by Alexander Gardner, where the same dead soldier in rebel uniform is seen behind a wall of piled stones nearly enclosed by a big rock foundations, his musket is still standing, and then again as a Northern soldier in a field, with a gun lying beside his head. Clearly the same corpse has been used twice for an aesthetic and editorial effect. After the set-up is done, various other schemes can be used to further manipulate the image. In addition to warm diffused light or strident lighting, the camera lens can romanticize the subject through soft focus or "harden" the subject through sharp focus. Different focal lenses can bring the background into clarity. With a wide-angle lens, the field takes on equal importance to the subject or even comments on the foreground figure. They can flatten or blur the background into insignificance with a telephoto lens that has very shallow depth of field, which directly puts all the emphasis on the subject. Full color can make an image seem happy and festive compared to an image in black and white that would be depressing. Angle and distance have powerful connotations for emotional involvement and attitude towards the subject. The composition and what is included in the picture and what is left out can also deeply alter a persons perception of the whole image. Before any photograph is taken, therefore, a number of decisions have already affected the outcome of the final photograph.This is why it is said so often that there is no such thing as an objective photograph. The photographer already builds the attitude and tone and mood into the photograph. The only photography that avoids these rules are passport photography and photography done by police because of a crime. In these two instances, things are seen just as they are and minimize the photographers discretion and ensure uniformity.In the processing and post-processing stages, a variety of techniques can be used to alter the print, inc...
