How did we fake photos before Photoshop?

[acc24ex]

http://io9.com/5942658/how-did-we-fake- ... t=52615572

cute article, conclusion: almost the same techniques are used today only with paper and glue and a lot of equipment and a lot more time

and in the end a photo is still subjective, and does not present reality, firstly it the style of the photographer, a mood that he wants to achieve, and then taking pictures which are out of context, missing the whole picture - so basically that is as fake as a render - although renders are in essence trying to be a hyperrealistic picture - where photorealism means you are painting something from a picture, and painting something realistic from your brain technically means it is hyperrealistic

-actually when you compare a photo to a render - render could be more related to painting, and photography (from Greek φωτός (photos), meaning "light", and γράφω (graphos), meaning "written") you are writing light (actually that is the same thing unbiased rendering engine does calculating photons based on a modelled scene and lights), but to achieve a render you need a scene set up - so it's 3d is like painting and photography combined

-now this lead me to a question, is 3d modelling really the same as painting - since I really cannot draw a straight line (I seem to lack a natural talent for drawing on paper, although I started improving after learning 3d modelling, and want to learn more since there are obviously great advantages learning how to draw on paper) .. but drawing on paper is also faking it - after I discovered two and three point perspective it became immediately questionable to me - is it faking, are those just tricks - why draw those fake lines when I can do it in 3d more naturally?, where we are playing with virtual lego cubes, building environments or digital clay modelling something complex that is almost real and you could feel it with a haptic device - obviously both techniques require from us a learning curve and some talent - and a lot of time learning tricks - and yes there are tricks in all of these - either in 3d or painting or drawing or photography
nevertheless I discovered after spending a lot of nights testing rendering options and stuyding light, I just started to notice all the complex lighting and shadowing that happens in real life or color bleeding and caustics, but still I cannot force myself to draw such complex stuff by hand since it would take me a long time to learn the technique to achieve the same result as a 3d render..

- one thing I noticed about octane, and unbiased engines - which is actually obvious if you think about it: it records the light the same way a camera would - and not he way our eyes see - our eyes actually see in full blown HDR and camera does not, so a simple lamp in a room cannot light the whole room properly with a camera, and our eyes are much more sophisticated and adapt to lighting conditions better - so we need to fake photos in order to correct it to what our eyes see

It seems like all of these are actually the same thing, painting, photography, 3dmodelling - only 3d sounds so computery, or CG see gee.. doesn't sound as nice as painting, because CG means robots did it - that's a general perception of things - it is just not as "real" as a photography or drawing/painting not so analogue - I am guessing now, but it was probably the same way when photography was first invented - all the top painters frowned upon photography saying, it is not the real thing - there were probably a lot of jobs lost due to that - less work for the people who earn a living out of taking portraits - as photography is faster and cheaper to produce..
.. is 3d now taking jobs out of photographers hands? .. actually it probably is - it is a lot cheaper to hire one person to recreate a model of a product where you only need a computer, than to hire someone to take a photo - where you need a studio with lights and a camera and someone has to carry the product around (if its big you pay for transportation), and if the product is a prototype expenses rise - someone has to create a model - and when animations come in mind - you probably need a crew of people which end up lifting the costs - but basically we are now using all of the presented techniques to get stuff done - there are no textures without photography (OK you can use CG textures, but almost always they dont look as real), and still you have to photomanipulate the textures and the final render..

- so the conclusion: it's just a technique > the end result is the purpose
and all of this stuff combined can save time, speeding up the process

still none of the older techniques died - apart from the ones that are obsolete - actually, yes some techniques probably died - because you can now do it faster or easier or cheaper with something else so it is pointless (unless it is a artistic expression) - a chisel and a hammer? That will never die out.. we still use techniques from when the first caveman started to build tools, so these are all just tools: computers, photos, paints - only a main defect to digital tools is that they require electricity - so in a end of day scenario with a strong EM pulse - you would end up using the analogue again - so it's best to be familiar with all of the tools anyway

- but in the end, does it depend on the technique that we use, or the result - would a michelangelo's david sculpture be less valuable if he modeled it in zbrush and than reproduced with a CNC robot arm that would chisel away a block of stone instead of him (still, he uses "tools") - or is the difference is on the "inside" - finding a way for the artist to see the sculpture inside a block of stone - which I have no idea on how it is done, but I guess he also used a lot of tricks and a technique on how to achieve a sculpture that he envisaged..