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Photographer Fired For Digitally Altering Photo
bewert writes "A sign of things to come? Is this kind of thing happening without anyone catching it? This short article notes that war photog Brian Walski was fired for combining elements from two photos to make one with 'better composition'.
Here is the 'Editor's Note' detailing the transgression. It's not really highlighted on their front page ;) I wonder how often this type of Photoshopping is done without anyone noticing it? To paraphrase Pink Floyd, "Mother, should I trust the government?"..." Another submitter points out an article examining digitally altered magazine covers. Slashdot has done several stories on unnoticeable digital alterations; here's 1, 2, 3 old stories to peruse.
If this were an artistic piece for a magazine, no problem. Hair on Christie Brinkley's upper lip, no problem.
A war photo that is altered so the depiction is inaccurate is unacceptable on any scale. There is not concrete place you can draw a line and say "this much alteration is okay, but this much changes the story".
News commentary can be editorialized by any anchor. Pictures and video have alway been held in higher standing for thier direct integrity. This will rais equestions.
The point is that _anything_ doctored cannot be considered news. If that became standard practice it would be so easy to abuse.
Pictures are taken as evidence to be an exact representation of what they are looking at. If you can't trust pictures in a newspaper or magazine, you can't trust the newspaper or magazine, period.
This was definitely the right decision.
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to paraphrase Pink Floyd, "Mother, should I trust the government?
While I respect your taste in music -- HUH? The guy was an LA Times photographer. Nowhere does he state that he has any affiliation with the government. The modification in question does not actually change much in the photo (I do NOT deny that it is wrong, just stating that it is not in any way propoganda IN THIS CASE). Don't blame the government for EVERYTHING.
In other news, Kudos to the times for catching the guy, and also for admitting and publishing the "error."
Photography is already biased enough depending on what you LEAVE OUT of the photo, or how you juxtapose certain elements, or use telephoto to change the size-distance ratio of objects. Use a long enough lens, and it looks like the kid running across the street is about to be bowled over by the tank, when in fact the tank is a block away.
Anything other than news photos and it's fair game.
It's a slippery slope. Once it's OK to alter photos as long as you preserve the "theme," all that's left is for a newspaper with a deluded idea of the "theme" of a photo to seriously alter a photo's contents. This already happens all the time with quotations being taken out of context and having phrases parenthetised for "clarity".
I strongly disagree for two reasons. One is that the paper already had a stated policy of no alterations, period. Once that policy has been adopted, they have to follow it. Two is that they chose the right policy. There has to be a bright, obvious line between what is allowable and what isn't. If you let a photographer alter things for artistic effect then somebody has to sit there and decide in each case whether the changes are just artistic or if they've distorted the truth. Only by having an objective standard of no alterations at all can you avoid that problem.
There's no point in questioning authority if you aren't going to listen to the answers.
Yes, the modifications were mostly compositional, but there is a *very good reason* for the L.A. Times banning the alteration of photos: because once you do it, the only difference between minor compositional alterations and ones that change the content in more significant ways is *just a matter of degree*. In other words, once you cross that threshold, the amount of alteration or significance of the alteration that is permissible is only a matter of judgement, a moving line in the sand. Banning such alteration of photographs outright shows good judgement by the publisher and demonstrates their commitment against the falsification of photographic evidence.
Of course, this does nothing to prevent completely staged photographs, but at least it's something.
I think the real problem with the unannounced altering of photos is that it has the ability to alter the meaning of a situation. I'm somewhat amazed at any discussion that argues that this is alright to do in any way, such as when the alteration does not change the fundamental nature of the shot.
The danger in allowing such discussion to breed is that it opens photographs to subjectivity. The editors alter photos to make them more dramatic, create more of an impact. But they are forging an image that did not exist in reality!
Altering photographs without providing a notice to the viewers allows the editors to become part of the story, enhancing and molding it, providing their own subliminal opinion, rather than reporting on it and allowing the reader to make up their own judgement. It's my opinion that media opinion and prejudice is already pervasive in news reporting worldwide, not just in the U.S. media.
We do not need any more opinions in our news, especially when those opinions are disguised as fact. If the situation wasn't dramatic enough, then it doesn't deserve to be 'pumped up' for our modern senses.
In one picture, the soldier is waving his hand and the guy with the baby is ignoring him; in the touched up one, the baby-carrier is looking at the soldier. That's a significant difference - what is this soldier doing, and is he getting any respect? In the first picture, it looks like his hand is up just to counter-balance himself as he's walking. In the composite, it looks like he's waving at people and they are dutifully following his orders.
I was the main non-sports fotographer for a newspaper in college & talked with my editor about this. Sure, you can digitally take out something as simple as a fence that's blocking a view, but then that implies that there is no fence to block the view (and thus no security/privacy barrier). And that's not the truth.
So, I agree with the editors here. No manipulation should be tolerated at all. The covers of magazines are different, though (and legally recogonized as different, too) - they serve as an attraction to buy the magazine, and not news reporting.
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Rember O'Reilly made his name on inside edition, a tabloid news program. This is why Fox another tabloid news outlet loves him. No one thinks hes a intellectual hes just the clown of the moment, and any one watching Fox news has probably never heard of PBS let alone watched it.
As a former journalism student and someone who has been in print a few times in High School and College, I think I can say what part of the Big Deal is.
Journalism is supposed to be accurate and unbiased. In practice this rarely happens, but the theory is there. The paper has a policy forbidding the modifying of photos, and they enforce it.
It's similar to the honor code many schools use. Cheating only hurts the student in the long run, but it can still get them kicked out of the school.
The point is the moral and ethical code. Journalists have a moral imperative to report the truth, and any modification, any stretching of the truth is a step down a slippery slope towards outright lies and falsehoods.
The photographer was fired for good reason. A modified photo is fine as a piece of "art" but as journalism it brings the entire publication's integrity and honesty into question.
I could go on, but my hope is that the majority of the people reading this thread realize that what the photographer did was a violation. It's not like photoshopping a playboy shoot to remove a pimple. This is falsifying the news. It's a small fake, a minor tweak, but it's still presenting falsehood as reality.
And before you make a wise ass reply about the fallacy of journalistic integrity in the real world, keep in mind, I did say "In practice this rarely happens".
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I bet some of the cameras being used by the photographers don't have "red eye" reduction....
C'mon folks, let's look at this more critically.
Ok... red eye reduction removes something that wasn't there originally. Unless the person you took a photograph has bright red eyes you are removing something that the camera artifically inserted into the image. The same goes with removing lense flair, colour balance correction, etc. This is *totally* different than manipulating the image by adding or subtracting content.
If anything, the altered photo is propaganda for the military, not those opposing the war. The real picture on the right shows a soldier seemingly pointing a machine gun of some kind at a man carrying a young child. The real picture on the left shows the gun pointing over the heads of people sitting down but also shows the soldier motioning the man with child to sit down just as the man starts to stand up or approach the soldier. The fake picture shows him motioning the man (now standing with child in arms) to sit down; the gun is pointed away from the child and the soldier is motioning the man to sit down.
If they had used the real photo on the right, it would be a picture of an American soldier pointing a gun at a man carrying his child. It is vaguely reminiscent of the photo of the guy pointing a gun at Elian Gonzales when the took him from Florida in the sense that it shows one of our boys pointing a gun at a young child.
The altered photo shows the soldier slightly more relaxed, the gun isn't pointed at anyone and the child is not in immediate harm at all.
It is subtle, I'll grant you that, but the original could have been much better propaganda for the anti-war crowd.
If the gun were pointing at the man and kid, you would be seeing the back end of it, not the side. Guns can't shoot out of the side. Just letting you know. Neither picture has the gun pointed at anyone.
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Sorry, a photograph, as in silver nitrate can be manipulated in the dark-room so why is anyone suprised about digital manipulation. The only difference is the process is faster and less smelly.
As regards journalisitic integrity, I'm sorry but there is none. Most journalists give the reports that their employers want, i.e. "Is there anyone here who has been raped who speaks English?". Of course they only tell the truth but it is a keyhole view of the truth. Both the original photo and the presentation can change the perceived meaning 100%.
The second one (without the boy) is obviously faked, and rather poorly. Some obvious indications:
Look at the grassline underneath the tank. See the regular vertical bands on the concrete wall just above the grass and below the tank. Those lines fall in direct line with both the blocky pattern of the grass as well as small brighter higlights on the underneath side of the tank (look closely). Obviously stamping the same pattern across the image, but the stamp includes the grass, the wall, and part of the tank; a dead giveaway.
On the front edge of the tank where the transition is to the underneath side there is a row of attached square reactive plate armor. Notice that above each is what looks like a horizontal hinge. Now on the second image those plates which fall behind where the boy should be have no attachment "hinge". And there are two out of place half-width plates where all other plates are more nearly square. Also the center outer block is missing...it would seem a lot easier to take this out than to put it in.
Now look at the ground which lies behind where the boy's legs would be. There is a very definite line-pattern there that looks sort of like tread marks, but is too regular. It certainly doesn't match the texture of the rest of the dirt. Also at the angle in which the light is shining any horizontal tread marks, if there, should be pratically invisible. And you can also see the same block repeated several times...way to regular to be real.
As for the first image, it's not as clearly a fake as the second. But there are small indications which look like some attempt was made to burn (lighten) parts of the tank underside, perhaps to provide more contrast? As another reader pointed out, the boy's empty hand has an unusual lightness to it as if a brush was swiped across it. Also the darker halo around the boy traces his outline fairly well, but especially under his armpit there is a clear circular curve where you can almost tell the exact brush size that had been used. Of course film optics can also produce this halo-like effect in certain light, so it's not clear cut.
Of course this begs the question (if my analysis is correct), the second image where the boy was removed is definitely unethical for news reports. But is it unethical to do minor corrections such as white balancing, darking or lightening incorrect exposures, etc as maybe was been done to the first?