Tiny frames her window of attack on the superball quarry, just off camera to the right. Quick's a cat can catch a superball or a squirrel, the blogosphere, taking its cue from the ever-alert Michelle Malkin, caught USA Today in a dirty trick -- trying to get away with publishing a photograph of Condoleezza Rice Photoshopped to look like a zombie -- and pounced.
USA Today got religion in record time. Presumably in response to the blogburst led by Michelle Malkin this morning, they have replaced the zombie version of that photo of Condoleezza Rice -- blogged here -- with the original AP photo and attached an "Editor's note":
The photo of Condoleezza Rice that originally accompanied this story was altered in a manner that did not meet USA TODAY's editorial standards. The photo has been replaced by a properly adjusted copy. Photos published online are routinely cropped for size and adjusted for brightness and sharpness to optimize their appearance. In this case, after sharpening the photo for clarity, the editor brightened a portion of Rice's face, giving her eyes an unnatural appearance. This resulted in a distortion of the original not in keeping with our editorial standards.
Holding the media's feet to the fire by confronting them with the errors of their ways: It's one of the things the blogosphere does best. We notice there were 60 trackbacks to Michelle's original post -- most if not all in support of her thesis -- including technical explanations by Photoshop experts as to how the original image may have been doctored. Congratulations to Michelle and her army of seekers of wisdom and truth for not letting 'em get away with it.
Update: Oh, sweet mystery of life.
Technorati tag: demonizing condi
Surely USA Today was engaging in a bit of Halloween trickery in rendering Condi with "gothic horror" eyes..as usual, we are just being paranoid../sarcasm level SKY HIGH
Posted by: Tara | October 26, 2005 at 07:30 PM
Yes, this is what the media is doing wrong, doctoring pictures. Oh yeah, there is that other thing they do, nothing. They have their heads so far up their you know whats that they have no clue what is going on in the world, which in turn means most americans have no clue.
Posted by: Gerald | October 26, 2005 at 08:17 PM
What's even more outrageous...we've got the "third photo" that reveals everything.
http://www.californiaconservative.org/?p=1287
Posted by: California Conservative | October 26, 2005 at 08:23 PM
I see tons of these sorts of things regarding AP, NYT, Reuters, ...
Has anyone ever seen something that affected a liberal?
Posted by: Jim, Mtn View, CA | October 26, 2005 at 09:05 PM
See what happens when I actually work all day... I miss all the fun. Demon Condi will be haunting me now. LOL.
After the Dan Rather fiasco, you'd think that any news idiot would take more care when doctoring things like papers and photos! Sheesh - why do their parents pay for J-school anyway - can't even turn out convincing manipulators!
Posted by: Teresa | October 26, 2005 at 10:19 PM
Actually I kind of liked the "demon eyes" photo. It said "Mess with me and I'll burn you to a crisp!"
Posted by: Paul | October 27, 2005 at 12:08 AM
The Internet and the Bloggers, the last great hope for America to avoid the Commissars predicted by Balint Vazsonyi in "America's 30 Years War."
Posted by: goomp | October 27, 2005 at 06:53 AM
Alteration of a photograph for political effect has a long pedigree in Stalinist Russia and in the pages of Pravda. It can be quite an effective method of trashing your opponent.
Posted by: Kevin F | October 27, 2005 at 07:43 AM
Love how they claimed it was the result of "brightening her face" - no, the pixels of her pupils were just painted white; I could probably do it myself with MS Paint if I had the time. If it was the result of "brightening", the rest of her face would have been lightened to a ghostly blur...
Really this is nothing more than the electronic equivalent of when I used to deface magazines as a teenager by whiting out people's eyes with an eraser - the kids at USA Today were just y'know, doing what kids do...
Posted by: Scott | October 27, 2005 at 08:40 AM
The photoprocessor could have simply clicked in the eyes to "set the white" and clicked in the hair to "set the black." Photos are routinely sharpened, which would heighten the effect. It is entirely possible that the processor did not properly select the pixels, which should be done carefully to prevent just such an occurrence, but the problem lies in not checking one's work to insure the least amount of change to the photo. I work in photoprocessing for a Gannett paper, and we try to alter the photos as little as possible, while still optimizing for the press.
Since we strive to change a photo as little as possible, the photoprocessor is likely at fault. It doesn't even have to be deliberate. Take it from me, we are not all left-wing liberals, especially not those of us in the blue-collar jobs, like production.
Posted by: pb | October 27, 2005 at 11:15 AM
Nice try, pb, but no cigar. Her eyes are the *only* pixels affected, and a simple gamma correction was not the culprit- note that her earrings are not changed, and they were brighter than her eyes in the original.
The change was not accidental.
Posted by: Grizz | October 27, 2005 at 11:35 AM
Nice. Thanks for sharing.
Posted by: TallDave | October 27, 2005 at 01:47 PM
"Photos published online are routinely cropped for size and adjusted for brightness and sharpness to optimize their appearance. In this case, after sharpening the photo for clarity, the editor brightened a portion of Rice's face, giving her eyes an unnatural appearance. This resulted in a distortion of the original not in keeping with our editorial standards." - USAToday
Distortion, huh? OK, an honest mistake.
So I decided to see if I could make the same honest mistake.
Nothing. I couldn't come close to USAToday's error in editing. Then I tried something really sneaky - I made a big increase in the Brightness just to Condi's eyes and nothing else.
Pow! In 5 minutes this 'old country redneck has nearly exactly matched the efforts of USAToday's high-priced graphics editors. And to make sure that I didn't try to hoodwink anyone I invite any and all to see my work at http://commonfolkcommonsense.blogspot.com/
The comment by Grizz above hit dead on target: "Her eyes are the *only* pixels affected, and a simple gamma correction was not the culprit..."
Those clowns "brightened a portion of Rice's face" all right - they did it on purpose for the one and only reason of making her look like a hideous demon (or like the average Liberal).
But this was "honest mistake" - sort of like "Kerry honorably served". Maybe Dan Rather can determine if the photo was "fake but accurate".
Posted by: shamalama | October 27, 2005 at 04:55 PM
I have the scoop on the photosphopping job on my site by a techie who knows his stuff.
It's worth checking out.
Posted by: Sam | October 27, 2005 at 05:48 PM