#NoFilter is the biggest lie in photography

#NoFilter is the biggest lie in photography

“Well, that's a pretty bold statement Matt” you might say to yourself, to which I say, “thank you, I'm a pretty bold person”. In all reality though, it's the truth. You see, a lot of people don't want you to believe this because it makes them feel inferior to the idea that their photo isn't as great as proclaiming it as unfiltered makes them seem. Do I say this because I think I am almighty photographer? No, I say this because it's the truth and I'm going to explain and show you why, without getting in to all the technical crap that even I don't understand.

Fully edited photograph

So let's start with the history of #NoFilter, it all began on a Tuesday afternoon in Berkshire, England between 2 schoolyard friends. No it didn't, I have no clue where it started, nor do I care. I do know that when Instagram was first introduced their photo filters quickly became the trend, and enter in #NoFilter. People claimed their photo was unfiltered meaning they didn't use any sort of Instagram filter. Which was fine. But as things tend to do in today's world, the idea evolved and quickly made it's way in to photography and has today become a sort of badge of honor among photographers. The sad thing is that the badge is no more real than the Jr Ranger badge the National Park Service hands out to kids who finish a coloring book.

Photo with "auto" settings in Lightroom

Now I know the argument is coming, “Matt you're only saying this because you filter everything” well yes, you're correct, but I also want to clarify the truth. I am proud of the work I do to my photos. I put in lots of time in post for editing in both Lightroom and Photoshop. I use layers, and effects, and crank up saturations and all the other fun tricks I've spent countless hours perfecting. But I also proudly accept that this is the way I take photos.

So dating back to the very first photo ever taken, it was in a sense “filtered”. You see a photograph is just capturing light, it is then processed in to an image. This is no different in today's digital world. Photographers of old used so many different tricks in their dark rooms, different types of film, different I don't even know whats because I'm not a film photographer. But 2 developers could take the same negative and come up with 2 totally different looking images, I do know that much.

So why all the fuss these days? Is it inferiority? Possibly. Is it that some photos look too good to be true? Possibly. Is it that we now have infinite options at our disposal and some people don't like that because it's “not true photography”? Probably. But as I stated, refer back to the dark room.

RAW photo exported to JPEG in Lightroom

When you take a photo on your camera or phone, it is captured in 1 of 2 file formats. A JPEG or a RAW file. Most people are only familiar with a JPEG as this is the most popular, smallest file, and generally the default for most phones. So is a JPEG image unfiltered? No! You see your camera/phone has an image sensor that takes a guess at what the colors are in that photo and then … wait for it … filters it to what it thinks it should be. A RAW photo is a flatter image, with TONS of information in it. When you first see a RAW image you generally will cringe at the look, size, and inability to do anything with it without specific programs.  So any RAW file, while as close to a film negative as you can get digitally, is unable to be posted online without being filtered in some way shape or form.

#FilteredMode

Now many people may use the "auto" function on either their phone, camera, or even in their post processing, but again, these all rely on an image sensor to guess and therefore, yup, filter the photo.

I won't go in to much more on this for now, but the next time someone posts their photo and proudly proclaiming it is "unfiltered" or #NoFilter, feel free to copy and paste this link as the top comment and let them come argue with me :)

Until then, filter on!!!