Disclaimer

A Word on realism and my art…

There are certain expectations when it comes to landscape photography when it’s billed as such. In my opinion, those expectations of realism, especially in the selling of products, are to be respected. That is why it’s my philosophy to point out when certain elements or entire images are the product of major composite work, etc. The parentheses at the end of my listing’s names denote important traits, including those relevant to this subject:

Title (composite)

Title (____ edit)

That said, although I consider myself a landscape photographer, I do not typically refer to my end results as landscape photography. Every single photo goes through a processing pipeline that starts with organization in Lightroom and ends with export in Photoshop. Along the way, changes to color, lighting, and undesirable elements occur and that is the baseline, regardless of major composite work. And it’s not just me—outside of purist photography by purist photographers (you’ll know one when you meet one), that is the baseline for the modern photographer. “Airbrushing” and “Photoshopping” are terms used for overtly doctored images, but only journalists, documentarians, and purists can be, and should be, safely expected to give “real” results.

Waking up at 3am, hiking to the top of a mountain or driving to a faraway beach, getting poured on and splashed on, risking my expensive gear to capture moments in nature does not preclude me from the digital artist moniker, but it surely lets me keep my footing in the photography-sphere. I call myself a Surrealscaper as a joke in my Instagram bio, but it befits what I do more than anything in either camp.

There are no rules in art, but there can be rules in classification for the viewer and the buyer. Genres exist, and they do nicely as filters for a consumer. As long as I offer my images to the public, I will do my best to distinguish what is what.

At the end of the day, it might be easier to denote only those that are “real” but then nothing would have that tag and we’d be back at square one.