UN Chimpy bathroom photo WAS photoshop tweaked...

[zulchzulu]

http://www.pdnonline.com/pdn/newswire/article_display.jsp?vnu_content_id=1001137642

As I suspected...

"Once he saw what it said, Hershorn decided the note was interesting and worth publishing. The white parts of the picture were overexposed, so a Reuters processor used Photoshop to burn down the note. This is a standard practice for news photos, Hershorn says, and the picture was not manipulated in any other way."

Why do we fall into this trap? If it's just going to be ammo for the Bush shills to change the subject, don't bite!

[Catherine Vincent]

1. It still doesn't change was was written.

[FranzFerdinand]

2. but...

the writing and the words were not photoshopped. read that quote again...

[zulchzulu]

10. I understand...

...it's now that you can bet the usual suspects will say it was tampered with. I'm well aware of publishing techniques and the use of Photoshop to change levels, lightness/darkness, cropping...but using burn techniques and the glow used around the hand was an obvious attempt at fixing the image... the story is shit now.

[VAMom]

13. But why the two different handwritings.......

First of all, I hope someone contacts the photographer and THANKS him for a great photo shoot. This makes ** look like a frigging 5 year old..... but that being said.. what is up with the two different handwritings? Did the president change his writing style, cuz that's a little wierd? Or as my husband mentioned, maybe the top note was written by Bolton, asking permission to go potty and the president was writing back, "is it possible to wait?" I almost like that explanation better.

[bluedawg12]

25. Not worth losing our cred over this light weight story

agree, let's not bite. it almost stinks of the albino hampster boy wonder- turd blossom

[zulchzulu]

26. That was the rat I smelled with the story...

Very old, stale Rovian trick...

[RagingInMiami]

3. Every photo that gets published is photoshopped

Just like every article is edited.

[thereismore]

4. Inconsequential brightness/contrast change. n/t

[JuniperLea]

5. Fall for what?

"Once he saw what it said, Hershorn decided the note was interesting and worth publishing. The white parts of the picture were overexposed, so a Reuters processor used Photoshop to burn down the note. This is a standard practice for news photos, Hershorn says, and the picture was not manipulated in any other way."

[mike_c]

6. it was image enhanced, that's all....

Virtually every published photo takes a turn through photoshop or some similar software.

[jobycom]

7. Oh my GOD! This will bring us all DOWN!

The horror! Too bad we based our entire opposition of Bush on him needing to go to the bathroom. What will we do now that the photo is EXPOSED? (Or is that less exposed?)

[ChairmanAgnostic]

14. he exposes himself?

braking news indeed.

[jobycom]

21. Braking?

Like, it would bring news to a halt?

[ChairmanAgnostic]

22. Gnus?

as in bird brain?

with the rust on the fenders showing through, the doors falling off, all four tires flat and smoke coming up from under the hood, I think the American public is beginning to see the Bush administration for what it truly is.

[jobycom]

24. Hope so. See if we can brake this rusted junk before it breaks us.

[MadisonProgressive]

8. Read again!

This is a standard practice for news photos, Hershorn says, and the picture was not manipulated in any other way."

[Dhalgren]

9. I don't see this as "falling into a trap".

For one thing, the whole issue is meaningless. The fact that Bush wrote a note inquiring about what the procedure was if you needed to go to the bathroom means that, at best, they didn't brief him very well before this event. Otherwise, it was simply something funny, but of no import. Secondly, the enhancement of a photograph by increasing the contrast of colors or grays and whites, is not "photo-shopping" in the sense that everyone has come to use the term. If anyone is stupid enough to think that enhancing the contrasts in a photo is the same thing as putting one person's head on another person's body in a photo, then they are too stupid to worry about...

[TallahasseeGrannie]

12. It's just funny, photoshopped or not

And it doesn't mean a damned thing but fodder for a SNL skit.

Just like Gerry Ford used to fall down a lot.

[sui generis]

11. sorry it wasn't a democratic evil plot to circulate the photo

it was photoshopped but the wording was what was reported.

I hope they do use that ammo some time. I'd let them go on about how childish it was and how improper and disgusting, and then interrupt to point out that the democrats didn't circulate the picture -- the news media did, and their own talk stations and free republic and conservative blogs made much more of it than we did here on DU.

I would also point out that liberals have no magical thought-ray control over the media, and saying that we do sounds pretty delusional and paranoid. Finally I'd finish by saying - "you brought it up, how childish is that? I'd completely forgotten about it."

:evilgrin:

[Wabbajack]

15. What does the rest of the writing say?

After "Bathroom Break"?

[FranzFerdinand]

17. is this possible?

.

[Igel]

18. It seems to start with "Is this possib(le) ..."

Seems to be asking about either security or protocol, IMHO.

[npincus]

16. ONLY ENHANCED: Reuters confirmed it WAS written by Chimpy

not Condi; hte image was not manipulated. We all know what it said!

[sadiesworld]

19. I laughed along with everyone else

but it really just fed into the whole bushbot liberal media persecution complex. Maybe that was the point, who knows?

[moobu2]

20. The Photo was enhanced, the content wasn’t changed

It's irrelevant.

[sandnsea]

23. The words are right, correct??

I don't understand what you're talking about. The man ought to know what to eat and not eat so he doesn't have to go to the bathroom, and doesn't even know the protocol for going to the friggin' bathroom, after FIVE GODDAMNED YEARS. Disrespectful idiot. That story hasn't changed a bit.

If you don't want the "photo-shopped" story to take hold, STOP REPEATING IT FOR CHRISSAKE. When will we learn this very simple lesson.

[Gyre]

27. Good eye.

Sometimes seem like we're a bunch of chickens all riled up and waiting for something to peck at. Suppose that makes us "peckish" (Wallace/Gromet reference).

Gyre

[progdonkey]

28. wtf are you talking about?

So, because the developer did some clarification tricks on the photo, this means Bush never wrote the note or that the text is suspect?

Your logic would say that a confession on an audio tape--without any evidence that the confession itself was tampered with or spliced in, etc.--that is put through filtering to get rid of extraneous noise would be inadmissible in court.

There is NO evidence the text of the note has been tampered with or altered in any substantive way.

[zulchzulu]

29. The photo was tampered out of normal Photoshop techniques

If you've ever worked professionally with Photoshop (I do), you know that the usual adjustment of colors, some brightness/contrast, some tweaking with alpha channels and cropping are the usual techniques used when submitting an image to a service.

But when you get into burning the image and other alterations, you then go into the "tampered" image. That's where this photo went to when submitted.

Yeah, it's a funny story. But using this tampered photo as part of some argument to bring Bush down only falls into the Rovian trap. Then the whole incident is discredited and the argument then turns to "gee, you're picking on the president" garbage.

In case you haven't noticed, that's also when the subject is changed to some petty story that hogs the headlines.

We don't need to fall into the trap...get it?

We have plenty of real material to use on Chimpy at the UN...like his speech!

[high density]

30. What trap??

I still don't see it. The photographer didn't write the note in Photoshop. Anyway, I fail to see how this is going to bring anybody down. It was funny and that's about it.