Fake film photography...busted!

Luckless said:

1) It very much IS the reporter's job to decide what facts to include when writing an article, and what is unnecessary or irrelevant to the issue at hand. This is why you very rarely read about the peeling paint or scuff marks in a room where someone gives a press release.

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But it is not his job to change the facts underlying his story in an attempt to satisfy his sense of what that story should have been. And that includes trivial facts that he has already made a part of the story. Reporters are not fiction writers.

Luckless said:

2) You argue that there is some great and magically difference in the reporter snapping a photo now and editing it, vs snapping a photo 10 seconds later, and they would produce a pair of photos of which you would have no way of telling apart, and you want to argue that this matters.

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The source of the underlying authenticity in a true photograph has to do with its realization without the need for intervention by the hand of man. Post-creation editing breaks that chain of authenticity. No doubt you will read those words and recoil. But the basic facts of nature (chemistry, physics, optics, etc.) which underlie that assertion are sound, if one is willing to look closely enough and think clearly enough and not be sidetracked by what one thinks one knows for a fact. Maris' earlier posts in this thread touch directly upon this area.

I'm not going to take it any deeper here. If I so much as mention the term provenance again I risk the long-time membership rising up in revolt from the dread of having to listen to it one more time. Try searching for my name and that p-word. You will find chapters and volumes of deeper discussion and analysis. Try searching for Maris' name and you will discover a whole new library wing on the same topic, just far more eloquently stated than my own humble efforts to explain.

Luckless said:

3) My argument has been that it is illogical and serves no purpose to froth at the mouth and attempt to lynch photojournalists who use the tools at their disposal to produce a clear and honest image of the subject matter at hand, while pretending that an 'unedited photo' is magically somehow more honest and truthful. Along side that is my argument that we should be holding photojournalists to a Higher standard of honesty and ethics by providing images which best represent the events, and not pretending that a reasonable usage of photoshop actually has an affect on this.

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Yet again... Who's clarity? Whose honesty? Yours? How do I know I can trust you? How do I know that because you didn't see a problem with removing a foot back then, that you also won't see a problem with removing the Hollywood sign later? Or have no problem removing heads and swapping them onto different bodies in the future? You roll your eyes and tell me that would not be honest. But again... Who's definition of honesty?

Advocating for the ethical is not frothing at the mouth. Although I'm beginning to think that it may be pissing in the wind...

Luckless said:

4) This is holding photojournalists to an arbitrarily different standard than others. Newspaper articles aren't published straight out of a reporter's notebook. Phrasing is reworked, information is dropped, additional information is sought if they feel they are coming up short on something. Editing is done. We don't demand to see a reporter's notebook, and then call for their metaphorical lynching when we spot a difference.

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Your reasoning moves like the proverbial herd of cats. Yes, writing is more a process of information aggregation over time, while photography is more a process of instantaneous (or close to it) information recording. Choosing an angle for a story is analogous to choosing an angle for the camera. Both are intended to choose one path to the exclusion of others.

But the issue here is not about how or why the facts are recorded. It's about not changing those facts AFTER they are recorded. It is expected that reportage writers will not change the facts in a story. It is expected that reportage photographers will not change the facts in an image.

Luckless said:

5) Is it 'cheating' if you used a different lens and obliterate part of an image through depth of field? Is it 'cheating' if you snap dozens of photos and then only provide a select few? A photojournalist's job is to provide a clear and objective view of what they are reporting on, and as such it is my belief that we should expect them to do just that with the tools they have available to them. It is up to the photographer to use their tools wisely and honestly. This is NOT supporting wild and unrestricted use of photoshop.

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Nor is it excluding it. And therein lies the problem. If you leave that door open, people will walk through it. Guaranteed. That's why ethical standards are so important. They serve to put people on notice with a common set of expectations before they consider misbehaving. And even when firmly in place the fellow in the article said there were still so many unethical (altered) entries in the sports category that they could not even award a third place.

I think your desire to leave the definition of the term ethical behavior wide open to each individual's interpretation is wildly naïve at best, and within a news reportage context dangerous at worst.

Luckless said:

6) "What might be done..." is a slippery slope fallacy. You can apply the exact same "What might be done" arguments to completely unedited photos. "What might be done if..."
- You stage a photo?
- Claim a photo is of something other than what is actually happening?
- Use strong bias in what you do and do not photograph?

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Staging is not unacknowledged altering after the fact.
Claiming is not unacknowledged altering after the fact.
Using strong bias is not unacknowledged altering after the fact.

The unethical behavior by the photographer in the original article concerned unacknowledged altering after the fact.

Luckless said:

You do realize that all of my arguments have been about changing to focus to real ethical practices, and breaking down the illogical current views that anything photoshop is always bad, and that it can never be trusted. Many in the world have settled on a horribly arbitrary black and white view on the matter. A photojournalist who abuses photoshop to present something that does not accurately represent the events is of course no different than any other journalist who outright lies in their reporting.

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<sigh...>

Who determines "real" ethical practices? And who determines the fake practices? You? What if others disagree with you? Do we banish them? What if they wish to banish you instead? Without an agreed upon framework of ethical behavior, everyone is right. And everyone is wrong. And no one can trust anyone.

Luckless said:

However the set of all photojournalists who use photoshop is not the same as the set of all photojournalists who abuse photoshop.

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And absent a confession from any one of them, please tell me how I can know the difference. You seem to believe you have a foolproof sense of true honesty when it comes to judging the abuse of honesty by others. How do you tell them apart when all you have to look at is the image they show you?

Luckless said:

Also just because something has been done, or that it is currently the widely accepted view, doesn't mean that it is actually right.

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Given that we are discussing honesty and ethics, this scares me...



Ken

Old-N-Feeble said:

This is not necessarily true. Some cultures want and ask for photographs of funerals, wakes and of their deceased. I personally think it's a bit morbid but it's never been a part of my culture. It's very possible the photographer was either invited or was welcomed after offering to take photos. Posed? Maybe... maybe not.

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I understand what you mean, but it's a deathbed portrait. Here you have all the "mourning woman", all dressed in black etc. and this is not something of interest to persons belonging to "those cultures". Some people want to have a recollection of the dear extinct, they are not interested in documenting for some other people their own funeral practices.

miha said:

It's not about whether the picture was posed or not, it's about the manipulaton Smith made later in his darkroom: Dead Link Removed

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I think everybody agrees that manipulations in the darkroom (dudging, burning, "stressing" certain elements of the image) is perfectly admissible in a picture that, from the start, was "posed" and was, therefore, something like a painture.
Besides, it is generally accepted that dodging and burning are OK, it's eliminating unwanted picture elements which is not OK.
In this deathbed picture, a disturbing element might even have been eliminated (a nail on the wall which reflects light, let's say) without altering the "authenticity" (or "message" or "documentary value") of the image. In an image sent to a newsfeed that would have been inadmissible. It's not that nails are important. It is that there are some rules and they have to be abided.

This discussion reminds me of the Wicked Bible.

In 1631 (?) a bible was published, in England, with an insignificant, common, three-letter word removed from the text.

This was probably accidental, but could have been an edit to save room on the page, to improve sales potential, or to twist the message (as is done by unscrupulous "journalists" at times).

Thus, by squeezing out the word "NOT", the seventh (or sixth) commandment became "THOU SHALT COMMIT ADULTERY".

Even a tiny detail can make a difference.

"Photography is, or can be, a most intellectual pursuit. In painting or sculpture or what not, the sensitive human hand aids the brain in affirming beauty. The camera has no such assistance, unless of course, the process after exposure has been interfered with, and hence ruined, by manipulation, manual dexterity."

— Edward Weston, The Daybooks of Edward Weston, January 15, 1926

Diapositivo said:

Photojournalism has nothing to do with photography as form of artistic expression. Changing the elements of a picture is like changing the transcript of a politician's speach in order to make it shorter, or clearer, or different from what it was. Adding or removing elements is taboo however "insignificant" the element.

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thanks you diapositivo !

having worked in the field i appreciate the post ...

it is too bad he hadn't stepped a few inches to the right ( or left ) ...

Well... my personal favorite journalistic manipulation is this one...

ic-racer said:

Oops! I guess not...the original image, prior to becoming a fake film photograph:

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anything worth faking is worth doing.

Faking the "film look" is worse than fake lens flare and is worthy only of my contempt. Clearly I'm the most influential person in photography so my opinion matters.

miha said:

Are you serious? It's a grand reportage, financed by Life Magazine. Smith included several European countries, and dedicated 2 months to Spain alone.
The man pictured is dead.

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And was starting to smell.