As usual, Phil Douglis gets it right. Especially in that last quote.

I agree that the real issue is how the photo is being used. Is it a record of an event or an illustration to a story? The editor has an obligation to let the audience know, perhaps through a small cutline that says "Photo illustration" or something similar.

When I edited the employee publication for a financial services company, we often used photos to illustrate our stories rather than as a record of events. I remember a fun story we ran about an employee who happened to have the same name as the company president and who often received correspondence intended for the latter. It gave us a great vehicle to talk about things like e-mail security and privacy of information. To illustrate the story, we wanted to have the employee and the company president, standing side by side, with name tags: "Hello, my name is ***." Although the president was a good enough sport that he would have posed for the photo if time and his schedule allowed, we didn't have such a luxury. So we digitally spliced two photos of the two men to make it appear they were in the same photo. The photo was playful in nature, not to be taken too seriously, and by using the technology we were able to create a fun illustration to the story. No harm done.

That, it seems, is a far cry from running a photograph of the president "giving an award" to an employee through digital manipulation when the event never took place.

David,

I work for the Department of Defense, and I've been to enough Ragan seminars to know that my job in public affairs is exactly like that of the corporate communicator, especially when it comes to employee communications. Here is some ammo for you: In DoD we don't have to worry about it -- we have a regulation (it's the law!) that says we will not alter photographs. Period.

Oh, there are exceptions, of course. You can alter a photo for artistic purposes for a brochure cover, or similar such purpose that would call for artwork, but then we must label it a "photo illustration." Also, in news photos we are required to obliterate (smudge) anything that is classified or would otherwise jeopordize security.

The common sense part of the regulation is that it specifies what we can and cannot do with photo editing software. We can dodge, burn and crop, for example; and we change contrast, brightness, color saturation, etc. We can, in short, do any of those things that before electronic manipulation would have been acceptable to do in a darkroom.

You would be amazed at how often people in my organization who know enough about Photoshop to be dangerous will ask us to remove a person or a person's wart, etc. from a photo. Sometimes it takes all the tact we can muster to get them to read the regulation.

Anyone who wants to see the regulation can Google "Alteration of DoD photos" and find it pretty easily.

Will

The way I approach the issue, David, is to remind my students that "photography" means "to write" (graph) with "light" (photo). We write everything two ways: once with words, once with light. The pictures should do visually what the words to verbaly.

You edit Speechwriter's Newsletter. Is writing a speech O.K. -- choosing some words and not others, structuring the whole piece, researching it, rehearsing it several times so the speaker gets the bugs out -- and in some sense is able to present the speech as his or her own, and as heartfelt? You'd apprvoe all that verbally, wouldn't you?

Phil's right: intention and audience sensistivity determine ethics. The rest is technqiue.

Pat

The way I figure: The cost of removing my wrinkles at a dermatologist - $5,000 or so. The cost of removing said wrinkles through Photoshop - $0.

I would give up my journalistic integrity for that one, unless I worked at the DoD, of course.

I think David's just trying to justify the heavy alteration of his blog photo to make him look younger and more dashing. ;-)

David, your post brings back memories. An article I wrote on this exact subject appeared in Communication World in Nov. 1992, around the time when Photoshop was just starting to make an impact on corporate journalism. Here's a link: http://findarticles.com/p/articles/mi_m4422/is_n11_v9/ai_13800357

I had a lot of fun illustrating the piece in the style of the Weekly World News tabloid, featuring an image of me, at my desk, with an alien spaceship outside of my window and headlines blaring "YOUR COMPUTER CAN CHANGE REALITY! Alien technology invades corporate world!"

In the last paragraph I quoted Lou Williams:

"There's nothing new in the concept of retouching," says Lou Williams, ABC, APR, of L.C. Williams and Associates in Chicago. "All we're getting is new ways to do it. If it gets abused, we can't blame the technology. We can only blame ourselves. I maintain that you can do these things as long as it doesn't change the truth. If you have any sense of integrity at all, you can make those decisions. If you can't do that, you shouldn't be in this business."

Just in the last year in my work as an employee publication editor, I have overseen serious retouching of several images. Some photos were staged to go with feature articles, others were editorial shots that were changed to remove distractions. I can confidently say that none of these retouching efforts compromised the content of the photos or the stories, and in fact the changes drew more of the reader's attention to what the articles were trying to communicate.

As one designer said to me, sometimes an altered image can be "truer" than an untouched one because it speaks to a bigger meaning. But it's a power that's almost too easy to wield these days, and we need to remind ourselves of that.

Robert, Will, Pat and Eileen--

Thanks much for the insights; that DoD regulation will come in as handy for me doing this session as it does for Will and his team in their work.

And as for you, Robert: I use the old-fashioned technique of "finding a five-year-old photo from back before I looked like a tired owl."

David

P.S. Here's the 12-year-old DoD regulation:

Department of Defense

DIRECTIVE

NUMBER 5040.5

August 29, 1995

Certified Current as of November 21, 2003

ATSD(PA)

SUBJECT: Alteration of Official DoD Imagery

Reference: (a) Deputy Secretary of Defense Policy
Memorandum, "Alteration of Official Photographic and
Video Imagery," December 9, 1994 (hereby canceled)

1. PURPOSE

This Directive:

1.1. Supersedes reference (a).

1.2. Establishes policy and assigns responsibilities
to ensure the absolute credibility of official DoD imagery
in and outside the Department of Defense.

2. APPLICABILITY AND SCOPE

This Directive:

2.1. Applies to the Office of the Secretary of Defense
(OSD), the Military Departments, the Chairman of the
Joint Chiefs of Staff, the Combatant Commands, the Inspector
General of the Department of Defense, the Defense Agencies,
and the DoD Field Activities (hereafter referred to
collectively as "the DoD Components").

2.2. Shall be consistent with the national security
responsibilities of the Secretary of Defense.

3. DEFINITION

Official DoD Imagery. All photographic and video images,
regardless of the medium in which they are acquired,
stored, or displayed, that are recorded or produced
by persons acting for or on behalf of DoD activities,
functions, or missions.

4. POLICY

It is DoD policy that:

4.1. Official DoD imagery is an essential tool of decision-makers
at every DoD level.

4.2. Mission success and the protection of lives and
property depend on official DoD imagery being complete,
timely, and above all, highly accurate.

4.3. Anything that weakens or casts doubt on the credibility
of official DoD imagery in or outside the Department
of Defense shall not be tolerated.

4.4. The alteration of official DoD imagery by persons
acting for or on behalf of the Department of Defense
is prohibited, except as follows:

4.4.1. Photographic techniques common to traditional
darkrooms and digital imaging stations such as dodging,
burning, color balancing, spotting, and contrast adjustment
that are used to achieve the accurate recording of an
event or object are not considered alterations.

4.4.2. Photographic and video image enhancement, exploitation,
and simulation techniques used in support of unique
cartography; topography; engineering; geodesy; intelligence;
criminal investigation; medical; research, development,
test & evaluation; scientific; and training requirements
are authorized if they do not misrepresent the subject
of the original image.

4.4.3. The obvious masking of portions of a photographic
image in support of specific security, criminal investigation,
privacy, or legal requirements is authorized.

4.4.4. The use of cropping, editing, or enlargement
to selectively isolate, link, or display a portion of
a photographic or video image is not considered alteration.
Cropping, editing, or image enlargement that has the
effect of misrepresenting the facts or circumstances
of the event or object as originally recorded is prohibited.

4.4.5. The digital conversion and compression of official
DoD imagery is authorized.

4.4.6. Photographic and video post-production enhancement,
including animation, digital simulation, graphics, and
special effects, used for dramatic or narrative effect
in education, recruiting, safety and training illustrations,
publications, or productions is authorized under either
of the conditions in subparagraph 4.4.6.1. or 4.4.6.2.,
below.

4.4.6.1. The enhancement does not misrepresent the
subject of the original image; or,

4.4.6.2. It is clearly and readily apparent from the
context or from the content of the image or accompanying
text that the enhanced image is not intended to be an
accurate representation of any actual event.

5. RESPONSIBILITIES

5.1. The Assistant to the Secretary of Defense for
Public Affairs shall:

5.1.1. In coordination with the other OSD Principal
Staff Assistants, provide oversight policy and guidance
to ensure the absolute credibility of official DoD imagery.

5.1.2. Monitor compliance of this Directive.

5.1.3. Ensure compliance with this Directive for those
activities in their purview.

5.2. The Other OSD Principal Staff Assistants shall:

5.2.1. Maintain liaison with the Assistant to the Secretary
of Defense for Public Affairs in maintaining oversight
policy and guidance to ensure the absolute credibility
of official DoD imagery.

5.2.2. Ensure compliance with this Directive for those
activities in their purview.

5.3. The Heads of the DoD Components shall ensure compliance
with this Directive for those activities in their purview.

6. EFFECTIVE DATE

This Directive is effective immediately.

Thanks, Ron--

Thanks to y'all, I'm going to be the best-prepared fighter on this panel.

As a way of thanking you, I offer this anecdote, from Chuck Wepner, the man who almost took Muhammed Ali the distance; from a Web site called the Monday Morning Memo:

... Wepner found himself scheduled to fight The Great One – Muhammad Ali himself. On the morning of the fight Wepner gave his wife a pink negligee and told her that she would "soon be sleeping with the heavyweight champion of the world."

Ali scored a technical knockout of Wepner with just 19 seconds remaining in the fight. ...

After the fight, Wepner's wife pulled the negligee out of her purse and asked, "Do I go to Ali's room or does he come to mine?"

A tired owl, maybe, but a wise one nonetheless...

Great story, David. And just about an ideal use of a blog as a live research tool!

Ron

P.S. I'm looking to convince my boss to send me to New Orleans because my client won a Gold Quill. So I hope to see your panel, among other New Orleans activities.

Oh, it would be great to see you in New Orleans, Ron. I'm covering the conference for The Ragan Report in addition to speaking, so I'll be far too busy to party like a maniac with you every single night. Tuesday night, you're on your own.

This is a very interesting discussion. I look forward to sitting in the front row of the panel session in New Orleans, munching popcorn, as you fend off the repeated blows of your fellow panelists, Chuck, uh, I mean, David.

I work with photographs often in my job, and I have used PhotoShop quite liberally. Usually, I pass my self-imposed "KGB warning system"--which only goes off when my work begins to strongly imitate the tactics of the former Soviet photo experts. (You know, when people would fall out of favor with the government and be "erased" from photographs.)

The closest I've come lately was when I was about to publish a photo that showed a group of managers participating in a pot-luck event that was held months prior at work. One of the managers, unfortunately, had just been let go because of an ethical lapse. He was popular with his former employees, and seeing his image would have raised some emotions that were just starting to quell.

I felt relief that he appeared at the far left of the photograph, and I could crop him out of the photo without retouching the shot.

Would the DOD require that I leave him in to maintain the original composition of the shot? If so, I'm glad that I don't work for them, comrade.

David--

I'm looking forward to joining you on the panel in New Orleans. I wish we were going to have more time, this is a huge, fun topic.

I'll start with the word manipulation since that seems to be the hot button.

At one end of the continuum are folks who believe that the act of photography itself is manipulation. Lens choice, film vs. digital, what to shoot, when to shoot and all the other decisions photographers make comprise an enormous manipulation of time and space. The addition of digital capabilities just makes for ever more creative images. To paraphrase Picaso, I photograph what I think, not what I see.

At the other end of the continuum are those that assume there is a pure image. Once the camera has captured a moment in time no, information may be added or taken from the image. This is rigorously enforced by the photojournalism community and the newspapers and magazines that use their photos. It also seems that most end users of photographs perceive that what the camera has seen is a graphical representation of reality. This may be due to the camera's ability to record a scene in great detail, something that sets it apart from painting or drawing a scene.

But this idea that the camera never lies appears to be changing. I was reading a study released in February 2007 based on how people view news magazine and newspaper photography. The perception among those in the study group is that all photographs are digitally manipulated. In fact, the more amazing or unbelieveable the photo, the more they believed it was manipulated. These are NEWS photos!

To your original point, David. the spinnng of the images has already begun. IMHO, the convergence of technology with new expectations about photographs is moving the needle away from the idea of pure images. A new generation of image consumers weened on "photoshopping" sites like Fark.com, Worth1000.com and Somethingawful.com will view capture as just one step in the image-making process.

I am not sure what this means for organizational communicators but it looks like our audience is changing.

Your humble panel mate.

keith

Tom,

You hit an obvious "gray area" on cropping folks out of photos. The DoD general rule of thumb is if it would have been acceptable in the old days in a darkroom, it is acceptable today electronically. I never had a problem cropping someone out of the photo like that on one side. We do it all the time in one fashion or another. For example, if we have a group photo and just need a mug shot, we'll crop down to the head and shoulders of one person in the group, and we have our mug shot.

Under the circumstances, I agree with your decision. Faced with the same situation in my DoD public affairs job, I might do the same thing. I'm sure the photo alteration police will never drag either one of us away for that.

Actually, comrade, working for DoD is a pretty darn good job.

Will

Will, thanks. We make decisions in the crush of work, and sometimes have to rely mostly on our training and instincts when confronted by the gray areas. I'll stop looking over my shoulder for the photo alteration police, although I still am wary of the IT keystroke loggers.

"Hey, I'm on break...back off!"

David--

I look forward to joining you on the panel in New Orleans. It's a big, fun topic.

Keith Philpott

I'm looking forward to it too, Keith.

As panel moderator I'm glad to see you, David, and you, Keith, acting so civilly to each other (at least in print) given your radically opposing viewpoints. All in all it might be a good idea for you two to buddy up because the third panelist, Donna Collum (advertising creative director extraordinaire of one of the largest companies on the planet) is capable of pinning both of your ears back. She's the one person I dread seeing in the audience when I speak because she always asks the tough, insightful questions. She's put me in my place more than once. I figure it was safer to put her on the panel than find her in the audience - safer for ME anyway, not for you guys!

Awww, c'mon, Suzanne, I'm not THAT bad, she says while sharpening her talons!! Tee hee.

This is an interesting thread of discussion and I've enjoyed reading thru it. I think that Phil Douglis gets it mostly right when he talks about content and intention. Reminds me of the "sin is in the intention" ethos that I grew up with in the Catholic church...but we all know that the loophole out of that is to have no scruples at all and therefore have no good or bad intentions, right?

Certainly photojournalistic manipulation is one thing, but most of us would agree that all is generally fair in love and war when it comes to advertising. And advertising people generally photoshop their asses off when it comes to images in their ads. But, even we whoredogs can get in trouble when we go too far. You probably remember Campbells' soup getting sued a few years back for false advertising for putting marbles in the bottom of a bowl of soup thereby pushing the meat and veggies to the top so as to look less watery in the photos. And this was before the photo retouchers even got a hold of it! This made us all really stop and think in the ad industry about how much manipulation is too much manipulation.

But we didn't stop for too long as we went on our merry way with our photo manipulating guiles. But the caveat, "Buyer beware" can't completely mitigate what we do any more than out-and-out defrauding someone in a business deal would make it okay to blame the victim. There has to be integrity in what we do. I guess asking for advertising people to have integrity in a business where we get paid to manipulate people is a laugh. And I suppose policing ourselves on this issue is something akin to the fox guarding the henhouse. But it would seem that only the most egregious advertising lies make it to court.

But we're not the only guilty parties. Even in photojournalism where they are supposed to comply to higher standards of journalistic integrity, such as objectivity, etc. we see a lot of built-in subjectivity. And this is before Photoshop is even deployed.I can think of dozens of examples where unflattering shots of people who it is acceptable to demonize pass for uneditorialized chronicling of the news. Where are the ethics there? So, who are the real whoredogs now?! At least in advertising you know you're being sold something.

Suddenly something has come up and I can't make it to New Orleans. Have fun, Keith!!!!!!!!