Where There's Smoke There's Fire

Reuters is a well-respected United Kingdom-based news service that provides reports from around the world to various newspapers and broadcasters. However in August 2006, Reuters was involved with an incident that greatly marred their reputation.

A photograph released by Reuters News Pictures featured smoky buildings in the Lebanese city of Beirut after an Israeli air raid. Thanks to online bloggers it was discovered that the smoke in the photo had been (quite poorly) altered using Photoshop (see below).

Reuters Original Photo

Reuters Manipulated Photo

As a result of the active bloggers in the public sphere, Reuters received over 200 emails from readers who had discovered the altered image. As a result, Reuters quickly fired Lebanese freelancer Adnan Hajj after discovering the photographer altered the image of the Israeli-Hezbollah conflict.

In an attempt to salvage any remaining reputation, Reuters Global Picture Editor Tom Szlukovenyi stated that, “there is no graver breach of Reuters standards for our photographers than the deliberate manipulation of an image.”

Upon further investigation, Reuters pulled 920 of Hajj’s images from its archive and found that two of them had been digitally altered. The fact that Hajj had manipulated two of his photographs ultimately meant that none of his images could be trusted or accepted as a truthful depiction of reality. Though Reuters worked diligently to fix the situation and the bad press surrounding the incident, the fact that the news service published that photograph in the first place had a lasting effect on the reputation of the company.

That same month, Spanish newspaper El Nuevo Herald also published an altered image that combined a freelancer photo with an Associated Press photo to suggest Cuban police officers were ignoring prostitution. However, this story received very little press and flew under the radar of the blogosphere. As a result of no active citizen engagement, none of the editors or designers of the newspaper faced suspension for the image.

The case of the manipulated Reuters photograph exemplifies how citizen engagement in mainstream media holds news producers accountable for the information that they present. Likewise, when citizen engagement does not happen, as with the case of the Spanish newspaper El Nuevo Herald, media corporations are not held responsible for the misrepresentation of reality and as a result the unsuspecting public may never learn the truth.

Are Doctored Images in Style?

A second prominent area of photographic manipulation in mainstream media is in fashion magazines. Many fashion magazines employ the use of stylistic photo alterations to make fashion models appear the way in which corporate executives want them portrayed. Fashion magazines routinely employ the use of airbrushing to reduce the appearance of cellulite, blemishes and other skin abnormalities, as well as cropping and further alterations that make models appear thinner than they actually are. The photographic manipulations in these magazines have overwhelmingly resulted in poor body image and unrealistic appearance expectations for its readers.


The first example I have for you is the January 2003 cover of GQ Magazine which featured a digitally slimmed actress Kate Winslet (see left). When asked to comment about the magazine cover, Winslet said that the retouching was "excessive." "I don't look like that and more importantly I don't desire to look like that. I can tell you that they've reduced the size of my legs by about a third", said Winslet.

The quote by Kate Winslet makes it evident that fashion magazines frequently manipulate images without the consent of the people they are portraying. Fashion magazines take the prerogative to alter body parts to the image they want to portray as the ideal body size/shape/colouring, etc. This type of photo manipulation has a grave effect on the hundreds of thousands of women and young girls that read these magazines every year. Instead of magazines presenting realistic body images, they depict unrealistic and unhealthy body shapes that gravely affect women's self esteem. In the instance of fashion magazines, the misrepresentation of facts through the manipulation of photos deeply effects people on a personal level.

As a second illustration of the presence of photo manipulation within the field of mainstream fashion magazines, was a Ralph Lauren ad a few short months ago. In October 2009, Ralph Lauren received a lot of (deserved) flack in the press about an advertisement featuring a stick-thin model (see right).

When asked to comment on the ad, major fashion designer Ralph Lauren admitted to "poor imaging and retouching" of a stick-skinny model used in a magazine advertisement that had set the blogosphere abuzz. A Ralph Lauren representative was reported to say, "We have learned that we are responsible for the poor imaging and retouching that resulted in a very distorted image of a woman's body," and "We have addressed the problem and going forward will take every precaution to ensure that the calibre of our artwork represents our brand appropriately."

What's particularly interesting to note with this example is that the controversy surrounding the advertisement started when the blog Boing Boing posted the ad of model Filippa Hamilton with the caption, "Dude, her head's bigger than her pelvis". The blog was soon notified that Ralph Lauren would seek legal action if they did not take down the photo and comments, and a legal battle pursued.

The point of this example is firstly that fashion magazines and fashion designers do not hesitate to warp images of women to feature in their magazines and ad campaigns. Media often mold the shape of women into a stick-thin, cookie-cutter shape which has grave effects on young girls and women. Fortunately, as with the example of Ralph Lauren, blogs are beginning to take interest and serve as watch dogs to the overwhelming practice of photo manipulation in fashion magazines. The Boing Boing blog is an excellent example of a blogger, or group of bloggers, that saw the unrealistically skinny image of the model as a betrayal of truth for society, so decided to make the active assertion to make people aware of the situation. The rise of these types of watch dog blogs and bloggers helps to discredit the numerous misrepresentations in mainstream media and helps the public discover the truth. The public sphere is a better place and a more realistic interpretation of the truth because of watch dogs.

Photographic Deception in News Media

News media is a particularly compelling area of contestation for photographic deception. Below are two prominent examples of ways in which popular mainstream news media have deceived their audiences by altering images. The first is the June 1994 TIME magazine cover of OJ Simpson, and the second are photos of New York Times journalists altered for a Fox News broadcast.

June 1994 had media around North America abuzz about the arrest of OJ Simpson (an American football player) on murder charges. The OJ trial was plastered all over the news at the time, as well as numerous other mainstream media outlets. One medium received a particularly high degree of attention, but unlike other news sources, people looked to this medium for the way in which OJ was portrayed...inaccurately that is.

The June 1994, just a short time after OJ Simpson's arrest, the previous football player appeared on the front cover of TIME magazine. However, the photo of Simpson was greatly manipulated from the original mug-shot photograph that appeared (unaltered) on the cover of Newsweek magazine (see below):


TIME magazine was subsequently accused of manipulating the photograph to make Simpson's skin colour darker to make him look "menacing". By TIME magazine darkening the skin colour, it was implied that they were trying to connote any fears against the African-American population. By making his skin "more black" the magazine attempted to allude to the high black crime rate in the United States, drawing on any racist connotations against blacks and visually darkening the image to make it look dirty and dingy. By doing so, TIME magazine was attempting to draw on human emotions of race and crime, to ultimately produce a dramatic and more compelling front cover to the magazine.

What are the implications for the reader? Skewed imagery leading to skewed opinion and information. TIME magazine manipulated its readership through the act of manipulating the photo of OJ. Through that photo manipulation, TIME magazine marred its reputation in being a reputable news source, and instead established itself as a mainstream media source that publishes deceptive information. As hard as TIME may have tried to clean up the bad press from that news story, their readers won't have the same trust in the news magazine. Once mainstream media loses the trust and respect of citizens, it is very difficult to get it back.

More recently, the popular news broadcaster Fox News was found guilty of manipulating photographs of their competitor in July 2008. It was discovered that, in response to a New York Times story that suggested the Fox network’s ratings might be slipping, the co-hosts of “Fox & Friends” broadcasted photos of Times reporter Jacques Steinberg and editor Steven Reddicliffe (see right). The photos were doctored to make the journalist appear less attractive with changes in skin tone, teeth colour and dark shadows around the eyes to make them appear beady.

When questioned about the incident, a Fox spokeswoman said the executive in charge of “Fox and Friends” was on vacation and not available for comment but she tried to smooth over the incident by stating that altering photos for humorous effect is a common practice on cable news stations. However, the question remains: how does this type of photographic manipulation affect their citizen viewership, as well as the credibility of their news broadcasts?

When Fox News made the conscious decision to alter the photos of the two New York Times reporters, they also made the conscious decision to deceive their audience. When photographs are altered, mainstream media are no longer being honest to citizens and as a result citizens lose trust and reliability in mainstream media. The photographic alterations that were played off to be a joke between news media, have a lasting effect on the viewer as one learns that they must be critical of everything that is being presented to them. And contrary to the hopes of news broadcasters, this is how citizens lose hope and trust in news media.

It is interesting to note the shift in the presentation of manipulated photographs in mainstream news media over the years. In June 1994, the altered photograph of OJ Simpson on the cover of TIME magazine was shocking and citizens were horrified that news media would deceive them in that way. However, in July 2008 the altered pictures of the two New York Times journalists by Fox News were more or less taken in stride. This proves that society as a whole is losing trust in their news media. Perhaps it's a positive thing that people are now being more critical of the news, no longer accepting information as it is presented and taking an active interest in the pursuit of the truth. Yet at the same time, it is pathetic that society has to dodge so many instances of misinformation that are being presented as truth by popular mainstream media. At this point, I doubt that mainstream media will be able to win back the credibility they once had.

In Other News...

Dear fellow bloggers,

Check out this great e-magazine:
http://www.wix.com/therevolutionwillbe/The-Revolution-Will-Be

The magazine is called "The Revolution Will Be", and takes an interesting look at the emergence and increasing popularity of digital reading and e-books. This month's issue includes such articles as: "The Loss of Haptics in a Digital World", "The Rhetoric of Death in the age of Digitization" and "Mortal Combat".

The rise of digital reading brings the issue of mainstream media's manipulation of photographs into the lime light. As more and more people are obtaining their information online, a digital world that often goes without moderation or fact-checked, the reader has to be increasingly aware of what they are reading and viewing online.

Will e-magazines and e-newspapers be a reliable news source? It's easier for online photographs to undergo many alterations, even after being published, so how does this affect our grasp of information and truth? The internet is a seemingly limitless web of information that we have to take critically.