Rich,
It must be extremely difficult for editors to evaluate images coming in from "witnesses" and "caught on tape" situations. I believe they are a valuable supplement to the news and should be used. There must be a workable strategy for publishers to adopt. I presume there has been serious discussion in the media trade journals, etc. about how to do this. The issue must create a lot of resistance and professional distress among the staff shooters.
TV news isn't shy about using anything that comes there way. Have they decided that TV viewers are more likely to think critically about pictures than readers?
-------- Original Message --------
Subject: [SPAM] Re: Not to pour gas on fire, but...
From: Rich Mason <cameratraveler@xxxxxxx>
Date: Tue, April 24, 2007 7:54 pm
To: List for Photo/Imaging Educators - Professionals - Students
<photoforum@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx>What are you saying, that the news media should abandon their policies of not allowing manipulations? That it should become a free- for-all where anything goes and no picture should be trusted? I think the possibility of getting fired is fairly good incentive for not retouching photographs, at least for staff and freelance photographers. Before the digital days when a newspaper received a photograph from someone not on staff it was easier to keep these mistakes from happening. Now it's not as simple. Perhaps newspapers should adopt a policy of examining the EXIF data on photographs from non-staff photographer sources to see if any manipulation has occurred. If there's any doubt they should not publish the picture until they have seen the original. This would be similar to the way film was handled when I was a staff photographer and lab tech--except in rare circumstances, such as historical/family pictures, we worked directly from the negatives or transparencies. Rich Mason On Apr 24, 2007, at 1:08 AM, Alberto Tirado wrote: > So, what good is the NYT policy if the photo ran > anyway? The photo was *not* from a staff photographer > in the first place. So may I be so bold to insist: we > might as well never have found out, and then what! http://richmason.com
