Reuters admits to more image manipulation

[Phx_Dem]

News organization withdraws photograph of Israeli fighter jet, admits image was doctored, fires photographer. Reuters pledges 'tighter editing procedure for images of the Middle East conflict'

http://www.ynetnews.com/articles/0,7340,L-3287774,00.html

[Atman]

1. Who the hell are Reuter's photo editors?

Both the doctored photos shown so far have been so OBVIOUSLY Photoshopped, I cannot imagine what the hell kind of photo editor reviewed them and green-lighted them. Unless he is an editor sympathetic to one side. Reuters: News for Fascists.

(Edited for clarity)

[Spoon]

6. Interesting

So your theorizing that Reuter's editors allowed Hajj's manipulated images to run, with the purpose of pulling them and discrediting any future pics of the carnage?

That's a hell of a circle, but possible I guess.

Not sure that I agree that they were obviously photoshopped. I never in a million would have known, and I'm still not 100% convinced they were even manipulated.

[Atman]

7. Did you see the first photograph?

The first one is so obviously faked it is laughable...the "smoke" billowing from the buildings looked like floor tiles, with the pattern repeating itself over and over again. I've seen first-timers more adept at manipulating the clone tool.

BTW, I admit that my logic represents a hell of circle, and I also admit it probably wasn't the most well thought-out position...but once I read it in your words I found myself thinking that it didn't sound much different than BushCo planting fake stories in the news in order to discredit the media in general. Dan Rather, New York Times come to mind.

The fact is, I've grown so cynical when it comes to the actions of any of the current world leaders and so-called "opinion makers," that nothing sounds too far-fetched anymore. Except, perhaps, the idea of George Bush stepping up to a podium and telling the truth to the American people. In complete sentences.

[sendero]

10. Another scenario..

.. would be that they thought they'd get away with it. You know, sort of like damn near every Republican in our government.

[Frank Cannon]

24. Funny how all these bogus PS jobs reflect bad on Hezbollah

Believe me, I absolutely have no dog in this fight. I wish a pox on BOTH Israel's and Hezbollah's houses. But these Photoshops have been SO amateurish, so laughably obvious to even a novice Photoshopper like me, that there is NO way that anyone put these in the media to convince people that Israel was doing bad things; they were put there to convince people that someone was LYING about Israel doing bad things.

This has the typical Rovian reverse-propaganda stamp all over it. A good rule of thumb is not to believe anything you see in the corporate-owned media. In fact, believe the opposite. It's just that bad, people.

[sendero]

25. I haven't seen anything....

.... larger than a thumbnail of the "smoke" picture. If anyone has that image I'd sure like to see it - I'm a middling photoshopper myself and now I'm curious as to just how lousy the job is :)

[Frank Cannon]

26. Here's a link to the photo thread from yesterday

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=show_mesg&forum=102&topic_id=2439767&mesg_id=2439768

I haven't seen anything larger than a thumbnail of the "Israeli rocket" picture, but you can still see clearly how an idiot chimp had fun with the clone feature in Photoshop. No one else would think someone would be fooled by that.

[sendero]

28. Well...

... I still only see a relatively small image, but I get your point. The repeating pattern in the smoke is ridiculously amateurish, its pretty amazing that a photo editor wouldn't spot it.

Ok, I agree that the PS job is a joke. I could do better than that in a matter of less than an hour, and I'm by no means advanced at it.

[IndianaGreen]

27. Like the Bush was AWOL papers given to CBS

something that could easily be refuted so that no one would ever bring the subject back up again.

[LuckyLib]

37. ITA. Why are we surprised? It's ALL manufactured. On many levels.

[mtice]

38. Reflecting badly on Hezbollah

Hezbollah is a fascist, religiously fanatic organization that uses the Nazi salute and aims to exterminate all Jews everywhere. Do you really think someone needs to create a grand reverse-propaganda conspiracy to make them look bad? Doesn't what they do as the very purpose of their existence make them look bad enough to any fair-minded person?

[Frank Cannon]

48. I'm a fair-minded person, and Israel and Hezbollah BOTH suck

Every day both sides continue the fighting and slaughter of innocents, they suck even harder.

This lameass Photoshop job was to convince people like me that one side is worse than the other. Nice fucking try.

[smitty]

46. Sometimes things happen without Rove instigating them.

Unless you believe Rove is out there personally hiring Lebanese double-agent stringers to work for Reuters.

[soaky]

47. i think they were highlighting the methods as rovian

not insinuating that rove was actually behind this

[Frank Cannon]

49. That's right

Although I doubt Karl Rove was behind this, the technique is well known and much associated with him.

It's sort of like the West Coast offense in football. It's not just used on the West Coast.

[Marie26]

8. You mean

an editor sympathetic to Lebanon, right? Otherwise it's a little paranoid to think that this is some insidious Israeli false-flag operation.

[Atman]

9. Yes, that is what I meant.

Sorry. Dumb mistake.

[Tandalayo_Scheisskopf]

13. I agree.

A quick blowup of the picture would reveal pixel deformations that would give away manipulation. What do the photo editors at Reuters get paid for and why?

[The Straight Story]

33. I am making a guess on the answer here:

Photo editors get a ton of shots, don't examine them all real closely, and just rubber stamp when they get busy. THIS is a busy time. Lots and lots of photos rolling in, no time to really check em all out, and some might have been submitted as thumbnails, etc.

[Renew Deal]

18. The guy in question was a Lebanese freelance photographer

I guess professionalism wasn't part of his job.

[GemMom]

21. Related story: Reuters withdraws all photos by Lebanese freelance

http://www.alertnet.org/thenews/newsdesk/N07348592.htm

LONDON, Aug 7 (Reuters) - Reuters withdrew all 920 photographs by a freelance Lebanese photographer from its database on Monday after an urgent review of his work showed he had altered two images from the conflict between Israel and the armed group Hizbollah.

Global Picture Editor Tom Szlukovenyi called the measure precautionary but said the fact that two of the images by photographer Adnan Hajj had been manipulated undermined trust in his entire body of work.

"There is no graver breach of Reuters standards for our photographers than the deliberate manipulation of an image," Szlukovenyi said in a statement.

"Reuters has zero tolerance for any doctoring of pictures and constantly reminds its photographers, both staff and freelance, of this strict and unalterable policy."

The news and information agency announced the decision in an advisory note to its photo service subscribers. The note also said Reuters had tightened editing procedures for photographs from the conflict and apologised for the case.

Removing the images from the Reuters database excludes them from future sale.

Reuters ended its relationship with Hajj on Sunday after it found that a photograph he had taken of the aftermath of an Israeli air strike on suburban Beirut had been manipulated using Photoshop software to show more and darker smoke rising from buildings.

An immediate enquiry began into Hajj's other work.

It established on Monday that a photograph of an Israeli F-16 fighter over Nabatiyeh, southern Lebanon and dated Aug 2, had also been doctored to increase the number of flares dropped by the plane from one to three.

"Manipulating photographs in this way is entirely unacceptable and contrary to all the principles consistently held by Reuters throughout its long and distinguished history. It undermines not only our reputation but also the good name of all our photographers," Szlukovenyi said.

"This doesn't mean that every one of his 920 photographs in our database was altered. We know that not to be the case from the majority of images we have looked at so far but we need to act swiftly and in a precautionary manner."

The two altered photographs were among 43 that Hajj filed directly to the Reuters Global Pictures Desk since the start of the conflict on July 12 rather than through an editor in Beirut, as was the case with the great majority of his images.

Filing drills have been tightened in Lebanon and only senior staff will now edit pictures from the Middle East on the Global Pictures Desk, with the final check undertaken by the Editor-in-Charge, Reuters said.

Hajj worked for Reuters as a non-staff contributing photographer from 1993 until 2003 and again since April 2005. Most of his work was in sports photography, much of it outside Lebanon.

Hajj was not in Beirut on Monday and was not responding to calls. He told Reuters on Sunday that the image of the Israeli air strike on Beirut had dust marks which he had wanted to remove.

Questions about the accuracy of the photograph arose after it appeared on news Web sites on Saturday.

Several blogs, including a number which accuse the media of distorted coverage of the Middle East conflict, said the photograph had been doctored.

[sabra]

2. seems like Reuters got burned by a local photographer.

[mom cat]

39. Or Rathered?

[joefree1]

3. The line between me and Reuters blurs

Looky, I made real news mom, just like Reuters.

[Marie26]

4. Whew!

Was this photo by the same photographer?

[Phx_Dem]

5. yes, he has been fired.

[sendero]

11. As well he should have been..

... the last thing we need is more lies.

[The Stranger]

12. Why would they doctor the image of an Israeli fighter jet?

This has the feel of the 60 Minutes Right Wing Smear Campaign -- where questions were raised about one document intentionally do distract the masses from the truth of the overall story -- that Bush skipped National Guard duty.

Here, there is no question Israeli jets are bombing innocent civilians, so there is a campaign of distraction focusing on whether a photograph captured an Israeli jet dropping one or two bombs, and one or three flares. We know the jets are dropping bombs because so many innocent civilians are dying, this is not in dispute.

[kurth]

14. Exactly. Destruction of Lebanon is a fiction in Photoshop

And all those Lebanese dead people are soooo fake. Only rocket attacks on Israel are real.

[Atman]

16. I don't think that is what the op is saying...

Not that Israel isn't dropping bombs. Rather, that "they" want us to fight about the faked photos of the bombings in order to blur the reality of what they're doing.

(ON EDIT) In re-reading your post, perhaps I missed the implied :sarcasm: emoticon. My apologies if I was restating the obvious.

[Tandalayo_Scheisskopf]

15. Furthermore...

Any slug on YouTube could identify those bright spots in the images as flares.

The Reuters d00dZ need to get out more.

[Hissyspit]

30. When I used the jet photo in one of my montages about a week ago it said

that the fighter was dropping leaflets to warn civilians. It didn't say anything about bombs - doctored or not.

[MrPrax]

35. Good point...

I read through this new story about the Reuters photos and the original one of Beirut, I swear I have seen posted without the photoshoping...the last example on Ynews' page is simply a case of a misidentified photo, which is what goes on all the time.

In fact, IF the photo was photoshoped, then how did we get the released original photo? Presumeably the original WAS around and that was then photoshoped and then place on Reuters site. This is what is being reported.

I am thinking outside the box and figuring that whatever upload process Reuters is using has been compromised...it's not like the old days, where a photog comes runnig into the editoring room with a roll of film that the city desk guy and the photog sit and watch develop in a dark room.

Today a professional photography will upload a bunch of pix, and the one's that are 'bought' are the one's that get released. It doesn't take much to find out Reuter's upload procedures, get a password and then go to work - when the photo was posted, the original was defaced and then substituted. Hackers do this to websites all the time. It is usually quite crude vandalism as it's done in a hurry by the Hack group. That's why I suspect the photoshoping was so crude -- it reminds me of the quicky defacement that hackers usually do to sites. Numerous examples of politically motivated 'vandalism' at Zone-H...some crude, some sophisticated.

This is an interesting story from the UK Time about:
Israel backed by army of cyber-soldiers published from July 26, 2006. It would be unfair to think that all the computer activity is strictly to fudge online polling...


There is also the possibility that the photographer himself might be someone's little spook.

[Ghost Dog]

17. There must be huge competition amongst these freelance photographers

to get their work into print/on screen and hence make money.

While there may be a few genuine artists amongst them, the majority, IMO, are little better than vampires, sucking blood out of the situation for financial gain.

(Same applies to many, not all journalists of the written word, also.)

edit: Reuters first issued this statement (re. the earlier (smoke) photos):

http://today.reuters.com/news/NewsRoom.aspx?&src=080706_11_FEATURES_doctored_photos%3A_reuters_responds
We got more than 2,000 reader e-mails on this one over the weekend. We issued a kill on the photo in question, and sent out an unaltered version – see below -- as soon as possible. We also issued a story about the incident.

Reuters has discussed the incident with the photographer, who has been a non-staff stringer. He 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. This represents a serious breach of Reuters standards and we will not be accepting or using pictures taken by him: Editor

And then, this:

http://today.reuters.com/news/articlenews.aspx?type=topNews&storyID=2006-08-07T144605Z_01_L06301298_RTRUKOC_0_US-MIDEAST-REUTERS.xml&archived=False&src=080706_11_FEATURES_doctored_photos%3A_reuters_responds
Reuters withdraws all photos by freelancer
Mon Aug 7, 2006 10:46am ET

LONDON (Reuters) - Reuters withdrew all 920 photographs by a freelance Lebanese photographer from its database on Monday after an urgent review of his work showed he had altered two images from the conflict between Israel and the armed group Hizbollah.

Global Picture Editor Tom Szlukovenyi called the measure precautionary but said the fact that two of the images by photographer Adnan Hajj had been manipulated undermined trust in his entire body of work.

"There is no graver breach of Reuters standards for our photographers than the deliberate manipulation of an image," Szlukovenyi said in a statement.

"Reuters has zero tolerance for any doctoring of pictures and constantly reminds its photographers, both staff and freelance, of this strict and unalterable policy."

The news and information agency announced the decision in an advisory note to its photo service subscribers. The note also said Reuters had tightened editing procedures for photographs from the conflict and apologized for the case.

Removing the images from the Reuters database excludes them from future sale.

Reuters ended its relationship with Hajj on Sunday after it found that a photograph he had taken of the aftermath of an Israeli air strike on suburban Beirut had been manipulated using Photoshop software to show more and darker smoke rising from buildings.

An immediate enquiry began into Hajj's other work.

It established on Monday that a photograph of an Israeli F-16 fighter over Nabatiyeh, southern Lebanon and dated Aug 2, had also been doctored to increase the number of flares dropped by the plane from one to three.

/more...

(comment edit: Looks like this guy doesn't subscribe to the Leica (that's my camera!) philosophy).

[Phx_Dem]

19. thx for the addt. info.....

[Igel]

20. It's probably too late.

Debunkers have been downloading copies of Hajj's photos for comparison, and are having a field day.

For example, two have the same ruined building, but all the damage done entirely by each of two bombing runs a week apart.

There are other shots that I think are less clearly staged, and they're reaching. Some are clearly staged. And in many cases it's clear that Adnan enjoyed the complete trust of Hezbollah--although other articles say it's clear that many Hezbollah fighters are more or less covert, and the faces of the Hezb associates aren't shown by Adnan.

Lebanese stringer operating freely in Hezb territory, with the trust of Hezbollah, and able to traverse the country while Western reporters aren't allowed in big chunks of it. And we assume objectivity?

[Kagemusha]

22. It's natural selection. Winnow out the weak/ fakes.

We'll be stronger for it in the future.

And it's not like they'd believe Israel can do anything bad even when presented with true visual evidence anyway, so don't lose sleep over it.

[Ghost Dog]

23. Hmm. I read a piece by a Spanish (female) reporter (El País) on location

visiting villages in the South of Lebanon not far from the border. She pointed out that Hizbollah folks are the only ones controlling anything, including rescue operations, since the Lebanese police and army have withdrawn and international red cross, for example, can't often get through. She describes older guys - teachers, for example, in civilian life - not carrying arms but carrying radios. Any visiting journalist (and there are foreign journalists close to the front line) knows it's best to approach these guys and get permission before proceeding (I repeat: this, she said, is the case there close to border, far South).

[fjc]

29. What is it with you people?

Where does it say in the article that Reuters admits altering photos? That's what the headline is saying. But that ain't what Reuters is saying.

[Hissyspit]

31. Also, the original caption a week and a half ago said leaflets, not bombs.

I remember this specifically. Whether or not it was doctored, there was no mention in the caption I used of BOMBS.

[Phx_Dem]

32. You people?

What is that supposed to mean? FYI, I ALWAYS copy the headline from the article, so feel free to take up your "concern" with Ynet.

[fjc]

40. How honest of you.

The headline is misleading. That's what's simple. Reuters is trying to solve the problem. They didn't cause it.

[Codeine]

44. Actually they *did* cause it.

They created the situation by not looking at the photos carefully before publishing them. The "smoke" pic especially -- that was outrageously fake-looking. They have a responsibility to look at their material before slapping any old garbage a freelancer sends them onto their news page, yes?

[The Straight Story]

34. Reuters ows the photos

So that is why they are mentioned in the title of thread/article.

They are admitting that more of their images were manipulated. Seems pretty simple.

[barb162]

36. Thanks so much for posting! This is a very important story

I prefer to see ORIGINAL, unadulterated photos with my news.

[General Paranoia]

41. Smells like day old fish or propaganda

Someone pointed out on a prior message on the same topic that a Google search is VERY informative - there is nothing out there. :wtf:

This should be all over the media, MSM included. Something very wrong here - it smells like a propaganda plant. :thumbsdown:

[Lurking Dem]

42. It's all over Reuters.

Were have ya been?

[daleo]

43. Israel has never denied that it is using F-16s to attack Lebanon

There is no reason to "fake" something that both sides admit is happening, except perhaps the desire for that "dramatic image" that photographers (and news editors) want.

Nobody doubts that the U.S. took Iwo Jima in WWII, but the famous flag planting photo was staged. Is the U.S. war effort in WWII all a deception then?

These photo debates have one thing in common with the photo in question - there is a lot of chaff being thrown about.

[bobthedrummer]

45. More perception management in the MSM-we talked about it in January

It's been going on a lot longer than that.

Reality vs. perception management: the tinfoil controversy
http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=view_all&address=364x71919#top