Master Photographers International / Friday, May 19, 2023 / Categories: MPI NEWS

MPI Co-Founders Announce New Awards

This past while we have mentioned we are adding another great competition and we are now ready to let you know what is coming.

This past 6-10 months we have all seen how quickly things are changing within the photographic industry. Artificial Intelligence (AI), has hit the market and has entered with such a big bang that it has overwhelmed many of us, especially the true professional photographers and photographic artist. We have been following many group chats and have seen how upset many are with AI coming to market. We as well were one of those and confused as this was not photography. 

After a while, and when I saw some amazing work created from AI, mostly text to Image, We started to view the whole AI Explosion in a different manor. The work created was simply amazing and flawless in most cases, so why do we not look at this differently…… Please keep reading.

Most of us agree with what AI is doing is not photography, correct? Then let’s all help GUIDE IT to the correct industry, and the correct industry for this is the ART INDUSTRY.  Yes, it a form of art and not photography. It is the vision of an artist that tells a machine to create it for them, or It is one of your photographs that you tell a machine to complete your vision by adding text.

Unlike Photography, a photographer uses their vision and available light along with their tools and their technics to complete the process. Photography can also become an art, but it is mostly an interpretation of what we see.

We have included from our research on the Greek word for Photography.

HISTORY OF THE NAME OF PHOTOGRAPHY
Created from the Greek words “phos,” meaning “light” or “to shine,” and “graphe,” meaning “to draw” or “to write,” the compound literally means “to paint with light.” Interestingly, other suggestions by scientists and photography pioneers at the time included “heliography,” from the Greek for sun (“helios”), literally “sun-printing” or “sun picture.” This term is now used to describe an earlier photographic process using light-sensitive metal plates.

We can see that AI is definitely not photography. Does it use photography to start, it can, but, it is not photography.

SO, WHAT IS IT?

After a long 6-month process of researching it, talking about it, seeing many argue, cry and also seeing the beautiful work that comes out of it, We would like to announce that we, and we hope others agree, have created a new term for this type of art.
 

We have created the term and would like to include AI as VISIONOGRAPHY. Here is how we came to this conclusion that AI be called VISIONOGRAPHY.


THE MEANING OF VISIONOGRAPHY WAS CREATED FROM,  
"ography is "a combining form denoting a process or form of drawing, writing, representing, recording, describing, etc., or an art or science concerned with such a process:

biography; choreography; geography; orthography; photography.

 

As you can see, AI ART works perfectly with this new term/word as it is created from a vision. We hope other photogrfaphic organizations follow and not not honor photographic degrees for this incovential method for photography. 

Other forms or art can also be included in VISONOGRAPHY and in the IV Awards are CGI and 3D Rendering, painted art, even composites that bring together images to create a piece of art.

With all this, we would like to introduce the new INTERNATIONAL VISIONOGRAPHY AWARDS, or many will be referring to it as the IV AWARDS.

The IV Awards will NOT be a part of the MPI International Imaging Competition (IIC) which is a photographic competition and a registered photographic program. The IV Awards are for the artist at heart who is dabbling with more than photography.

We do not believe that AI should be part of any Photographic Competition other than on a very minor scale.

The IV Awards have been created by the co-founders of MPI. The Call for entries will open in June/Summer 2023. We are still working on the some details as we prepare to bring this to the many excited to enter. 

We have started a group, and if this interest you, please join the IV Awards group and follow the IV Awards page. We will be talking more of the IV Awards in that group. With the IV Awards group, you can also share your AI and other art that the IV Awards will be accepting. 

This should now give many of our members and others both alternatives. The MPI IIC is a Photographic Competition and the rules with AI will be a bit tougher as we work towards upholding the integrity of the MPI IIC Program and Awards. We believe this will facilitate within the industry to uphold the meaning of true photography.

We do have one more question we would like to ask for the new IV Awards – trophies or cash? I now cash be spent quickly and gone, and trophies can last. What is the consensus?

IV AWARDS WEBSITE
IV AWARDS FB GROUP
IV AWARDS FB PAGE

Written by
Tula Edmunds
MPI Co-Founder