PP for publication (Page 4): But the standards of manipulation are stricter now than in the film era. One of our greatest photojournalists, W. Eugene Smith, routinely darkened...

JohnSwanda Loc: San Francisco

kymarto wrote:

Generally speaking, pictures can be optimized in terms of exposure and color, without manipulations that affect the impact of the photos. For instance, correction of lens vignetting is fine, but darkening or lightening specific areas to draw attention to a face or a certain area of the photograph, for example, is not allowed. Manipulation of pixels, such as removing, adding, altering or moving objects, is a complete no-no.

But the standards of manipulation are stricter now than in the film era. One of our greatest photojournalists, W. Eugene Smith, routinely darkened backgrounds or areas he felt weren't important to make the main subject stand out, or lightened (sometimes using bleach) areas he felt were important, and nobody seemed to object.

lamiaceae Loc: San Luis Obispo County, CA

Cany143 wrote:

The semantics battle again, so soon? Will it reach another twenty pages?

If your initial question was other than hypothetical, wouldn't it be best to contact whatever journal or journals you had in mind and learn exactly what their criteria is?

That is too simple (and what I was thinking as well).

lamiaceae Loc: San Luis Obispo County, CA

kymarto wrote:

Generally speaking, pictures can be optimized in terms of exposure and color, without manipulations that affect the impact of the photos. For instance, correction of lens vignetting is fine, but darkening or lightening specific areas to draw attention to a face or a certain area of the photograph, for example, is not allowed. Manipulation of pixels, such as removing, adding, altering or moving objects, is a complete no-no.

That is probably the best explanation thus far.

lamiaceae Loc: San Luis Obispo County, CA

Longshadow wrote:

Can all three be changed???
(I've no idea as I don't use an EXIF editor.)

All three? What 3? It is more like all 300 parameters.

lamiaceae Loc: San Luis Obispo County, CA

mwsilvers wrote:

FastStone Viewer is not exactly a super-duper file manipulator. Its free to anyone and easy to use. I have around 4 or 5 others image viewers and file managers on my Windows 10 machine which can do the same thing, including Windows file manager. Here's an another image where I changed the taken date to two days in the future. I used the built in file manager to do it.

Is this what causes all the conspiracy fanatics to freak-out? Man lands on the Moon, July 1769. Plane crashes in to WTC September 9, 2001.

G Brown Loc: Sunny Bognor Regis West Sussex UK

Les Brown wrote:

Some journals say photos submitted may have NO electronic enhancement. If JPEG is manipulated in the camera, should they be disqualified? If this is true, only RAW un-manipulated photos would qualify. Oh, I know they will accept JPEGs, but I thought this is an interesting, likely unimportant, conundrum.

Just use your cell phone and email it ! They obviously do not want professional images and are likely to pay very little for any photo.

mwsilvers Loc: Central New Jersey

lamiaceae wrote:

Is this what causes all the conspiracy fanatics to freak-out? Man lands on the Moon, July 1769. Plane crashes in to WTC September 9, 2001.

I'm not sure a date changing program was behind it all.

I can't comment on the moon landing, but I believe it to took place. I have a happy memory of watching the first steps on TV at my then girlfriend's house. As far as 9/11 is concerned, that's kind of a sore subject with me since I was in the World Trade Center concourse that morning, and would have possibly been killed if I had hung around much longer instead of vacating the building sometime after the first plane crashed into the north tower. As it was I had to attend three funerals, with no bodies, for three of the people I knew who did not make it out. As a result I have absolutely no tolerance for anyone who says it was a hoax.

rmalarz Loc: Tempe, Arizona

I should think it judicious to inquire as to exactly what they consider electronic enhancements.
--Bob

Les Brown wrote:

Some journals say photos submitted may have NO electronic enhancement. If JPEG is manipulated in the camera, should they be disqualified? If this is true, only RAW un-manipulated photos would qualify. Oh, I know they will accept JPEGs, but I thought this is an interesting, likely unimportant, conundrum.

Longshadow Loc: Audubon, PA, United States

rmalarz wrote:

I should think it judicious to inquire as to exactly what they consider electronic enhancements.
--Bob

SO many people write ambiguously any more.
In-camera "enhancements", editor "enhancements"... Define enhancements!

lamiaceae Loc: San Luis Obispo County, CA

mwsilvers wrote:

I'm not sure a date changing program was behind it... (show quote)

I'm being critical of the "wackos" as you might say. Yes, I watched the moon landing live too. Oddly on a boat on a tiny 9" B&W TV. And I saw the second plane hit the south tower on live TV news. Glad you made it out OK. The incident was certainly no hoax.

Haydon

CHG_CANON wrote:

Just send them a mental image directly from your mind ...

I don't know about you but my mental images always ends up edited :)

mwsilvers Loc: Central New Jersey

lamiaceae wrote:

I'm being critical of the "wackos" as you might say. Yes, I watched the moon landing live too. Oddly on a boat on a tiny 9" B&W TV. And I saw the second plane hit the south tower on live TV news. Glad you made it out OK. The incident was certainly no hoax.

Don't want to continue hijacking the thread, but I was a bit closer than you for the second plane. I was standing on Liberty Street, half way between Church Street and lower Broadway, a couple of hundred feed from the south tower when I saw it hit the tower and just disappear. Because of my angle of view it looked like the entire top 40 stories was covered by velvety black smoke and hug flames. I ran my a$$ off down Broadway but still got pelted by dust particles and small hail sized chunks of concrete. But, let's get back to this thread.

toxdoc42

Les Brown wrote:

Some journals say photos submitted may have NO electronic enhancement. If JPEG is manipulated in the camera, should they be disqualified? If this is true, only RAW un-manipulated photos would qualify. Oh, I know they will accept JPEGs, but I thought this is an interesting, likely unimportant, conundrum.

Particularly scientific publications have been burned in the past by unscrupulous "researchers" who doctored data including photos. So I see their point. I wonder how one can determine that an image has or has not been altered?

toxdoc42

mwsilvers wrote:

Don't want to continue hijacking the thread, but I... (show quote)

I was miles away in my office in Newark NJ. I was physically safe, but got to watch the second tower get hit and the towers collapse. I have photos somewhere of the events taken from my office windows. It was certainly no hoax, sadly no alterations or enhancements of my photos were needed! We lost a Good friend in the Pa plane and many good friends suffered from great grief seeing things on the site that morning that no one should ever see.

dsmeltz Loc: Philadelphia

JohnSwanda wrote:

But the standards of manipulation are stricter now than in the film era. One of our greatest photojournalists, W. Eugene Smith, routinely darkened backgrounds or areas he felt weren't important to make the main subject stand out, or lightened (sometimes using bleach) areas he felt were important, and nobody seemed to object.

And I have never had a problem with that. How is a photographer being selective in what the image shows different than the writer of the article being selective in the events presented? Have you ever read or heard of an article where in the middle of a paragraph the author sidetracks to "as the Mayor was finished commenting on the recent violence a piece of paper rolled across the ground in front of him where the wind picked it up in the air in front of the dais. It was a Macy's bag circa 1980. The chief of police then spoke in support of....."? Yet a photojournalist can't remove that bag from a photo that not only adds nothing to the reader's understanding but distracts the eye from the relevant parts of the image. There is a difference between removing relevant items like actual people from an image and editing the image to focus on what illustrates the story. It is odd. If one removes a piece of paper floating in the wind in the center of an image that is wrong and evil, but cropping the image to eliminate relevant but inconvenient content near the outside of the frame is perfectly fine.