TRUTH VERSUS REALITY

By MICHAEL PERKINS

ORSON WELLES ONCE SAID OF JAMES CAGNEY that, while he was not a “realistic” actor per se, there had never been a single frame of film shot of him that was untrue. Something in the Yankee Doodle Dandy’s presence on screen was both more and less than real, and so, as a result, it registered with audiences as authentic, as if it ought to be true. Oddly, in making this observation, Welles may as well have been talking about two competing visions of photography, two disparate camps that choose either “truth” or “reality” in almost everything they create.

Many of us learn a formal definition of words like sharpness, tone, contrast, color, and many more of us learn that a certain combination of these elements equals a picture that is “like life”. This comes from the earliest years of photographic instruction, in which raw amateurs, who were necessarily outcome-oriented (i.e., wanting a return on their investment in gear and film) were given certain arbitrary rules for the making of a so-called “good” picture. But “good”, or “real”, or “authentic” according to whom? After reading all the “how-to” booklets, we have to spend the rest of our lives figuring out the answer to those questions.

In comparing these two renderings of a single landscape shot, what, in your mind, qualifies (or disqualifies) one version over the other in terms of its post-processing? Which reflects what I saw in the moment versus what I later re-sculpted in terms of tonal range, intensity, color? Which picture came first? (Spoiler: I’m not telling). Is one “realer”, or more naturalistic, than the other? Why or why not? And which one is, to your mind or eye, true?

More to the point, whatever your conclusion, how can it become the standard for my opinion, or his, or hers, or theirs? When we look at an image, are we actively weighing what was, at various stages, done to it, or do we merely judge the result (Spoiler Two: often we do both)? Cagney’s entire approach to acting was summarized in his advice to a beginner: “Plant your feet, look the other fellow in the eye, and tell the truth”. How that truth makes it from vision to result is anyone’s guess, and everyone’s decision. No manual, no set of rules, no formal class can teach that.