This was the 2013 World Press Photo of the Year, a shot of a number of casualties after a bombing in Gaza. The event itself wasn’t fake, but as one tech expert figured out, the photo was ‘Shopped.
UPDATE: World Press Photo is denying these allegations, and spoke to some independent experts, who found no manipulation outside of normal post-production.
The National Review ran a magazine cover in which they Photoshopped signs at an Obama rally to read “ABORTION” instead of “FORWARD” as they originally did.
The top image shows the October 1, 2012 cover of “National Review” magazine.
The image at the bottom shows another photo taken at the same rally.
When Photoshop is used for evil.
Shop’s been dropped: Seventeen magazine’s editor-in-chief Anne Shoket, bowing to the pressures of fourteen-year-old Julia Bluhm’s 84,000-signature petition, agreed to stop photoshopping the girls featured in her magazine. The new “Body Peace Treaty” makes a pledge to diversity within the magazine regarding body shape, size and skin color. In an interview with NPR, Shocket assured listeners Photoshop would only be used to fix errant strands of hair or acne blemishes to “make you look like you would on your best possible day.” Excellent work, Julia. source
» So which one’s the best value? Let’s do some quick math — if you’ve never purchased the Adobe Creative Suite before, you supposedly have to pay full price. Most people don’t need every single app, but let’s say you’re naïve and you think you do. At $2,599, that’s not particularly cheap, but $50 a month for the same thing doesn’t seem so bad, right? Well, Adobe comes out with a new Creative Suite every year or two. In two years, you’re paying $1,200 for the same apps that cost twice as much in full. But what, you say the upgrade on the next version of the Master Collection is $525? If you upgrade immediately at every iteration (most people don’t), logic suggests that over a seven-year span, you’ll pay less by buying outright. But only if you’re buying new — if you’re upgrading (most people are), the cloud deal isn’t worth it in any way, whatsoever. It’s worth noting that students get a really good discount — $29.99 a month — on the cloud deal. (Edit: Here are a couple more thoughts on the matter of cloud pricing; also corrected the price of the student package, which is $29.99 per month)
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I’ve been posting hundreds of photographs online every month for nearly four years now, and this is the first image I’ve posted that has verifiably been manipulated. Photo manipulation of this kind is unacceptable under my, and The Atlantic’s, guidelines and principles. I try my best to publish only what I believe to be honest representations of people and events. But in some cases, as here, the alteration can go unnoticed for years — until enough eyes come into play (the fantastic magnifying effect of the Internet) and unseen details start to emerge.
Many thanks to Donna Meiss, Ken Oye, Ernie Smith, and everyone else who caught this issue and brought it to our attention. The photo will remain in place in the original photo story here, with a prominent link back to this article, explaining the whole story.
Taylor talked to AP, who said it was an unacceptable attempt to clear up some lens flare on the photo. Check over here to see our role in this saga. And thanks to Squashed, who pointed out the manipulation in the first place.
Tonight, spurred by a tweet I was sending along, I took a second look at AP for more details on this 1991 photo, wrongly claimed to be from over the weekend and later debunked as Photoshopped. There were some questions as to why a photo of this nature would be manipulated, and I think I have an answer. I went back to the link I posted yesterday and noticed the AP link was now broken. Weird, I thought — it worked fine yesterday. So then, I did a fresh search and found this photo, which is nearly the same as the one In Focus ran in December. I did a compare and contrast and noticed a red blotch that wasn’t there before. And a different date on the photo — March 19, 1991, not March 10. I compared it with the photo from In Focus, and there was some definite photo manipulation going on — see the bottom four images. However, I can firmly say that the AP photo I downloaded on Sunday did not have this blotch — so The Atlantic is in the clear, this is all AP. The photo that was manipulated appears to have been removed from the archives and replaced with one that hasn’t. In the end, it’s not full deception, but an attempt at cleaning up imperfection. — Ernie @ SFB
woodbro-chillson asks: A bit confused about the photomanip: The picture from The Atlantic, which has been proven manipulated, looks exactly the same as the one you alter posted originally from 1991 AP. Those same parts that were proven edited exist in the 1991 AP's picture too, could it be this image was always manipulated and doesn't exist unedited?
» SFB says: That’s exactly what I’m saying. I.E. this photo has been manipulated for over 20 years, and we’ve basically been able to prove that it’s been manipulated since before Photoshop was in wide use and has existed in the AP archives for a couple of decades. Which is kind of an amazing thing to discover. — Ernie @ SFB
Our reader squashed threw this in a reply to that fake Russia crowd post, confirming that the picture is in fact Photoshopped:
Looked at the big version of the photo myself and confirmed this using pixel matching. Will send a note to Alan Taylor of the Atlantic about this photo. EDIT: Here’s the original photo on AP.
On the top is a photo of a snowy egret trying to nom on a great egret’s recent grab — a frog. To the right of it is a photo taken moments later that shows the frog in a much better angle. Unfortunate they both couldn’t be in the same shot, right? Apparently photographer Bryan Patrick thought the same thing, because he allegedly merged the two photos together into one. Problem, is, a reader caught the Photoshop job, and now Patrick is out of a job this morning. “After The Bee published a correction and apology online Wednesday and in print Thursday,” the paper wrote in an apology this morning, “editors reviewed a selection of Patrick’s work and found two additional digital alterations that violate The Bee’s standards.” Patrick did a very bad no-no for photojournalism. (top photos from The Sacramento Bee; newspaper photo from KXTV)
Check out the before/after of Adobe’s new deblurring (magic?) technology.
Crappy photographers, Adobe has answered your prayers.
Fat Cats on Wall Street, the Tumblr.
Finally.
Well, that’s it. The Internet’s over. Everyone shut down your computers and go home.
True story: A 40-minute-old Tumblr steals our hearts.
In part because we were inspired by this hilarious image, we fixed the Hasidic newspaper’s handiwork, to get the best of both worlds (male and female) going. Der Tzitung is lucky we were bored and in the mood to play with Photoshop.
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