Photojounalism or visual deception?

As a child, I always had an idea of black and white pictures when the phrase photojournalism came to mind. Somehow, looking at black and white pictures gave me a sense of truth and excitement and this was the picture I had of photojournalism.

A century ago, people believed what they saw in photographs but with the dawning of the digital age, many visual representations that seem to be true are not. Photojournalism, the profession by which journalists take news-editorial photographs for print, broadcast and online media is losing its faith. Lately, critics have questioned the use of gruesome images, photographers hounding celebrities, picture manipulations, negative stereotypical visuals and so forth (Emery and Smythe, 1995).

What has caused this change? According to Emery and Smythe (1995), the advances of computer technology has enabled anyone to produce and disseminate visual messages in great numbers across the world. These advances have made it possible for individuals to use softwares for purposes like photo manipulation.

Recently, photo manipulation has been greatly criticized among journalists. Photo manipulation seems to be a common term in photojournalism today. In fact, it is commonly used in photographs that sometimes even we can’t easily distinguish its forgery. So, where does this leave a profession whose mission was to deliver instant, realistic and “eyewitness” accounts of people or events across the world? (Newton, 2001).

In 2006, Patrick Schneider, a staff photographer at the Observer was fired when the publication discovered that he had enhanced the image. The picture depicted a Charlotte firefighter on a ladder, silhouetted by the sun. However in the original photo, the sky was brownish-gray skies instead of being deep red like the manipulated version (Winslow, 2006).

Source: National Press Photographers Association

Los Angeles Times staff photographer Brian Walski also received the same fate. In 2003, he combined two images of the war in Iraq and his work was published in the Times and other newspapers. Another case is when editors at el Nuevo Herald decided to manipulate two photographs and combine it into one image to send a message that prostitution was ignored by Cuban police (Winslow, 2006). However, in this incident no one at was disciplined or fired for producing or publishing the fake photograph.

Source: National Press Photographers Association

So, can photojournalism and visual truth coexist in the future? Photojournalism is changing in the digital era where more and more computer advances are replacing traditional tools and equipments. Now, with digital cameras and numerous editing softwares, photojournalism is in doubts. However Emery and Smythe (1995) stress that, “no matter how the tools of journalism change, fundamental ethical concerns still apply”. They add that, unethical issues in photojournalism will be continually discussed in the future in hopes that credibility can be achieves in this field.

References:

Emery, M. and Smythe, T.C., 1995. Readings in Mass Communication. Brown & Benchmark Publishers, viewed 12 November 2008, <http://commfaculty.fullerton.edu/lester/writings/photoethics.html>

Winslow, D. R., 2006. ‘A Question of Truth: Photojournalism and visual ethics’. National Press Photographers Association, viewed 12 November 2008,
<http://www.nppa.org/news_and_events/news/2006/08/ethics.html>

Newton, J., 2001. The Burden of Visual Truth: The Role of Photojournalism in Mediating Reality. Lawrence Erlbaum Associates.