Comments on: Comments on 3479

Post number 3479

Steven Den Beste — Sat, 30 Sep 2000 17:45:40 -0800

"It is important that we show the diversity of the University of Idaho." And we'll do whatever it takes to show it. [more inside]

By: Steven Den Beste

Steven Den Beste — Sat, 30 Sep 2000 17:50:28 -0800

Which brings up the whole question of the value and validity of photos. There was a time when in court cases, a photograph could basically be trusted. No longer. I've seen pictures of lower Manhattan over the water where all the buildings had been moved around. It looked absolutely genuine. And now this. So if you're being tried for a crime, and a significant part of the evidence against you is photographic, how do you prove to a jury that it wasn't fabricated? Or how does the state prove that it's genuine? Can photographs be trusted in court at all any more? Or anywhere else?

By: bkdelong

bkdelong — Sat, 30 Sep 2000 17:59:21 -0800

This has been a big deal in journalism for the last 2 decades and although I'm not suprised that this is the second such issue of photo modification at a public University in recent weeks, I must say that I thought this would become an issue in corporate public relations first. Then again, I came from a University where diversity was everywhere. I don't understand why publications doesn't just walk around campus for a week or so and look for diverity-centric picture opportunities. Enrollment at these schools aren't THAT bad, are they?

By: holloway

holloway — Sat, 30 Sep 2000 18:08:49 -0800

Surely if they wanted that they could have just wandered about campus for half an hour to find an ethnically diverse - Captain Planetish - photo opportunity, right? Are negatives still safe, or can people fake those too?

By: highindustrial

highindustrial — Sat, 30 Sep 2000 18:17:03 -0800

It's common knowledge that minority students are particularly difficult to photograph in their natural milieu. Costly, complicated infrared equipment is required, for starters ... to say nothing of extremely rare magic beans.

By: bkdelong

bkdelong — Sat, 30 Sep 2000 18:19:34 -0800

holloway: "Are negatives still safe, or can people fake those too?" I believe the actual negatives are safe, yes however most places scan the negatives in and pull them into graphics editing programs for modification. Most pictures being taken today are done so with a digital camera. Those still using REAL cameras are seasoned photojournalists, college/high school students borrowing a camera, and artists. Perhaps this continued decrying of photo modification will bring about use of watermark origination authentication....digital cameras that authenticate photos with an encrypted watermark that will get modified if the graphic is altered. Or graphics editing programs that will leave a footprint in an altered graphic. (Although technically Adobe Photoshop already does that).

By: Mars Saxman

Mars Saxman — Sat, 30 Sep 2000 18:32:57 -0800

Negatives are pretty safe, yes, but there's no reason you can't scan in a bunch of originals, manipulate them, then use a film printer to spit out a brand new negative containing your composite image. You'd lose resolution, and that could probably be spotted, but it'd technically meet your criteria. :-) -mars

By: howa2396

howa2396 — Sat, 30 Sep 2000 19:03:11 -0800

I really don't think this a big deal. Maybe its just me?

By: pnevares

pnevares — Sat, 30 Sep 2000 19:13:45 -0800

continuing with the "maybe it's just me?" discussion, did we already post something similar?

By: lileks

lileks — Sat, 30 Sep 2000 19:36:10 -0800

Odd: the University of Wisconsin 'fessed up to doing the same thing a few weeks ago. The cover of a brochure was insufficiently diverse, so they took a photo of a Black student, reversed the head and stuck him in the stands at a football game. University officials later admitted that this was "inappropriate," which is that weasily word bureaucrats use when they cannot bear to say "wrong."

By: holloway

holloway — Sat, 30 Sep 2000 19:45:24 -0800

I haven't seen digital watermarks even stand up to "increase size 10%" then "decrease size 10%". The new Jpeg2000 standard has some copyright metadata. And I give an MCSE five minutes to rip that out.

By: tj

tj — Sat, 30 Sep 2000 20:11:42 -0800

Call me silly, but I thought the diversity at University of Idaho was along the lines of:"We listen to bith types of music, Country AND Western". Then again, I'm a Wolvie berserker, and may just be too used to talking trash.

By: baylink

baylink — Sat, 30 Sep 2000 21:25:16 -0800

Legally, as I'm surprised Mikewas hasn't jumped in already to point out, none of this is pertinent to the presentation of photographic evidence in court. Photographs have *always*, so far as I'm aware, been introduced into evidence based on the testimony of the photographer that, yes, I was at that location at thatdate and time, and that photograph accurately represents what I saw... and, in particularly important cases, chain of evidence is maintained through the developing and printing that nothing was modified. "Justice" rests, as it always has, on the testimony of humans in a courtroom, before a jury of your peers. If a lawyer tried to introduce a photograph without testimony to back it up, discovery, and then the judge, wouldn't let him. If he sprang it, he'd be tempting a mistrial. The days of Della Street are long dead.

By: Steven Den Beste

Steven Den Beste — Sat, 30 Sep 2000 22:52:30 -0800

Oh, I have no doubt that a photographer has to testify to make a photograph legal evidence. I also know that more than a hundred people in LA are being released from jail right now because the cops fabricated the evidence which put them behind bars -- and then lied in court about it. What protects me against a photographer who modifies a photo and then perjures himself? "Oh, I was there alright, and that's what I saw, alright..."

By: dhartung

dhartung — Sun, 01 Oct 2000 02:07:20 -0800

This is especially ironic, since if they had merely called in a group of models, not even necessarily students, and dressed them all in school colors, and THEN taken a photograph, nobody would have blinked. That sort of subterfuge happens all the time. Or consider a photo collage, of the old cut-and-paste kind, where a disproportionate number of faces are minorities. No, that would be too easy -- we have to put faces on other people's bodies, so we can get a Photoshop job next year. Ahem.

By: Fidel

Fidel — Sun, 01 Oct 2000 03:11:31 -0800

Does this mean that If I decided to go to U of I they'll cut off my head and stick it on a whiteboys body?

By: baylink

baylink — Mon, 02 Oct 2000 06:53:55 -0800

Note that I didn't comment, quite on purpose, on the potential veracity of the testifier (there's a cooler word for that, but I can't remember it :-).