Street Photography Ethics (mine anyway!)
I present a lesson on what I see as street photography ethics (just one of many ethical points in the genre I might add and a full on topic in my upcoming street photography course in May). Ethics and adherence to them vary of course. That said, let's begin.
What about this shot makes me think of ethics?
It's the bottle next to this photogenic man.
Would removing it make for a better image? Uncertain. Possible.
Could I have moved? Yes (but the light was perfect for here and I like the background).
Could I have moved the bottle? Possibly, but that would require way to much scenic manipulation for my taste and the possibility of the gentleman just saying no for something that isn't important.
I could have moved in and cropped tighter except that I like(d) the extra context of his environment with this crop.
Could I just remove it in post? Absolutely not! Not in my ethical model anyway. To remove something by way of editing software or any other means (other than cropping) is changing the reality of the moment and therefore creates something that never really existed. That goes against everything I believe in street and documentary photography.
If you are creating images as fine art and don't really care about the reality of the moment then feel free to do what you wish. I choose to let things remain as they are and work with or around them.
Cropping isn't unethical as it doesn't change anything. It simply acts the same as moving closer or farther back. You can crop in camera or in post and the basic effect is the same (differences due to perspective perhaps but no manipulation of reality).
The bottle in question was his and as such can be a part of his story (whatever story that is).
Leave it, crop it or move on to the next pic and count this as one of the many that just wasn't good enough to show. The choice is yours.
Over the years, countless images have gone unseen because of something I could change. That's just how it is.
