Having assisted a photographer who spent weeks coming up with ideas for and planning sometimes single photographs we traveled like 100km to take, a both very gifted and work obsessed person, I am absolutely firm in "not being a real photographer" even though I do have somewhat of an eye for it, if I may say so myself. That's not to belittle what I or others do, but my way to tip my hat. I cannot use one word to conflate all that, she paints with light, she thinks long and hard about what she will paint and how she will do it, she knows her palette, and doing right by what ever is going on in her head as well as she can consumes her. I am not that way, and I doubt the people who make most of the photos we see on the web are that way.

And yes, she could do that 100% digitally too, she uses digital if need be, and the big frame camera stuff she scans anyway, to mangle in photoshop. She just also spent her nights in the dark room she had built in her apartment ^^

Have you ever met someone who is passionate about dancing? The kind that kills your knees by the time you're 30? Imagine saying to them "oh, I'm a dancer too", just because I sometimes dance at home or at the club. In a sense, yes I'm a "dancer", in another, heck no. And the distinction I'm looking for isn't covered by "professional photographer" at all.

Oh, and I also feel that way about the "music" I make with trackers. I put it in quotes not because I don't listen to it for hours on end with a grin on my face, but because I just derp around until I like the result. I know how seriously in contrast I take the lyrics I write, that's an entirely different game; but the "music" really could be the way I make it or a million other ways, I don't care too much. I'm easy to please and lazy in that regard. Everybody has to decide that for themselves, I'm not trying to delineate "serious art" or define "art" in general, but still, if you'd call me a musician I'd say that feels subjectively wrong, I don't want that label, it's a bit too big.