Smoke billows from burning buildings destroyed during an overnight Israeli air raid on Beirut’s suburbs August 5, 2006. Many buildings were flattened during the attack. REUTERS/Adnan Hajj
This photo appeared on Saturday, and, being from Reuters, was widely used in the media. Only, it doesn't look right. See all of those repeating elements in the smoke? Smoke doesn't do that.
It's not just the smoke either.
Professionals became convinced that this photo had been doctored. Reuters agreed, and pulled the photo.
A Reuters photograph of smoke rising from buildings in Beirut has been withdrawn after coming under attack by American web logs. The blogs accused Reuters of distorting the photograph to include more smoke and damage.
The photograph showed two very heavy plumes of black smoke billowing from buildings in Beirut after an Air Force attack on the Lebanese capital. Reuters has since withdrawn the photograph from its website, along a message admitting that the image was distorted, and an apology to editors.
In the message, Reuters said that “photo editing software was improperly used on this image. A corrected version will immediately follow this advisory. We are sorry for any inconvience.”
Reuters’ head of PR Moira Whittle said in response: “Reuters has suspended a photographer until investigations are completed into changes made to a photograph showing smoke billowing from buildings following an air strike on Beirut. Reuters takes such matters extremely seriously as it is strictly against company editorial policy to alter pictures.”
“As soon as the allegation came to light, the photograph, filed on Saturday 5 August, was removed from the file and a replacement, showing the same scene, was sent. The explanation for the removal was the improper use of photo-editing software,” she added.
Earlier, Charles Johnson, of the Little Green Footballs blog, which has exposed a previous attempt at fraud by a major American news corporation, wrote : “This Reuters photograph shows blatant evidence of manipulation. Notice the repeating patterns in the smoke; this is almost certainly caused by using the Photoshop “clone” tool to add more smoke to the image.”
Worst Excuse of the Decade
LONDON, Aug 6 (Reuters) - Reuters, the global news and information agency, told a freelance Lebanese photographer on Sunday it would not use any more of his pictures after he doctored an image of the aftermath of an Israeli air strike on Beirut. ...
Reuters withdrew the doctored image on Sunday and replaced it with the unaltered photograph after several news blogs said it had been manipulated using Photoshop software to show more smoke. Reuters has strict standards of accuracy that bar the manipulation of images in ways that mislead the viewer.
“The photographer has denied deliberately attempting to manipulate the image, saying that he was trying to remove dust marks and that he made mistakes due to the bad lighting conditions he was working under,” said Moira Whittle, the head of public relations for Reuters.
“This represents a serious breach of Reuters’ standards and we shall not be accepting or using pictures taken by him,” Whittle said in a statement issued in London. Hajj worked for Reuters as a non-staff freelance, or contributing photographer, from 1993 until 2003 and again since April 2005.
Some suggestions of what the original may have looked like pre-dust removal.
Now it's emerged that the same guy may have been familiar with this sort of stuff.
Really, you'd think he'd have been better at it with so much practice.
People have been a little on the scathing side about this. Who has sympathy for a cheat?
Possible originals:
Reuters claims this is original:
Probable actual original - dated from July, this was an Associated Press picture, by Ben Curtis, a different photographer! The cheating SOB didn't even take the cruddy original.
Of course, I wouldn't go so far as to exhonerate Reuters, who've been accused of yet more duplicity:
http://drinkingfromhome.blogspot.com/2006/08/extreme-makeover-beirut-edition.html
http://powerlineblog.com/archives/014919.php
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