The magic happens in the camera!

Often when some people comment on my work, they say things like: "nice post-work", or "you are good with photoshop"; as if to denote that my photography really takes place after the shot is made.  

Although I can appreciate the nature of those comments given the facilities made by our digital world, especially with the hundreds of easy to use editing apps available not only for computers but for phones as well; I fail to understand how an artist could possibly portray his/her message to his viewers in this way.

Let me explain what I mean with an example:  Lets say that a sculptor has a big block of marble, and he just starts hammering and chiseling away bits until in the end he has something that sort of resembles a statue, a good thing considering that he had no idea what he was making when he started anyways.  But then he realizes that for this statue, he hammered and chiseled too much and did not leave enough marble for the arms, so he fills the space to make the arms, with rebar and concrete and then paints the rebar and concrete to look like the marble of the rest of the statue.  And finally when his masterpiece is unveiled, the viewers say "your a great artist, you really know how to make the paint look like marble".  Huh? 

Call me old fashioned, but I believe that a true artist starts with a vision, and only after much consideration and research, is the final product brought to life.  Just like a sculptor has a clear understanding of what his masterpiece will look like before he starts to carve, and also ensures that the masterpiece is carved from a single piece of stone; likewise, a photographer finishes his masterpiece - in the camera.  A homage to their respective technical and artistic skills. 

It is a belief I have always had in fact.  A photographer is a artist that uses his/her technical abilities to manipulate the camera to capture an artistic vision.  More technically speaking, its about using f-stops, ISO sensitivity, and shutter speeds, to manipulate light and cause it to do what he/she wants it to do.  To cause, for a fraction of a second, film or a digital sensor to reveal emotion, passion, seduction, pain, happiness, vulnerability, or any combination thereof, as portrayed through the photographer's subject.  

So how could all this be accomplished in post-work editing I still do not understand.  And although technology continues to shape our lives and give us new tools to make things easier, to me photography will continue to be about capturing a vision - in the camera.  That my friends, is where my magic happens!