Wardrobe Malfunction: President's Tie Produces 'Moire' Effect on TV

Newhouse News ^ | 4/15/2004 | Dru Sefton

[Incorrigible]

Wardrobe Malfunction: President's Tie Produces 'Moire' Effect on TV BY DRU SEFTON

WASHINGTON -- Necktie patterns can behave in strange and mysterious ways on television. President Bush's tie at his Tuesday evening news conference is a case in point.

His selection, navy with small white dots, produced a moire (pronounced mwa-RAY) effect. Simply put, that's when a pattern being photographed interferes with the grid pattern on television screens, creating an eerie, shimmering visual.

Call it a wardrobe malfunction.

Many viewers puzzled over the phenomenon.

Nancy Mathis, a former television anchor, was watching when her phone rang. It was a friend who said, "Oh my God, it looks like his tie is on fire!"

Mathis knew exactly what the caller meant.

She now heads First Take Communications, a Washington, D.C., media training firm, coaching politicians and others on how best to get their messages across in important public appearances. As far as neckties go, some small patterns "end up having a life of their own" on camera, Mathis said. "And if it's something that distracts the viewer, it detracts from the message. The bottom line is, if you want to look solid, wear a solid."

She added, "I'm really curious as to why they didn't look at that tie on camera ahead of time."

A White House spokesman said the president's choice of ties "is not something we generally talk about."

But tailor Georges de Paris, with a shop near the White House, is very familiar with that tie. He said the president purchased it from him.

"It is a wonderful tie, he has worn it before," said de Paris, who has clothed presidents for 40 years, since Lyndon Johnson.

The tie is de Paris' own design, a fine silk with "very teeny polka dots." If it looked different on television, he added, "it's because of how the light reflects off of it."

It's a bit more complex than that, said Kenneth Brecher, a Boston University astronomy and physics professor who heads Project LITE (Light Inquiry Through Experiments), teaching students about light, optics, vision and perception. In physics-speak, the moire effect is "a beat frequency between two other frequencies creating an interference pattern," Brecher said.

Think of two transparent pages, each with an identical grid of lines. Place one transparency on top of the other and line them up; it appears as one pattern. Skew one slightly, and there's another pattern.

Moire is French, meaning "watered pattern," Brecher said, because the effect sometimes shimmers like it's wet. The phenomenon was discovered by British physicist Lord Rayleigh in the late 1800s.

A TV camera pixelates images, "producing dots in rows to create the picture," Brecher said. The dots are horizontal, which interfered, in this case, with the dot pattern on Bush's tie.

Voila, moire.

(For an animated example of moire, go to www.bu.edu/smec/lite/moire/moire_rot2_5.html)

April 15, 2004


(Dru Sefton can be contacted at dru.sefton@newhouse.com)

Not for commercial use.  For educational and discussion purposes only.

[1Old Pro]

Odd, I never noticed this. But Ted Kennedy's face always looks blood red on my TV.

[Doohickey]

I watched the press conference on Fox with DirecTV. I didn't notice any problems with the tie.

[kdot]

JFnK's face does that all the time.

[berserker]

[Paul C. Jesup]

Okay, but I suggest you look for a 4:3 ratio 32 inch HDTV; some DVD's play their Widescreen subtitles in the lower black bar.

[KarlInOhio]

Don't use one of these as a necktie.

[FourPeas]

W *singing*:

I closed my eyes, drew back the curtain
To see for certain what dems thought they knew
Far, far away the dems were keeping
But the world was peeping -- any tie will do!

I wore my tie with little white dots
Just like the good zots, wonderful and due
And in the truck their eyes were hazing
The dots were phasing -- any tie will do.

[bondjamesbond]

Yeah, he walked out and I saw the tie and just did one of those "head slap" takes. I've never been on TV in my life, and I would know better than to wear that tie. Doesn't anybody check these things at the White House?

That said, I liked just about everything else about the night. Except the last time he got the "any regrets" line. I would have turned that around and said that if I did have any, I would not state them in that forum, since that would become the story, which would be counterproductive. If they asked the question again, I would have broken out with Sinatra's "My Way".

[NotJustAnotherPrettyFace]

Nobody should ever wear herringbone anything when on TV. It REALLY goes wild with the pixels. Norm Van Lier, former player with the Chicago Bulls, does commentary for them now - it drives me crazy when he wears herringbone-pattern sportcoats.

[zx2dragon]

Digital satellite + Sony WEGA tv=no problems with viewing

[So Cal Rocket]

REPORTER: Mr. President, you said during the debates in 2000 that your worst mistake was trading Sammy Sosa. What would you say your worst mistake has been during your presidency?

PRESIDENT BUSH: Wearing this trippy tie.

[aculeus]

I thought everyone knew by now that you don't wear houndstooth, checks, tiny stripes or anything the camera reads as houndstooth, checks, or tiny stripes, when dressing for TV.

The latest no-no is yellow teeth. All the television professionals have pearly whites but many of those they interview haven't had a whitening job and look so very ... English.

[isom35]

Bush promises to find "Weapons of Moire Destruction"

[mattdono]

Well, actually, there were several FREEPERs that joked about that on the live threads. The best one

The tie is to hypnotize morons. The left will believe.

Check out some of the funny tie comments here, here, and here.

Perhaps this would have been better...

P.S. I just love the look on his face in this picture. It is like he already know something...because he does.

[Tamzee]

The man looks good in cowboy gear OR moire malfunctions.... Kerry looks like a cadaver even with Botox ;-)

[El Gran Salseron]

Moire, my butt.

Up the french.

The American and technical word is "strobing."

[KnutCase]

Where did he buy the 4 giant ties behind him?