> More frequently I see traditional > photographers labeling their work "unmanipulated photograph" or > something similar. Why should they need to "opt-out" as it were, of > the mixed media genre? It is the deviant pictures that should be > labeled as such. And worse than this Alan, why should you need to brace yourself the onslaught that the use of the terms "unmanipulated" or "straight photo" sometimes brings. It's as if some take it as a slur on the validity of thier work if you dare express any preference for straight. Going back to my earliest texts (very early 1900s) it's clear that even then hand tinted photographs, double exposures etc were always treated as different from simple/straight/unmanipulated photographs. Sure, PhotoShop is great, but I would never try to pass off a composite image as a straight one. There's no need: it is what it is. Hehehe ... I did upset some at a camera club once when I entered a straight photo into a "digital battle". When it won and I was asked how I made it I told them: I scanned the slide with my LS30 :o) I suspect that pre 1990 worldwide the fraction of photos worldwide given any sort of post capture "intervention" approached 0.0000001% of all pictures taken. Certainly nothing to give widespread applicability to the claims that "photographers have always manipulated ..." Bob
