Is this a real photograph?

Here you define by your understanding of how a camera works, and the truth of the scene. It is a photographic image because it uses a photographic process. Though it is fairly representative, in terms of colour/contrast it is enhanced and modified to convey a certain aspect of that reality, not all of it. Anyone researching the popularity of religion in the early 21st century might be misled. :-)

In years to come the meaning will change in the same was as if we looked at an old glass plate photo and see it as representative of the time rather than the truth of the object which it invariably was when it was first taken. It's an odd concept that we find it difficult to relate your photo of a static (and older) cathedral to how it looked in the mid 19th century and hard to relate a sepia tone glass plate image to how it looks today.

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A photograph is the image created from the light captured by a camera during a single shutter actuation.

That is an opinion, not an established fact.

What data are you basing your opinion on?

Photographs, as defined earlier, can be combined into an image, not a photograph.

There is still no definitive answer to the question posed by the thread title, just a variety of opinions.

We're just talking about the common usage of words in the English language, of course it's subjective.

And because it's subjective, as you correctly say, threads like this one can only go round in circles proving my earlier point that all you will ever get is a variety of opinions in reply to Nigel V's thread title question, not a definitive answer. -

Surely with the subjective it's the discussion that's of importance and the definitive answer that's pointless? I don't think we're going round in circles, plenty to think about.

That's just your opinion.

Defined where? Oh! Your definition! But that's just another opinion, as you say below.

"The word, "photograph" is a conjunction of Greek words and means 'mark produced by light'".

By definition, one image, two images or more, of the same scene, combined, still create a photograph. Where the photograph drifts from being a photograph is when excessive pp alters the scene - something you know a lot about.

Even Alan earlier asked if the question in the thread title is important.

By having a discussion that can at best only come up with a variety of opinions and not a definitive answer to the thread title question then I see that discussion as just going round in circles and nothing more.

That's quite a good definition.

By definition, one image, two images or more, of the same scene, combined, still create a photograph. Where the photograph drifts from being a photograph is when excessive pp alters the scene - something you know a lot about.
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Yes, this is a good definition, probably the most accurate. If I combine several exposures of the same scene with the camera fixed in one position, I am still just recording a mark made by light. You are right again when you say a heavily PP photograph, with things cloned out or colour relationships heavily exaggerated becomes an image.

The question is of some importance to some people. For example they may want to explore different definitions, discuss them and, if they can, come up with an agreed consensus. Very often this may not be possible, but it doesn't mean that they shouldn't try. And it can be good for "exercising the brain", improving one's logical thinking, etc

You seem to have already decided on your definition and it probably isn't going to change whatever anyone else says - in which case wouldn't be more sensible to state it once and then bow out unless you have something extra to add?

And what's wrong with going round in circles - some pay people pay good money to just that at fun fairs, etc?

Tim

I think that several exposures of the same scene with the camera fixed in one position is several "marks made by light" and is therefore several photographs, not "a photograph". If those several photographs are combined in any way, the result is an image of the scene but not "a mark made by light".

Pardon the pedantry.

I am not the only one who has stated their opinion more than once in this thread.

Let's see if they listen to your advice.

Let us take the story one step forward. Not a great picture, but it was an experiment to explore the usefulness, of hand held HDR. Yes, it works if you are careful with framing. I did not have my tilt shift, so I have added perspective correction into the mix. We see a buildings vertical walls as being vertical, as our brain carries out its own corrections. The dynamic range was well beyond any single shot with a digital camera. Shooting for highlights would probably mean noisy shadows. Here are three steps. The three frames are combined. Secondly verticals are corrected, and thirdly with masking and colour corrections, I brought the shot closer to what I experienced.

With my Z7, I set the bracketing menu, and self timer to 10 seconds, which fires of the three bracketed shots in sequence, automatically.

Our brain compensates for keystoning and very high dynamic range. The finished image is more "photographic" than the component parts, due to the fact it is closer to what our eyes record.

The final shot of the Austrian fortifications on the Reschenpass, between Austria and Alto Adige, in Italy

I believe these programs work by using the properly exposed frame and add the underexposed frame to increase DR in the highlights, and the overexposed frame to add detail into the shadows. I get a feeling we are not getting three frames simply mingled into one. Maybe sombody knows how these HDR programs work.

That is effectively repeating your original post but with a different example of combining 3 photographs into a single final image.

The HDR programs take for each element in the scene what they consider to be the best "exposed" corresponding element from the individual bracketed photographs and blend them into a single final image.

Just as with the image in your op, some will see the blended final picture as a photograph and some will see it as an image, not as a photograph.

And so how would you know if you didn't have the technical explanation alongside it? Is there any real difference between a "photograph" and an "image"? This is the trouble with photo forums, we define photography by our technical understanding of cameras and so our definitions depend on technical details that are largely invisible to the vast majority of observers viewing photos. Not a very useful definition.

Notre Dame, attributed to anonymous 1852. Are the streets empty because it was early in the morning and there was nobody around or is it because it was shot with a slow emulsion and therefore moving figures are rendered invisible? What is the truth, who would you ask, does it really matter, does it mean that you can't tell if it's a photograph or an image without more technical details?

Do all photographs go in the pending tray until you are furnished with the numbers for you to "correctly" label them?

Seems like nonsense to me.

You wouldn't know, obviously.

That is why I posted earlier that imo all photographs are images but not all images are photographs.

Hence in the absence of knowing how a picture was created I normally refer to the picture as an image, not as a photograph.

As I posted earlier, any difference depends on one's chosen definition of "photograph".

I posted my definition earlier and so yes, there can be a difference between a photograph and an image.

I tend to agree with you in so far as threads like this can only go round in circles with a variety of opinions on whether any particular picture is a photograph and/or an image.