In a recent exercise you manipulated a photograph of a musician to
make him look more handsome and more traditional. And you have just
modified a picture of elephants to make them look like wild elephants. In both
cases you are guilty of fraudulent image manipulation or 'fauxtography'!
It is easy to manipulate photographs with powerful
software like Paint Shop Pro with the intent of deceiving people, and
since this practice is becoming more common it is worth a special page.
The most important thing is for you to ask yourself "how acceptable it is
to modify photographs in order to change the viewers reaction to the
photo?" Is it OK to use Paint Shop Pro to modify the photo you took of
Grandma by removing or softening some of the wrinkles in the photo? Is
it OK to modify the photo of the house you're trying to sell by
replacing the gray Belgian sky in the photo with a much-less-typical
blue sky taken from another photo? (This is a fairly common technique
used by Belgian estate agents.)
A number of photographs that have
appeared in the media in recent years have turned out to be fraudulent -
they had been modified to make them more dramatic or to manipulate the
truth. Some examples:
The first photo below was
obtained by Agence France-Presse - it shows the
test-firing of some missiles somewhere in the Middle
East.
It was used on the front pages of The Los Angeles
Times, The Financial Times, The Chicago Tribune and
several other newspapers as well as on BBC News, MSNBC,
Yahoo! News, NYTimes.com and many other major news Web
sites. Look at the photo carefully
- does it look suspicious in any way?
Some people noticed that the pattern of stirred-up
dust on the ground under the two rightmost rockets
is very similar and the smoke patterns under the
middle two rockets are also very similar. You may
also be able to detect that the sky around the third
rocket seems a little too light in colour? Here are
the suspicious areas highlighted:
A confirmation that the image had been fraudulently
manipulated came when the following photo came to
light. It was clearly taken from almost the same
location at almost the same moment as the first
photo but shows only three rockets in the
air. Conclusion? One of the rockets had failed to
fire so the photo was manipulated to hide this
fact.
Image manipulation (e.g. to make women look more beautiful) is common
practice in magazines. The magazine makers claim that this is OK because
their readers are smart enough to know that most of the images have been
manipulated, but are the readers really that smart? The animated image below shows the
cover of
Redbook magazine, July 2007 and the original. How many differences can you spot?
The above photo shows 1999 Scientology event in Los Angeles. It shows
clear evidence of Photoshop "cloning." In the cloning technique, details
in one area of a photo are copied and then repeatedly pasted in another
area to fill space. In this photo above, the cloning was used to copy
individuals (see woman right of red patch) and repeatedly paste them to
expand the audience.
A hoaxer took an existing photo of Obama, see top image, and added a
cigarette. The Photoshopped image, on bottom, circulated the Internet
during the 2008 campaign. Barack Obama, a former smoker, admitted to sometimes lighting up a cig
or two during the stressful campaign, but this photo is a fake.
Another president, Mr. Nicolas Sarkozy, was photographed canoeing in August
2007. The photo was modified by Paris Match magazine before they
published it...
Celebrity culture and sales require ageless beauty...even if it has long faded. My Pinoy Humor
Blog apparently found some "before and after" images of a recent photo
shoot of Madonna...
Spot the difference between these two pictures of British supermodel
Twiggy, both taken recently when she was 59. The manipulated photo on
the left was used in an advertising campaign for Olay cosmetic creams.
The one on the right was not altered, and shows Twiggy at her local
supermarket.
According to an article in the Daily Mail, airbrushing expert
Michelle Facey of Facey Media said the amount of work done to wizard
away the signs of aging in the advert picture was 'a sham' and 'totally
misleading to the customer'.
Finally, here are two photographs showing General Dunwoody, the
highest ranking female military officer in the US Army. In the original
photo she is sitting at a desk with a bookshelf behind her but the
altered photo, distributed by the army and initially sent by the
Associated Press news agency (AP) to its clients around the world, shows
General Dunwoody against a background of the stars and stripes. When the
digital alteration was discovered, AP immediately withdrew the photo and
began an investigation. AP says that adjusting photos and other imagery,
even for aesthetic reasons, damages the credibility of the information
distributed by the military to news organizations and the public.
The video below (not accessible in school) shows an interview with a
photographer who explains how magazines almost always manipulate photos.
A November 2009 article in the French newspaper 'The
Connexion' reports that a French MP has proposed a law requiring that
images that have been touched up by computer should carry a clear
warning saying that they have been altered. 50 MPs have already backed
the plan. Publishers ignoring the disclaimer would face fines of up to
37500 Euros. Would you be in favour of a similar law for Belgium or the
UK? Do you think that such a law could be applied effectively?
