Steve Bloom, One hell of a photographer

[jdini76]

Originally posted by: ghostman

Originally posted by: jdini76
The polar bears look photochopped

Edit: The picture with the cubs sleeping on the mother's back.

That's exactly what I thought when I scrolled through the pictures. All the other ones look fine, but the polar bears made me stop and look again. Still, some of those shots are incredible.

agreed.

 

[iamaelephant]

Originally posted by: DrPizza
Okay, I did some digging. First, let me state that I don't have the skills that Steve Bloom does. I'm not trying to say that his work is of poor quality. However, is work is *not* pure photography, or even photography with a *little* digital manipulation to clean it up.

It's been pointed out that even Steve Bloom himself admits to manipulation of his photos. Translated quote attributed to Steve:

"Photographs are raw materials, which I shape to archieve estetical perfection. The computer offers me all possibilities of the traditional darkroom and at the same time some advantages of a studio. Where necessary I change vague backgrounds and remove disturbing lights. I remove elements from a scene or add aother ones. Sometimes I change the angle of light a little to archieve a lighting effect that is only possible in a studio and not in nature. With some photos I make minor changes, with others significant changes.
The thought that there would be a perfect photograph is strange to me. Thats why I try to change the visual harmony in each of my photos before publishing"

Thus, I'd consider what he does to be exceptionally beautiful and skilled art. But, I think it still crosses the line when calling them photographs. Well, some of his work probably qualifies as photographs... other pieces probably qualify as digital art. It's a shame that he doesn't distinguish which is which on individual pieces.

So, the dolphins jumping simultaneously from the ocean... was it 2 dolphins jumping simultaneously at SeaWorld? Or was it two separate jumps by 2 dolphins at different times joined together digitally on a computer? To capture such a shot in the real world would be absolutely incredible. To create such a shot electronically? Well, that just takes a tremendous amount of skill. Do his photos show that he's an incredible wildlife photographer? Or do these pictures show that he's an incredible photoshop expert?

Here's another quote from Bloom:

'Most of what I do is controlling the tone and lightening and darkening and drawing the eye into the picture' which is 'very different from doing something like, say, taking an elephant in the zoo and dropping it into a picture of the alps.'

Regardless, he has presented some amazing images, and this starts with incredible photography. I'm sure the originals are nothing to balk at, and every photographer uses post-processing to some degree. I would like to know which ones have undergone major transformations (new backgrounds, elements added or subtracted) because I'm far more interested in photography than digital art, personally. But I have no doubt that Bloom is an incredibly talented photographer.

 

[dbk]

Amazing pictures. Elephants always crack me up. Look at those polar bears chillin'! :thumbsup:

 

[Inspector Jihad]

kewl...but wait till you guys see my photos. i just have to find the usb cable to hook up my phone to the computer...

 

[alrocky]

That hippo is having a bad day...

 

[chuckywang]

It's "Planet Earth"-like amazing.

 

[Verse914]

pretty sweet "art".

I too, noticed the polar bears looking PS'ed, but he did a great job on the rest.