10MPlayer wrote:
... UHH needs to come up with a good definition of what a photograph is and it is not ...
The only time that will get complicated is if we try to be too idealistic about it. Going down that road would involve us excluding anything that didn't fit into a universally agreed upon idealised notion of what a
real photograph is. We should be looking to do as little excluding as possible. Put another way, we should be leaning towards being as accommodating as possible, without going so far that the concept of photography becomes meaningless.
It's probably easier and simpler if we start by defining what a photograph is not, which in this case would specifically be images generated from scratch by AI software or computer graphics software. That would mean using the
medium of origin as one of the defining factors (but not the only one). In the spirit of keeping things simple, where photographs are concerned we could define the medium of origin as "photographic equipment", which, from a photographer's point of view means cameras, including cameras built into non-camera devices such as phones.
The definition of "photograph" could then realistically include composites (which may or may not include AI generated elements). Photography has a long history of including composites of various types.
Just because a photo has been given some post processing, that needn't mean that we have to stop referring to it as a photo. All photos (digital and analog) have to be given some kind of processing, whether it's in camera or in a computer or a dark room, so the idea that any post processing is a no-no is not realistic.
We would still have to allow for the possibility of photographs being extensively modified. It should be up to the individual to decide whether they felt the need
for disclosure in such matters. The alternative would be to exclude extensively modified photos and then we are left with the problem of where to draw the line.
Those who felt the need for disclosure could refer to such images as "modified photos" which would cover all possibilities.
If someone had the intention of producing a creatively edited image from a photo, the chances are they wouldn't want to refer to it as a photo anyway, so getting precious about such definitions would seem to be futile and trivial.
What's the definition of a photograph? To answer that there are two possibilities - we can be idealistic or we can be realistic. Perhaps to be clear we should specify that we're looking for a
working definition. In that context, being realistic would seem to be the better choice. That involves being flexible and accommodating and making sensible assessments. Some people aren't very good at any of those things and they prefer the rigid exclusiveness of idealism. The down side is that being rigid and exclusive is the option that's least likely to produce a working, real world definition.
The possibility of deception will be with us no matter what definitions we choose. For those who feel the need for disclosure there's no problem because there's nothing stopping them. For those who have the intention to deceive, they don't care what the agreed definitions are.