Photo Manipulation! Photo manipulation or photo editing is the application of image editing techniques to modifying photographs, through analog or digital means. Uses, cultural impact, and ethical concerns have made it a subject of interest beyond the technical process and skills involved. History In digital editing, photographs are usually taken with a digital camera and input directly into a computer. Transparencies, negatives or printed photographs may also be digitized using a scanner. Photos can also be obtained from stock photography databases. With the advent of computers, graphics tablets, and digital cameras, the term photo editing encompasses everything that can be done to a photo in a darkroom or on a computer. Photo editing is most commonly subtle (e.g. alterations to coloring, contrast, so forth), but may be explicit also (e.g. overlaying a head onto a different body, changing a sign's text). Image editing software can be used to apply effects and warp an image in whatever way possible until the desired result is achieved. Sometimes, after photo editing, the resulting image has little or no resemblance to the photo (or photos in the case of compositing) from which it started. Before computers, photo editing was done by retouching with ink, paint, double-exposure, piecing photos or negatives together in the darkroom, or scratching Polaroids. The 1980s saw the advent of digital retouching with Quantel computers running Paintbox being used professionally. Silicon Graphics computers running Barco Creator became available in the late 1980s which, alongside other contemporary packages, were eventually replaced in the market by Adobe Photoshop running on the Apple Macintosh.