[APML]: Astrophotography or Astro-Art?

[Chuck Vaughn <aa6g@aa6g.org>]

The Astro-Photography Mailing List ------------------------------------
Hi All,

After seeing Tony Hallas' recent images and considering
the explosion of digital processing in general over
the last few years I've been thinking about whether
we've left photography and entered art yet. I know
this question has no definitive answer as photography
as art has been debated as long as there has been
photography. Each person has his own feelings about this.
As far as astrophotography goes, at one extreme there
are those who consider it all to be art and at the other
extreme none of it to be art no matter how much digital
processing is applied to an image.

Personally I'm more in the middle of the road. I don't
consider it all art but there is a point that I feel
that it begins to take on an artsy quality.

I have another motive to this message. I'd like to see
published images, print or electronic, begin to include
at least a general description of what was done with
the image between exposing it on film and the final form
in which we see it. Normally we get the details of the
exposure and the equipment like, "8"-f/8 Newtonian on
Kodak PPF for 60 minutes." But what often follows,
"Scanned and processed in Photoshop" in no longer an
adequate description. I'd like to know what techniques
were applied to each image to obtain the final result.
Sometimes we get this and but often we don't.

What follows is how I feel about the astrophotography
as art question as well as techniques I'd like to
know were applied to an image. Let me say that this
list is not a criticism of anyone using any technique.
I just want to to know what processing was applied so I
can decide for myself just as you can.

Basic Image Processing - Some examples are; contrast
strecthing, color cast removal, elimination of defects
like dust, satellites, reflections....

Processing with a Purpose - I couldn't think of one
word to descibe this but it includes techniques that
purposely distort the image in some way to highlight
some aspect of it. A few examples are; Unsharp masking,
Deconvolution, False Color and maybe even photo compositing
to show a dynamic range that otherwise could not be 
obtained in one photo.

Art - For me an image begins to take on the quality of
art when techniques are applied solely for aesthetic
reasons that make the image deviate considerably 
from its appearance _after_ the basic techniques have been
applied. Two techniques that jump to mind are selective
color or contrast enhancement which are typically applied
to a portion of the image to give it a visual impact that
it would not otherwise have.

With a wide variation in the appearance of astronomical
objects that are no longer the result of just what film
and telescope was used, I think it's a good idea to include
some details with each image about how it was processed
especially since digital processing is fast becoming the
norm.

Chuck  <aa6g@aa6g.org>