Yeah, it's complicated. On the one hand, you have dodging and burning, which were often used in actual darkrooms and are still used by respected photojournalis

Yeah, it's complicated. On the one hand, you have dodging and burning, which were often used in actual darkrooms and are still used by respected photojournalists to increase the impact of their photos. [0] Then you have things like this: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Adnan_Hajj_photographs_controversy http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Adnan_Hajj_photographs_controve... Where clumsy and obvious use of the clone tool damaged the reputation of an entire news organization. The AP standards and practices strikes an interesting balance [1]: AP pictures must always tell the truth. We do not alter or digitally manipulate the content of a photograph in any way. The content of a photograph must not be altered in Photoshop or by any other means. No element should be digitally added to or subtracted from any photograph. The faces or identities of individuals must not be obscured by Photoshop or any other editing tool. Only retouching or the use of the cloning tool to eliminate dust on camera sensors and scratches on scanned negatives or scanned prints are acceptable. Minor adjustments in Photoshop are acceptable. These include cropping, dodging and burning, conversion into grayscale, and normal toning and color adjustments that should be limited to those minimally necessary for clear and accurate reproduction (analogous to the burning and dodging previously used in darkroom processing of images) and that restore the authentic nature of the photograph. Changes in density, contrast, color and saturation levels that substantially alter the original scene are not acceptable. Backgrounds should not be digitally blurred or eliminated by burning down or by aggressive toning. The removal of “red eye” from photographs is not permissible. [0] http://www.poynter.org/uncategorized/14840/a-photojournalistic-confession/ http://www.poynter.org/uncategorized/14840/a-photojournalist... [1] http://www.ap.org/company/news-values http://www.ap.org/company/news-values