Posted on 08/08/2006 5:22:54 PM PDT by mdittmar
NEW YORK Gary Hershorn, a photo editor for Reuters, explained today why the news agency withdrew two altered photos, and then hundreds of others by the same photographer, earlier this week – and also described Reuter’s policy on Photoshopping images.
Hershorn, whose title is news pictures editor for North America, said he did not believe the freelance photographer, Adnan Hajj—now dismissed by the agency—made his changes for political effect. "I believe he was trying to take a picture and make it better rather than trying to take a picture and make a statement," Hershorn told National Public Radio in an interview aired today.
That doctored picture showed thick, black smoke rising over buildings in Beirut after an Israeli airstrike, while the original had less smoke and a lighter tone overall. Bloggers had posted observations that it looked like a Photoshop “cloning” tool was used.
The second photo showed an Israeli jet releasing three flares – while the original photo showed one flare.
Referring to the smoke photo, Hershorn told NPR, "This one slipped through the system. It just came in. A photo editor looked at it and coded it and sent it to our clients."
He explained, "a photographer is never allowed to change content. Reuters has zero tolerance to doctoring photos this way. You can't add information; you can't take away things."
Later, at a Reuters blog site, Hershorn went into technical details about the standards:
“News photographers routinely process images using Adobe Photoshop software. But there has been a basic premise in the world of photojournalism that what was allowed in making prints in the pre-digital days of darkrooms is all that is acceptable today.
“Back in the days of the darkroom, we used very basic tools to develop prints. In black and white printing, the contrast of a picture was controlled by a paper’s grade. The higher the number of the paper, the higher the contrast. In the wire agency darkooms I’ve worked in, we typically used grades 3,4 and 5. We allowed ‘dodge and burn’ to lighten or darken areas. A dodge tool was made by taping a small piece of cardboard the size of a quarter onto a paper clip. A burn tool was a piece of cardboard the size of an 8×10 sheet of paper with a hole in the center.
“If a print had dust spots caused by a dirty negative, we used Spotone, a photographic paint that was dabbed onto a print with a very fine paint brush to eliminate the unsightly marks. One other tool that was allowed when printing color pictures was changing color balance. This was done by placing filters between the light source of the enlarger and the paper that the image was being printed on.
“When we moved to scanning negatives and then to shooting digital, we began using Photoshop. This program allows us to do the same things we did in the darkroom. Changes in contrast, dodging and burning and color balance are now done with software.
“The most controversial tool in Photoshop that we use is the cloning tool. The only accepted use of this tool is to clear dust from the image. We have a zero tolerance policy when it comes to using the cloning tool to change content, and by that we mean removing something that exists in a photo, moving or replicating it or adding to a photo.
“The tools we use in Photoshop are levels, curves and saturation for changing contrasts; and, color balance to bring the image back to the way the natural eye would see the color….Photoshop is a highly sophisticated image manipulation program. We use only a tiny part of its potential capability to format our pictures, crop and size them and balance the tone and colour. For us it is a presentational tool. The rules are – no additions or deletions, no misleading the viewer by manipulation of the tonal and color balance to disguise elements of an image or to change the context.
“Photoshop is a powerful image processing program with many more tools to help photographers produce the best quality image they can for the type of photography they do. There is not a Photoshop program for use by news photographers and another for advertising, where image-changing is tolerated. What we in the news photo community need to regulate is what tools are used for photojournalism and what are not.”
To be fair, Charles Johnson at LGF had posted the word several hours earlier this afternoon. He should get the credit for coining the word.
Or he'll just pick a new name.
OK...THANKS to LGF Johnson!!! It's now in the lexicon...FAUXTOGRAPHY!!
Mirrors are supposed to be out of the way when the "film" is exposed. Dust on the lens would be way out of focus and cause a sharpness problem. I find the "dust" argument to be specious at best.
Professional quality Digital SLR's (single lens reflex) cameras have the capacity to use various focal length lenses, wide-angle, telephoto, zoom, etc. During the lens changing operation, both the mirror and digital sensors are subject to dust intrusion, especailly in a war zone. However, almost all have sonic dust 'puffers' just for the purpose of removing the dust. I'm more amused by the claim of working under 'bad conditions'. If he could power up his lap top and see the backlit screen, he could see enough to know exactly what he was doing. Another lying POS jihadi 5th columnist. so to speak.
All righty. Thanks and a tip o' the chapeaux to Charles Johnson at LGF!
The question is, in addition to the altered images, how many photo shots were staged and overseen by Hizbollah minders.
I have never had dust spots on negatives or prints from dust on lens or mirror.
Being soooo stupid about this stringer reporter's motivations and actions;or lying about the same.
Of course speaking to NPR he is "preaching to the choir"
Rueters and AP have always sickened me.Now we know they are complicit in all the anti American activities.
Remember this little episode from the U.N.?
Reuters Explains Photo Of Bush Bathroom Note
September 15, 2005
...[Gary] Hershorn, Reuters' news editor for pictures for the Americas, says he's responsible for zooming in on the note and deciding to transmit the photo to Reuters clients. He says Wilking didn't know what the note said when he shot the picture.
...Out of curiosity, [Hershorn] zoomed in to see if he could read it.
Once he saw what it said, Hershorn decided the note was interesting and worth publishing. The white parts of the picture were overexposed, so a Reuters processor used Photoshop to burn down the note. This is a standard practice for news photos, Hershorn says, and the picture was not manipulated in any other way.
...Hershorn says he decided to transmit the picture because it was interesting.
"There was no malicious intent," he says. "That's not what we do."
http://www.pdnonline.com/pdn/newswire/article_display.jsp?vnu_content_id=1001137642
Dust might transfer from the mirror to the light sensing array
So what is their explanation for the triple flares and the wailing actress?
Or he'll just pick a new name.
...If a print had dust spots caused by a dirty negative...
How do you get a dusty negative with a digital camera?
OK, that post is Aug. 8, at 8:07 PM, but it was on LGF at 4:38.
Credit where credit is due.
Yup. See #41 and #46
From The Urban Dictionary:
the crappy pictures of the sky or dead plants that scene kids take with their digital cameras and call it a hobby. They say photography is their passion, but we all know it's really fauxtography. Wow, a picture of the sky. And I see you went on paint and added your name with a TM. Now no one can steal your fauxtography. tags photography digicam fake pointless trendy by JF. NJ Apr 23, 2006 email it
"Now no one can steal your fauxtography"
Heck, it's been stolen several times here!
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