The Truth in Digital Editing
Before computers were invented, photographic editing was achieved in darkrooms, going as far back as early 1860’s. Up until computers were invented, editing required skillful artistic ability, and it had to be done carefully. Editing in the 21st century became more technological with the development of newer and more powerful computers and computer software for digital editing. Photographic manipulation has been going on for more than a hundred years, but as the technology increases, photo editing difficulty decreases. People have many reasons to edit pictures; pictures might be a little blurry, or the lighting might not be to their taste, or they just might not like the composition. But there is a huge difference between editing a picture to improve its quality and editing a picture to change the composition of the image. There are three main purposes for editing: artistic, common and persuasive. There is the common editing. Something everyone does at some point, such as sharpening a photo of himself/herself or make it a little darker for a nice Facebook picture. This type of editing is harmless because the pictures are being used in a positive way to promote someone’s looks instead of changing reality. Then, there is artistic editing, where artists edit to improve the quality of their picture without changing the composition of the picture. If a photographer saw a beautiful sunset and took a picture of it, but then later they wanted to make the sun rays appear redder, there is no harm in slightly changing the color. The photo has been changed to suit the artist. However, if the photo were to be published, the publisher must be aware of its originality before it is published by a source claiming it’s real. Lastly, there is persuasive editing. Persuasive techniques are frequently used in politics. While some powerful political figures, such as Stalin, would manipulate photos to completely air-brush their enemies out of pictures,...