Inside the Big Lie
by Richard Martha

Past and Present

A few months back I was contacted, through Facebook, by an old basketball teammate who I had lost contact with when I started my global explorations 17 years ago. As we were reminiscing about our youth, and catching up, the question of professional occupation arose. He mentioned that he was a software developer in the Netherlands and I explained that I was running a company that provides digital image manipulation in the heart of New York City and I sent him a link to our website. The next day he replied and started out by stating “Digital Image Manipulation", you mean just d*cking around in Photoshop”. Now, the notion that Photoshop artists aimlessly click around on images that grace covers and billboards worldwide seems to be shared unfortunately by a rather large number of people. I can only blame it on lack of knowledge of our craft and through this newsletter I will attempt to shed more light on the deception surrounding us. And to do so we need to explore what I call the three ‘P’s’ and their history.

Paint
In early fifteenth century Europe there was a shared need for artists to increase the level of realism in their paintings. Prior to this point, dating all the way back to the Stone Age, painting was mostly decorative and mythological. Due to an advanced understanding of the laws of perspective and a desire to create more emotional works of art, a new painting medium was required. Tempera, a mix of natural pigment with egg as a binder dried too fast, which therefore didn’t allow for great color transition. Jan Van Eyck (1395-1441), a painter fascinated with the tiniest of details to give life to his subject, started experimenting with oil as a binder in order to get better shading. The longer drying time permitted him to work slower and accurately, allowing him to create the most vivid detail in his work. This was also a result of multiple layers of color on top of each other also known as glazing. His contemporaries were amazed by the results and oil paint achieved general acceptance as the new standard.

Photo
According to historians, the first photographic plate was created around 1826. Joseph Nicephore Niepce (1765-1833) often is credited for the invention. Photography (derived from the Greek words for light and writing) evolved through the combined work of several individuals of different nationalities and appears to be more evolution than invention. The technology in itself really became known in 1839, when the professional scene painter Louis-Jacques-Mande Daguerre introduced the process to the public. Prior to this point he had been using a camera obscura as an aid to create perspective in his elaborate stage designs, and this led him to seek a way to freeze the image. In 1829 he partnered up with Niepce who died only a few years later in 1833. Daguerre forged ahead in his quest to fix images despite the lack of sponsors. The rights to the new device, which he christened the Daguerreotype, were sold to the French government and a booklet was published to explain the process. Furthermore, the announcement that the Daguerreotype “requires no knowledge of drawing…” and that “anyone may succeed…and perform as well as the author of the invention” was greeted with enormous interest, and “Daguerreomania” became a craze overnight. However, not all people welcomed it and some artists deemed it a threat to their livelihood. Some even predicted that painting would cease to exist. But unlike painting – which originates from a blank surface to which the artist adds a design – the photograph originates in the complete opposite manner. The design is already present in reality, and the photographer enters the relationship with his subject at the decisive moment. One last interesting fact of early photographs was the illusion of deserted cityscapes created by the really long lengths of exposure time, since all the moving objects would not register.

Pixels
Image Manipulation is about as old as photography itself. In around 1860, an iconic portrait of President Abraham Lincoln was found to be a composite of an image of John Calhoun with only the head of Lincoln put in its place. You can see it here. Stalin around 1930, Mao in 1936 and Hitler in 1937 all had people that fell out of favor removed from photographs. A photo of Mussolini posing on horseback, sword raised high, had the horse handler removed to portray a more heroic image. In the past, manipulation was achieved by retouching with ink, paint, double exposure, sandwiching negatives or scratching prints. In the late sixties, the medium of choice was the airbrush, which required advanced skills to master and attracted many painters and illustrators to the trade of photo manipulation. The 1980s saw the introduction of the Quantel Paintbox, which was in essence the digital evolution of the airbrush. The ability to digitize photographic data through scanning and later through digital capture placed expanded creative limitations. From this point forth no pixel would ever be safe from alteration. The derogative term “photoshopping” encompasses much more than some subtle color changes and eliminating blemishes. Removing elements, drastic color alterations and mood shifts, complete restoration of vintage photos, compositing, transforming and illustrating elements from scratch are all part of the job description. Image manipulation is about creating effective visual communication.

One of the most extraordinary paintings that I have ever viewed is the “Apotheosis” by Anne-Louis Girodet (1767-1824). His impression of transparency, ghosting, blending techniques, treatment of sharp and soft areas and his precise degree of luminance make this painting a piece of art far beyond the realm of what imagination can fathom, even in modern times. For these reasons, this month I am a spotlighting this highly skillful master who enjoyed combining Neoclassicist subject matter with Romanticist nuance and technique, giving this work his personal spin. For those going to Paris soon, I believe it’s hanging at the Musée National du Château de Malmaison.

May 2008

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