Differentiating between digitally created and digitally manipulated photographic images

Abstract

In today's society the level of art consciousness is considerably higher than a few decades ago. It is, however, still questionable whether people understand the artistic value and aesthetics of photography as an art form. The aim of this research is to investigate digital photography in order to show the difference between digitally manipulated and digitally created photographic images. In order to reach a conclusion on this aim extensive literary research was conducted into the field of digital photography and digital fine art photography. Firstly the research aimed to differentiate between "created" and "manipulated" photographic images, by looking at the international history of digital photography and photographers that made use of both creation and manipulation to create fme art photographs. An introduction to digital fine art photography in a South African context was conducted to give an overview of more recent photographers in the field, also setting the ground work for the researcher's discussion of her own work and the techniques and tools available to photographers. The discussion of the researcher's own work and the techniques and tools used to create them is done in detail. Along with the full colour images, as examples of the use of the tools and techniques, it gives a clear explanation of the difference between digitally created and digitally manipulated photographs. Through combining these studies the research has fulfilled its aims by: investigating and applying the techniques involved in digital fine art photography investigating photographers working in the field of digital fine art photography giving a written explanation and a visual representation of the differences between digital creation and manipulation giving a written account of all the images and the methods used to create them, and gaining an understanding of people's perception of fine art photography through the use of a questionnaire.