What a wild ride it’s been this past week with amateur photographer Catherine, the Princess of Wales, gaining the limelight for her reconstructive efforts on her husband’s family snaps. Is any of the story and picture true and real?
What’s certain is that there’s been lots of confusion for various reasons, lots of shrugging from royalist sympathisers (“does it really matter?”), lots of obfuscation, and lots of “there’s vastly more important news to report”. And yes, the latter is definitely a necessary perspective. But we’re here for the photography. So… what on earth is going on!?
For those who love conspiracy theories, everything and anything has been possible. There’s now vastly too many conspiracies to bother with. At the end, someone is bound to be correct and will receive all the game points and the plaudits. Congratulations to the future winner.
For those whose interest is in pixel-peeping, not everything has been well executed. There were so many retouching errors on that single image, that, with relatively close inspection, no one working on it should have ever allowed it to be seen.
The retouching, aka Photoshopping, is so amateurish that it’s hard to believe that a very useful and talented amateur photographer, the Princess, did it.
If I play the conspiracist role for a moment, maybe the poor retouching was the point? Why? No idea. Maybe someone was intoxicated when they did it and just didn’t realise how poor it was? Maybe it was an early April Fool’s Day gift?
But why did all those media companies called for a “Kill Order” on the photograph?
Well, despite many conspiracy theorists not believing what the media does, they still have their own ethics that they abide by. Generally speaking it works well. Manipulated imagery is an absolute no-no for them. They operate on the basic premise that trust is hard to gain and easy to lose. Therefore the rules of journalism need to be adhered to. “Lying is easy, telling the truth is the hard part”.
Over the years, photographers have had their images “killed” (and what a terrible term that is) for all manner of ethical and moral matters. News photographers are not supposed to interfere with either the scene, or the image, at all. If it is provable that something has been manipulated the image is pulled.
“But this was a private image shot by a private family.” It was released by the Kensington Palace, knowing it would be used as a news device. It’s fine if someone wants to print, frame and display even amateurishly retouched images on their home walls. But when prominent people show images that seemingly purport to be truthful, questions will be raised, “rightly or wrongly”.
If the released image shown was retouched purely for vanity’s sake, such as smoothing wrinkles, taming hair, adjusting the body slightly, there’d be some understanding. But this is an image that has been manipulated more than retouched. There’s a big difference. There are so many edits in the image that the closer observer wonders if it intends to tell a different story. The viewer can now ask questions about when the image was taken, who was actually posing, why have things been moved. Have colours been replaced? Who did participate? What is being concealed?
The royal family, could learn a few lessons from this PR disaster. For those who align themselves with “everything the family does is ok”, do allow for outside perspective.
Issuing a photograph by their own hand needs to be done with an image as clean as a photograph can get. Given what has just happened, the image agencies and media organisations are saying that they will now carefully inspect the images they hold from the royal family, and will carefully look at future releases. Overreaction? That’s how quickly trust is eroded.
Think of the very rare times top level political representatives in the US, UK or Australia have had an image released that has been pixel level manipulated. It’s so rare, than when it does happen there is, rightfully, a huge argument, loss of face and ultimately, a loss of trust.
A business, government or royal family can CHOOSE to show an image that works for them, but is truthful, or show nothing, especially if it’s unflattering or in any way inaccurate. To maintain trustworthiness there are a few simple “rules” to follow. Without understanding all the photojournalistic ethics involved, as I am not a journalist, the following would be considered relatively standard needs:
Use an independent photographer. Don’t manipulate the scene or the participants when shooting. Don’t use flash (there will be exceptions to that rule). Shoot a jpeg. Download it. Add metadata as required. Release it without putting it through any additional software. Export it – and that’s it. There are some adjustments deemed acceptable in some cases, and that would be to correct white balance, some exposure adjustment, and similar for shadows and highlights. Note that those changes are allowable because of the limitations of the camera. They are not fundamentally altering the scene.
That’s pretty much how the media gathers and distributes images. There’s usually little to no RAW used. There’s no Photoshop. My own suggestion was that the British version of Photoshop is very different to Adobe. There’s no GIMP (that would be funny if she was). There’s no Insta filters. There’s no VSCO.
On social media the speculation became so intense that the palace posted this, purportedly from the Princess, “I wanted to express my apologies for any confusion the family photograph we shared yesterday caused.” That added nothing to the understanding of the image at all, especially since there has been no offer to furnish the media with the original image or images.
Incidentally, apologies don’t seek to lay the blame at the foot of the observer. That’s the usual insincere non-apology.
The fault of the confusion doesn’t lie with anyone but those who shot and provided the image. And given that no explanation has been offered as to WHY the specific manipulations were done (“I like photoshop,” is hardly a worthwhile excuse), the conspiracists will keep having a field day.
That it was a family photograph, shot at home, without independent verification, and released via social media doesn’t worry anyone at all. The royal family can do as much of that as they want. That it was submitted as an exercise in assuaging public concern about a member of the family, and fails at that purpose because it was presented as factual, is the worry.
There are quotes attributed to named AND unnamed royal insiders, who apparently haven’t got a clue what’s going on but are happy to defend the decisions. If it turns out one of the conspiracy theories is correct then their own influence will lessen, yet again. Defend with the truth, not more aimless speculation.
And right now, almost everyone is speculating. Only a few actually know what is happening, and they haven’t provided definitive answers or proofs.
Is all publicity good publicity? Not this time. This is an international PR disaster. Media around the world have increasingly sought better answers from the royal family. From the public point of view, when will our need to know more about the private lives of everything be satiated? Are we owed this? Most rational people would say no.
This shows the power of a single photograph combined with the insidious aspects of fame. Maybe more usefully, it shows just how important truth is.
It also gives a new energy, a reinvigorated conversation, about the roles of retouching, manipulation, and the big one, artificial intelligence.
David