World Press Photo Disqualifies Winner
World Press Photo has disqualified one of the winners of this year’s contest after concluding that the photographer digitally manipulated his work. The disqualified entry “Street fighting, Kiev, Ukraine”, shot by Stepan Rudik for the Russian news agency RIA Novosti, had won 3rd prize in Sports Features.
This year, for the first time, photographers were required to submit RAW image files if the judges suspected that photographs were manipulated beyond what the rules allowed. The rule states:
The content of the image must not be altered. Only retouching which conforms to the currently accepted standards in the industry is allowed.
According to the British Journal of Photography, the manipulation involved removing the foot of one of the subjects in a photo.
(via Amateur Photographer)
Update: Stepan Rudik just contacted us with the original photograph and the version he entered in the contest. He says,
Your website gave information about disqualification of my material at the World Press Photo contest. I do NOT argue the decision of the jury.
At the same time, I would like to present the original photograph, from which it is clear that I haven’t made any significant alternation nor removed any important informative detail. The photograph I submitted to the contest is a crop, and the retouched detail is the foot of a man which appears on the original photograph, but who is not a subject of the image submitted to the contest. I believe this explanation is important for my reputation and good name as a reportage photographer. I’d like this picture to be published.
Here is the photograph in question:
It was actually a crop of the following photograph:
It wasn’t the crop, nor the post-processing, that caused the photograph to be disqualified, but the removal of the portion of the foot that is visible between the thumb and fingers of the hand being bandaged. We’ve cropped it ourselves here (Hover your mouse over the image to compare it to the version Rudik submitted):
Do you think the disqualification was justified? Share your thoughts with us in the comments!
Image credit: Photograph by Stepan Rudik
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[...] http://www.petapixel.com/assets/uplo…3/rudiknew.jpg maar wat blijkt? er is een voet weggewerkt (artikel) en daardoor wordt de originele RAW opgevraagd [...]
Sorry for my English
I think that you have to see your mistake before to take pictures. it was a mistake so it's correct they do it.
In my opinion, back in dark room days, just about everything done with digital manipulation today, could be done back then. I personally don't like the vignette for drama added to the image. the foot in my opinion looked like an obtrusion of the mans hand and was distracting. It did not remove or ad any falseness to the story. But the mood enhancing did. I think it is over done and the foot to me is nothing compared to the drama added to evoke emotion. If you think superimposing wasn't done in the dark room to add things that weren't there, you are sadly mistaken. Photoshop is just a digital version of an old darkroom with some amazing tools to make it all easier. Many of which were used a long time ago with film. I ask that IF the foot was removed but the dark mood hadn't been added, would the foot have been that big of deal? Or is it that together it was all too much? We have questioned the reality and integrity of photos since photos were invented. Photoshop just makes it easier to get the job done these days and with better results.
For me its obvious manipulation and the disqualification is justified. If we have certain, clear rules one cannot break them. I can't see why he decided to erase the foot. Congrats for jury for good eye!
The extreme cropping is a bigger problem than only the little piece of the foot. In the original picture you see the people aswell; a totally different pinture!!
[...] Check the rest of the article here. [...]
Cropping is as old as photography itself. Basic darkroom work from a negative could have had an identical effect on contrast and vignetting, and a skilled printer of news photography could have (and frankly, should have) burned the offending detail down to the same tone as the grass in order to better highlight the shape of the hand.
Rudik was possibly misguided in actually cloning out the detail instead of just darkening it into insignificance, but I think that's really more a consequence of better familiarity with today's tools (Photoshop vs the enlarger).*
The image accurately captures a real moment (albeit through the filter of a arguably old-fashioned reportage aesthetic), and I feel disqualification is excessive in this case.
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* I will concede that tonal manipulation vs pixel manipulation seems cut and dry right and wrong, but when one sees what sophisticated tonal manipulation (dodging and burning) can achieve without “moving” a single pixel, the case is less clear.
[...] http://www.petapixel.com/2010/03/03/world-press-photo-disqualifies-winner/ [...]
[...] om manipulation, retouchering og fotografiens etik, synes jeg lige jeg vil kommentere på at Stepan Rudik er smidt ud af Word Press Photo for at have manipuleret sine billeder. Min kommentar går ikke så meget på den konkrete sag, men [...]
[...] em contacto com um dos sítios que divulgou a notícia e a partir do qual este post foi escrito – Peta Pixel – e escreveu uma mensagem defendendo a sua hombridade [...]
[...] applicata, è una cosa che mi piacerebbe sentire da voi, limitandomi a fornirvi gli elementi per verificare cosa è accaduto a quell’immagine e ascoltare le spiegazioni fornite [...]
[...] There is enough beauty on the road, to easily take a great picture without having to send it to some post-production process and enhance the picture with filters and over-cropping. For instance, there was the case of Stepan Rudik being disqualified from the World Press Photo contest for enhancing his picture with photoshop, which goes back to the ethics of the travel industry. It’s unfortunate that he got disqualified, because his base image wasn’t terrible, but in competitions one needs every edge they can get – here is the original photo and altered image. [...]
[...] revirement du jury, qui provoqué un débat nourri chez les photographes, est motivé par le souhait d’afficher une ligne stricte face aux pratiques de correction [...]
I agree with the disqualification.
The photographer retouched the photo, then it changed the fact that another man appear behind.
[...] We attempted to edit the original RAW to get the award-winning photo. Here’s our sequence of steps. (If you want to try this as well, you’ll find the original photo here). [...]
Is not cropping removing content?
how the hell did this damn photo even place? its an ok photo after it was manipulated but what does this show? either way terrible that this person would sit there and do so much work on a photo… sad thing is all i see now days are manipulated photos that win photojournalism.
No offence but this contest just shows the sad state of the pj photography, the heavy cropping and the tonal manipulations are so common that as you've said there is no any difference do you cut some pixels or not. It is a different image anyway. Most of the winning pictures are the same anyway. Why do they call it pj phto contest is a mystery to me. You can use actors and do the same.
[...] last month, before the current version of CS5’s release, World Press Photo disqualified 2010 third-place winner Ukrainian photographer Stepan Rudik from its annual competition for digitally manipulating an [...]
It *should* indeed be disqualified. If he was a better photographer the foot wouldn't have been in the image in the first place.
What is the point of a photography contest if you can just make up some collage, or add/remove whatever you like?
[...] how things can be carried a bit too far, but I guess it is better to have rules than none at all: World Press Photo Disqualifies Winner Here is some more good reading on the subject: A Photo Editor – Aurora Photos Now Has A [...]
Yes, he did a bad thing retouching out the foot, however, this photograph shouldn’t have ever won this award in the first place, it’s an absolute average nothing photograph…
just remember the essay of david alan harvey ” tell it like it is ” i think that resumes the point of it. you’re suppose to document reality and add your personal touch, your style, not to manipulate in any way that mislead the viewers objectivity. On the first place they should not let anybody crop a picture like this, you can do a minor crop on the edges but that’s it….he got a picture from a bad picture…..that is not documentary photography.
correct! in contest you must be fair with others!
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