picture be "post processed" too? Wouldn't that be a logical flaw?

And now we got back to the point of why was the term "post processing" created at all? If you say that everything is post processed then post processing = (main) processing, which leads to the question: why would you create a new term for the exactly same activity/process? It was created to name an activity that is different from the base (main) activity, and to be able to differentiate "original" and altered pictures.

[foxglove]

Originally Posted by simico

And now we got back to the point of why was the term "post processing" created at all? If you say that everything is post processed then post processing = (main) processing, which leads to the question: why would you create a new term for the exactly same activity/process? It was created to name an activity that is different from the base (main) activity, and to be able to differentiate "original" and altered pictures.

Interesting, you seem to be moving toward the same conclusion that I am, that "post processing" is the wrong term to be using, period.

Mulling it over yesterday evening, it occurred to me that I have no memory of the term "post processing" before doing digital photography. I asked my husband, who used to be in graphic design, if he'd ever run across it, and he figured it appeared in the 80s in the context of video post-production. Without having done the least research, I'm guessing the term was adopted by digital photographers at some point, whether it exactly suited the context or not, has never been adequately defined, and indeed may be the wrong term, particularly given its origin.

That's it then, I'm not using the terms "post processing" or "PP" any more. It's all just processing, it's merely a question of how much you (or some processor given a bunch of settings) do to the image. It's the usual human problem of trying to make everything black or white (either you PP or you don't) when actually there are all shades of grey (you process more or less).

This was never a question using film, that I recall - you shot your film, and you processed it. You could do very little (develop the film, make a contact print) or a whole lot (dodge, burn, solarize, etc.) but it was all processing. I suppose then you get into the debate about whether it's photography or "photographic art", but that's a whole other kettle of fish and takes us right back to the human desire to categorize in the face of non-categorizable concepts.

[debbie]

Originally Posted by simico

Let's try a different (not technical) approach.

Let's say I shoot all my photos directly in JPG with the factory settings. I do not alter/modify them at all, they rest on my hard drive in exactly the same state as the cam wrote them to the SD card. Let's call these "original" pictures.

Now let's say I select a nice landscape pic and create two copies of it (with simple file copy).
Copy #1 is uploaded to my website as it is.
On copy #2 I darken the sky to very deep blue, light up the trees a bit, crank up saturation and contrast to get a surrealistic picture, and finally upload it to my website.

Are you saying that there's no difference between the pictures, they are the same? If no, then what is the difference? Maybe the difference is that one of them was modified, it became different from its original state? How do you call the activity of modifying an (original) image? Is it called "post processing"? If yes, then how can a non-modified, original picture be "post processed" too? Wouldn't that be a logical flaw?

And now we got back to the point of why was the term "post processing" created at all? If you say that everything is post processed then post processing = (main) processing, which leads to the question: why would you create a new term for the exactly same activity/process? It was created to name an activity that is different from the base (main) activity, and to be able to differentiate "original" and altered pictures.

well, isn´t the problem that the original doesn´t really exist?? I mean, which photopaper or screen or printer shows the correct version?

[simico]

Originally Posted by foxglove

It's the usual human problem of trying to make everything black or white (either you PP or you don't) when actually there are all shades of grey (you process more or less).

I absolutely agree with that That's why we always have to be careful with our statements, no matter how true they might seem to be for ourself.

Originally Posted by debbie

well, isn´t the problem that the original doesn´t really exist?? I mean, which photopaper or screen or printer shows the correct version?

In my example "original" just ment the file created by the camera, so it was just a reference to a base (starter) state of the image file.

What you're asking is an interesting thing and can take us to the land of philosophy. Is there a "correct version" at all? We don't know. What you can see with your eyes is also not the "correct version", not the reality around us. Without going into the biological details (even if it's very exciting) of what happens only in our eyes, it is enough to mention that our brain modifies, "adjusts" all the incoming (btw already pre-processed and compressed!) data to create an illusion what it beleives to be reality (based on a lot of things, previous data from memory being one of them). If you cannot trust your senses, how do you know what is the "correct version", what is real?