The Sun and the disappearing rasta

[Jimski]

The Sun and the disappearing rasta

Am I the only one who finds the idea that people are now apparently routinely photoshopped out of press photos rather scary (racism or no)?

[Cavalry Trouser Tips]

The Sun and the disappearing rasta

Of a similar nature

[Spearmint Rhino]

The Sun and the disappearing rasta

Jimski wrote:

Am I the only one who finds the idea that people are now apparently routinely photoshopped out of press photos rather scary (racism or no)?

No, you're not.

[David Agnew]

The Sun and the disappearing rasta

It's been going on for years - when Chris Evans was on Radio One, he, Danny Baker, Paul Gascoigne and their producer went on the piss, and the pictures were all over the press - only for some reason one or two papers had removed the producer from the photos, presumably on the grounds he wasn't famous enough.

That would have been 1995-1996

[beak]

The Sun and the disappearing rasta

Jimski wrote:

Am I the only one who finds the idea that people are now apparently routinely photoshopped out of press photos rather scary (racism or no)?

What are you scared of?

Can you not just consider it a logical extension of cropping someone out of a photo?

[Ginger Yellow]

The Sun and the disappearing rasta

Not really. People intuitively understand cropping, but there's still an assumption that within the frame of a photo what's printed is what was shot (at least content-wise), even though that's very often not the case. Any material manipulation, which definitely includes removing people from the shot) should be disclosed, if you ask me.

Of course, you can maliciously manipulate a photo through cropping, but I do feel there is a qualitative difference.

[ad hoc]

The Sun and the disappearing rasta

For me, it's just one more thing I cannot trust. I mean we've all read Manufacturing Consent, so we know on some intellectual level that the news is manipulated incredibly, but we still read it/listen to it/watch it with interest. But knowing that photos are not to be trusted too, just makes the whole this seem a waste of time. It's not that there's anything to be scared of, more that it's profoundly depressing

[beak]

The Sun and the disappearing rasta

Sorry, in my brain scrambled state I've realised the better analogy is not cropping, but airbrushing. Photo manipulation in the media is by no means new, but given the current state of the media, I think Ad Hoc puts it right: 'profoundly depressing' is a better reflection of my opinion over the idea of being scared of anything. One of the most depressing aspects of it - to me anyway - is the instinctive search for a malicious intent behind a bit of photoshopping.

I don't think photos are getting more or less trustworthy; going by the shite you see on Photoshop disasters, you could argue that the spread of this technology into non-expert hands is making the ham-fisted cock-ups more and more obvious. Plus, the endless dissection of the news media by blogs etc. must make it harder for the media to hoodwink the populace than it would have been previously?

(P.S. We havent all read Manufacturing Consent.)

[ad hoc]

The Sun and the disappearing rasta

Well we should have.

(This is by way of an enthusiastic bigging up rather than snooty condescension. I hope that's how it comes across.)

[Jimmy Bignutz]

The Sun and the disappearing rasta

Nope.

[Ginger Yellow]

The Sun and the disappearing rasta

As far as I'm concerned, airbrushing is even more insidious than more obvious photoshopping, but in a different way. With airbrushing, it's not a question of being able to trust the printed image, it's a question of the social message. Even the people the media decides to hold up as paragons of beauty or fitness aren't good enough to be presented as they are. It's deeply unhealthy.

[Er Liquidatore]

The Sun and the disappearing rasta

Taylor and GY are right by the way, this is just lazy designing.

[Mumpo]

The Sun and the disappearing rasta

No, lazy designing would have meant they made no adjustments at all, and ran the photo unaltered, with the headline obscuring the character.

[N est à?]

The Sun and the disappearing rasta

Or they could have used a headline that fit the picture/used another picture that would fit their headline.

And The Sun newspaper is about the last organisation on Earth that I'd give any benefit of the doubt on issues of racism.

[Er Liquidatore]

The Sun and the disappearing rasta

But kept the other black guy in.It takes no time at all to make people disappear in Photoshop. You can tell it's lazy designing by the monstrous fuck up they made.

[Guest]

The Sun and the disappearing rasta

I have to Photoshop people out of pictures all the time, just to make the thing look less cluttered.

The other day, I whipped out my pixellator of death and erased Mary Coughlan, Ireland's deputy prime minister, from a photo of Sarkozy and Brian Cowen, not because she was a woman, but because she was partly in the way.

[Lucia Lanigan]

The Sun and the disappearing rasta

Wasn't there was one of these a while back in which a Cabinet minister had been Photoshopped into a picture of politicians visiting a factory or something? They'd not managed to turn up on time, so someone just stuck them in there.

(Or did that happen in The Thick Of It? Hard to tell the difference sometimes.)

[Nico Rijnders]

The Sun and the disappearing rasta

Stamping down on deception's, James Purnell, no less:

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/england/manchester/7018729.stm

[G-Man]

The Sun and the disappearing rasta

How about this for non-racialism:

[EIM]

The Sun and the disappearing rasta

[Spearmint Rhino]

The Sun and the disappearing rasta

D'you reckon anyone ran up to that hoarding and celebrated, before they realised what they were doing?

[Gangster Octopus]

The Sun and the disappearing rasta

Maybe they did that fucking annoying thing of putting a finger over their mouths to indicate silence. And thought it worked...

[Eggchaser]

The Sun and the disappearing rasta

Before and after in the land of fashion photoshopping.

http://www.digitalphotoshopretouchin...FREWQgodHgP7kQ