I submitted a photo recentley that has me perplexed. I have been taking photographs for about 30 years, and I worked in a photo lab for sometime too (strictly black and white). I have taken pictures that I thought needed to be "cleaned up" to make them look better. But I was also taught that when you take a picture, you get what was there (working with 35mm film). Thus making the individual concentrate on each picture to get it right. But now that I have a digital camera, and I guess the possibilities are limitless. I have absolutley no software to alter/edit any of my photos. I have people telling me that I should alter/edit one of my photos, but I can't bring myself to do it. I guess if I had the software to change the photo, and I tried to alter it, maybe that would change my mind. But I also feel that changing the photo is not the right thing to do. I am considering removing the photo all together. If I thought the photo was junk, I would have never submitted it. I don't think bad of any one who alters/edits their own photos, I just don't feel comfortable doing that to my own photos. What do you think?

In the good old days of black n white film people spent ages creating edge masks, dodging and burning, trying coloured filters on the enlarger etc to get the effect they wanted. Even Ansel Adams is said to have spent a great deal of time getting the prints right. Therefore I see nothing wrong with editing your photos. I don’t however agree with adding elements like birds in the sky. That falls into another category, which we call altered reality in this part of the world. Actually I don’t see anything wrong with that either provided it’s acknowledged by the author for all to see.

You are correct that it’s better to get it right in the camera. If nothing else the time it takes to get the photo is quicker than editing that photo in PhotoShop.

you also have to bear in mind that unless your shooting in RAW format then your camera is doing a lot of alterations to it already all by itself in its software trying its best to emulate whatever scenario you have selected it to do. Digital shots are inherently quite soft (unless your in high end DSLR body and lenses country) and normally require a slight sharpen at the very least....

Depends on your goal, If you want something pretty to look at, then by all means edit away to your hearts content. Personally I usually at least increase the color saturation in all my photos, as I generally find them not to be as vibrant as I remember; sometimes I will use the sharpen filter also. My goal is to provide images that are as aesthetically appealing as possible and if editing the photo helps acheive this I don't see why I shouldn't do it. If you have a different goal, such as recording an event for historical reasons, then editing the photo becomes more questionable I guess.

Someone once made a comment in this forum that the camera doesn't record exactly what the eye sees; and you can alter the final result by adjusting shutter speed, aperture etc. This is really not that different than editing on the computer, it just requires an adjustment in your way of thinking.

You know, it took me a long time (see my early works on Caedes) to give in and edit my photos. I railed against it until I caved and bought Paintshop. Now I clone out undesirable objects, boost contrast, and change saturation to get my photos right. I have even started shooting RAW (My last ten or so images were all RAW.), and editing them in RAWShooter to change the white balance or exposure setting (yes, after I shoot the photo!) and even do fine rotation and cropping to get exactly what I am after. My photos are art. I'm trying to project a mood or create a story, so whatever I do to my images is OK I feel as long as I get what I'm after. After all it's my creation, right?