Althouse: "'Crop' was the wrong word, implying that the original framing was not used."

March 10, 2015

"'Crop' was the wrong word, implying that the original framing was not used."

"They selected a shot that was framed the way they liked it. The NYT defense is entirely semantic, no?"

30 comments:

Jim said...: I'm GOP all the way. However, I thought the picture they used just looked better than the one with the Bushes in it. Something about the composition that appealed to me. Perhaps someone with a background in art, who has taken a lot of pictures that they carefully framed, would have an informed opinion.; 3/10/15, 9:06 AM
Renee said...: I saw the White House video, plenty of views of George Bush. Not as many as Obama, but clearly not cropped out.

What's the deal with Al Sharpton popping his head behind Obama...; 3/10/15, 9:10 AM
Brando said...: That's the problem with having an anti-Bush reputation--you may have a perfectly legitimate reason for doing something, but people are understandably going to wonder if there was some conscious or unconscious bias against Bush behind this. Had they simply cropped out a Democratic senator, no one would be questioning this explanation.; 3/10/15, 9:11 AM
Brando said...: Personally I have a bigger problem with Sharpton even being invited to the damn thing. Maybe it says something terrible about the state of the black empowerment movement these days, but it still is noxious to have the civil rights movement associated with that bigoted criminal.; 3/10/15, 9:12 AM
Big Mike said...: What Brando said. It's the Times, after all. Their hatred for the Bushes is deep and abiding.; 3/10/15, 9:13 AM
Capt. Schmoe said...: Conservative independent here, though I thought President Bush was too moderate, I am still a fan. I am also a photographer and as such, I would have probably cropped the photo in a similar fashion. There are several compositional things going on in the photo, including lighting, background and balance that would have led me to crop it similarly as well.

People tend to forget that post capture processing is part of the compositional process. While we try to get the shot as close as we want it before getting on the trigger, sometimes when we have time to look at it afterwards, we find ways to improve it.

This is much ado about nothing.; 3/10/15, 9:13 AM
m stone said...: No. Most every photo in print and now online is cropped for visual effect.

Comparing the two, the "framed" photo works best, showing the larger crowd and a single focal point--the man in the white shirt, Obama and not two (larger shot).

That's not to say there is no editorial bias.; 3/10/15, 9:16 AM
traditionalguy said...: Didn't you know that those election stealing Bushes will never be invitees to NYT celebrations of popular voting laws. They graduated from Electoral College.; 3/10/15, 9:18 AM
Jaq said...: Semantic, like spot the difference between "All the news that's fit to print" and "All the news we sit fit to print."; 3/10/15, 9:21 AM
MadisonMan said...: Blame the photographer, in other words.; 3/10/15, 9:22 AM
Jaq said...: This is much ado about nothing

You are sort of assuming that the photographer was powerless to take another photo that captured what was actually happening, that two presidents were at the event.

It's like printing a photo of the end of the superbowl immediately before the interception, when it looked like the guy was open for an easy touchdown, and claiming "composition considerations" for why what actually happened was not shown.; 3/10/15, 9:25 AM
PB said...: This is a key problem. Are they looking for a photograph that looks good, one that fits a narrative, or one that more broadly illustrates what really occurred?

A key flaw in the NY Times defense was that the photo with Bush was "underexposed". Yeah, right. We're talking about digital images taken by highly sophisticated cameras shot in RAW format, all of which appear underexposed until post-processed for proper color treatment. You only post-process the images you want to publish, so some flak assigned to create a back story would look at the published image and the un-processed image with Bush and come up with the naive conclusion about under exposure.

They chose the photo that looked best that fit the narrative. This is the NY Times we're talking about, whose latest "scoop" was the Hillary email matter fed to them by the White House.; 3/10/15, 9:43 AM
Chris said...: I understand the composition argument. But the Times is not running a photoblog, they're running a newspaper. The more pleasing composition should not trump the more newsworthy image.

The story earlier in the week was about how Republicans were snubbing the event, and of the choices in photographs, one reinforced that slant, and one undermined it. The Times made a poor editorial decision.; 3/10/15, 9:44 AM
Paco Wové said...: "spot the difference between "All the news that's fit to print" and "All the news we sit fit to print.""

"All the news that fits our refined artistic sensibilities"; 3/10/15, 9:46 AM
Rob said...: Like so many on campuses these days, Ann is anti-semantic.; 3/10/15, 9:49 AM
buwaya said...: Modern photojournalism is mainly about editing, because the guys on the spot will take many thousands of technically perfect images.
And there are hundreds of photographers at these things, most of whom make their stuff easily available to the NYT. That's a lot of images to choose from.; 3/10/15, 9:52 AM
pm317 said...: Who put the Bushes at the other end? That is the person to be scorned and I would bet it was Jarret and Obama. The Blacks there didn't want to share the stage and the big photo-op with Bush. That shows how small they are. And NYT wanted to put Obama right in the middle and he would not have been if Bush were to be included in the Pic. All around smallness as is expected of these fuckers.; 3/10/15, 9:59 AM
Drago said...: It is purely coincidental that liberal groups are attacking the GOP for insufficient participation while other liberal entities simply don't show the GOP participating.

Purely coincidental.

As always.

And always in the same direction.

Coincidentally.; 3/10/15, 9:59 AM
Jaq said...: We're talking about digital images taken by highly sophisticated cameras shot in RAW format, all of which appear underexposed until post-processed for proper color treatment

Maybe they don't have a post processing program capable of regional adjustments? Why don't they go with that defense? Maybe they just work with the program that comes with the camera? Yeah, that's the ticket!; 3/10/15, 10:03 AM
Hagar said...: It is deeper than the photograph. The shot was posed for a photo of Obama purposefully leading a phalanx of black Democrats over on the left and W. and Laura Bush out of the picture with some miscellaneous stragglers over on the right.; 3/10/15, 10:18 AM
MadisonMan said...: Who put the Bushes at the other end? That is the person to be scorned

It wouldn't surprise me if the Bushes themselves chose not to walk next to Obama, simply to avoid the spotlight.; 3/10/15, 10:34 AM
etbass said...: Seems to me the obvious question is why the Bushes were so far from Obama. Normally someone would get that corrected as all politicians know the photo is the thing.

And it seems to me that it would have been Obama's place to ask the Bushes to join them in the center. I would be surprised it the Bushes themselves would have suggested it.; 3/10/15, 10:47 AM
Renee said...: Obama was NOT center. Look at the double yellow line, In the middle were individuals I assume marched 50 years ago,considering the wheelchairs.; 3/10/15, 10:50 AM
Hagar said...: Again, it is a posed photograph.; 3/10/15, 11:02 AM
mccullough said...: Why weren't the Clintons there?; 3/10/15, 11:54 AM
machine said...: another conspiracy shot down.

ever thus the victim...; 3/10/15, 11:57 AM
HoodlumDoodlum said...: Where were the Clintons? Where was Hilary??
Was she some ways taared and just couldn't make it?; 3/10/15, 12:00 PM
Col Mustard said...: The New York Times is a NEWSpaper. Any photo in the news section should reflect the true nature of the subject/event. The photo selected would lead one to believe that the civil rights struggle was an all-black affair. Nothing could be farther from the truth.; 3/10/15, 12:02 PM
William said...: The picture that was published was the better picture, but why wasn't there a better picture that included Bush.....The present Times editors are probably uncomfortable with that Iwo Jima picture. The patriotism is kind of jingoistic, maybe even fascist. How much better if they had published a picture of the grief stricken faces of Marines against a backdrop of ruin and desolation.; 3/10/15, 12:38 PM
Drago said...: bbkingfish: "No"

Of course not.

It's all simply coincidental.

As always.

In the same direction to be sure.

shutup, they explained.; 3/10/15, 1:51 PM