You have seen the blurs. They are everywhere foregrounded in the news.
February 22, 2020 10:57 AM   Subscribe

Rise of the Blur: A specter is haunting photojournalism -- an actual, visible specter (N+1): "But these blurs in your newsfeed are purposeful, perhaps even artful. They are being chosen, with notable regularity, by photo editors to illustrate our most serious political stories. Why?"
posted by not_the_water (18 comments total) 13 users marked this as a favorite
 
OK, points for the subtitle.
posted by praemunire at 11:15 AM on February 22, 2020 [2 favorites]


It is the ghost of democracy.
posted by sjswitzer at 11:51 AM on February 22, 2020 [11 favorites]


tldr: the level of technical skill in current photo-journalism is astonishing.
posted by thatwhichfalls at 11:52 AM on February 22, 2020 [1 favorite]


"Blur" suggests a capture of motion with a slow shutter speed, but the effect that the author really is going on about is bokeh, or the quality of the out-of-focus elements in a photograph. Yeah, bokeh is trendy now, and pro-level primes are all f 1.4 or even lower nowadays to meet the demand. And the rise of full frame mirrorless will just exacerbate the trend. I'd like to read what Errol Morris would have to say about this.
posted by St. Oops at 11:54 AM on February 22, 2020 [18 favorites]


Now that’s overthinking a plate of beans.
posted by bjrubble at 11:59 AM on February 22, 2020 [2 favorites]


Or under-focusing it...
posted by Greg_Ace at 12:04 PM on February 22, 2020 [8 favorites]


It's a way for a PJ to indicate that they're shooting with a "real" camera and thus that what they're doing has some kind of superior artistic merit. Which is an almost unutterable level of bullshit, but whatever. I guess if you wanna keep your camera-holding job you gotta sell something unique.
posted by seanmpuckett at 12:38 PM on February 22, 2020 [5 favorites]


It's a way for a PJ to indicate that they're shooting with a "real" camera
Yeah, bokeh is trendy now

I have to say as a professional I hate the term "bokeh" because it only exists on the internet. In a decade plus of working on professional shoots, never once heard anyone actually say this word out loud. But I think shooting wide open has less to do with lens marketing BS or proving their cameras are "real" (LOL!) and more with the fact that these political events tend to happen indoors in places where the photographers have zero control over the often sub-par lighting.

Both the term "blur" and "bokeh" are meaningless here anyways. These shooters follows these campaigns or politicians day in and day out - they are always looking for a different visual take on the same old subject matter. The examples in the article use a variety of technical techniques to achieve this, familiar to anyone who has ever had to shoot an editorial assignment of boring dudes in a boring location.

And more importantly, so are their editors, who are the ones who have to wade through thousands of pool images of the same people every day and then choose one that doesn't look the same as what they ran last week.
posted by bradbane at 12:41 PM on February 22, 2020 [40 favorites]


Great piece. I agree with the writer, but would add that the blur can sometimes feel demonic as well. I mean, look at this Doug Mills one (Instagram).

(I hope this trend dies...for aesthetic reasons and because I’d like the general mood of this era to end.)
posted by sallybrown at 12:49 PM on February 22, 2020 [1 favorite]


I can second bradbane, I've never heard anyone who was an actual photographer who made money from shooting use the word "bokeh."

As someone who shoots the same things over and over every day, you really start to get bored enough that you start to mess around just to keep it interesting. You can't turn in the exact same images constantly, so you submit the playful stuff.

If anything, I think it speaks more to the fact that photo editors, utterly awash in photography as a result of literally everyone on the planet having a camera in their pocket, are looking for something fresh and different, and are starting to use images they never expected to.
posted by nevercalm at 1:00 PM on February 22, 2020 [10 favorites]


look at this Doug Mills one

My take on that image is that it is visually showing Trump's narcissism and how he's always playing to the camera, by literally framing him in a video camera viewfinder. The contrast between Trump and the bust of Churchill (literally inverted with the high contrast B&W) sets up an obvious comparison between the two. This is a much more nuanced image that visually tells what's going on here, rather than just: here is Trump sitting next to Victor Orban. Future generations, who aren't witnessing what we are first hand, will benefit from this evidence even if it's highly stylized.

So yes a variety of technical techniques were used to achieve this - low depth of field, ultra high contrast, B&W - but it's all in service to the composition, which is quite masterful and tells the story visually better than just a "straight" shot would. But simply pointing out the technical part of the image and not how that image's composition is served by them is a lazy interpretation.

A camera is just a light tight box, everyone has one in their pocket now. "f/8 and be there" isn't good enough anymore, if it ever was.
posted by bradbane at 1:13 PM on February 22, 2020 [10 favorites]


The ones I've been noticing are the pictures of disgraced or disgruntled Trump staffers in sharp focus in the background looking disgraced or disgruntled while Trump is huge and out-of-focus in the foreground. Bolton, Barr... Collect them all!
posted by acrasis at 2:09 PM on February 22, 2020 [3 favorites]


I had high hopes but this seemed shallow focus. I am still waiting for a blow-me-away n plus one article.
posted by Morpeth at 4:45 PM on February 22, 2020


N̶̬͎͍͍͖̹͗̇̚i̵͍̤̙͍̎͛̃̉̌̄͗͠͝x̸̮͈̟͋̅͂͆̋̈͋̑̊́̈́̿ǫ̴̤͔̞͚̰̬̣̟͑͛͊͋̈́̚n̷̘̙̻̓͌͋̍̑͝ͅ ̵̢̹̱̲͇̩̠̹̞̟̯̘̐o̴̦̮͙͓̔̀͗̈́̔̀̑͊̂͒͊͝ͅư̸̺̬̝͍̗̊͐͛͊̇̊̋̽̈́̕t̴̬̮̲̞̔̒͂͑̌͋̑̉̕ ̵̻̖̰͉̺̣̽̋o̶̠̰͖͔̠̩̼̳̥̬͓̓̀̄̽f̴̨̼̺͋ ̷͖̠͔̮͎̰͕̥͚͓̑̊̀f̶̣͉̹̆ǭ̵̞͍̤̦̦͈̬͔̰͑̆̆̇́̚c̵̠̯̲̝̤̟͎̼͈̾̄̓͆͘ͅí̷̢̤̠͌͊
posted by clavdivs at 5:29 PM on February 22, 2020 [1 favorite]


The author didn’t seem to understand enough about photography or photojournalism to write this article well.
posted by snofoam at 6:25 PM on February 22, 2020 [5 favorites]


The blurred figures are because we're all living in the Jacob's Ladder purgatory.
posted by benzenedream at 12:14 AM on February 23, 2020 [2 favorites]


I have noticed this too and I’m glad someone has written about it.
posted by daisyk at 8:32 AM on February 23, 2020


This mystery about some non-blur seems appropriate to post here.
posted by St. Oops at 12:19 PM on February 25, 2020


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