Award-winning Charlotte Observer photojournalist Patrick Schneider has been fired.
Today, Rick Thames, the paper’s editor, dashed off an apology for his readership, while summarily firing Schneider with a curt one-line dismissal.
According to Thames:
In the original photo, the sky in the photo was brownish-gray. Enhanced with photo-editing software, the sky became a deep red and the sun took on a more distinct halo.
Thames’ action is as much about saving face in an industry plagued by public distrust than it is about cleaning house. Given Schneider’s history with prior questions about manipulating pictures, Thames didn’t have much of a choice – the incident just gave him an opportunity to stand on the pretense of upholding journalistic integrity.
Just about the only thing a newspaper has left to court readers is the sense that what gets published is reported as accurately as possible.
Schneider’s predicament is less about misleading readers and more about misjudging editorial oversight.
This isn’t the first time Schneider has gotten into hot water for doctoring pictures. In 2003, the North Carolina Press Photographers Association (NCPPA) stripped Schneider of several awards he won for news pictures after the organization had determined excessive adjustments were made to the backgrounds of images.
Thames’ reaction to this current incident is one based primarily on fear.
The chief concern here is one of maintaining a perception in the public’s eye that journalism is somehow bias-free, and those that break from proscribed norms will be punished.
It is interesting to reflect on just how limited our understanding of what counts for journalistic ethics in this country. Editors use a rather narrow definition that applies mostly to the practice of constructing and correcting images. What the public isn’t privileged to is how assignments are conceived, what constitutes news, and how news is constructed for us.
Editors are conspicuously sensitive when it comes to the altering of pictures in Photoshop, but hardly raise an eyebrow when the pictures produced are actually sophisticated visual constructions, i.e., photo-ops, that push a particular agenda. Isn’t a “grip and grin” or “shin plaster” picture a type of manipulation as well -- be it the grand opening of a local hardware store or the kick off of some governor’s race?
Photographers are constantly being manipulated by political and economic interests, yet the only time they risk getting fired is when they refuse to cater to the overbearing demands of a public relations flack.
The big question now is whether or not the punishment fits the crime. Unfortunately for Schneider, the editors may be applying antecedent conventions to a medium that is constantly changing. The guidelines for what is acceptable in terms of post-production processes were drawn from previous practices that may no longer be all together relevant in an age of the seamless digital workflow.
What was Schneider up to when he adjusted the colors to reflect what he thought he saw through his lens? Tweaking the color to enhance the narrative qualities of images may be thought of as something akin to how a writer may use an adverb in a news story. Adverbs are generally those descriptive “ly” words that can get writers into trouble for injecting personal opinion.
What Schneider was doing to his image was adding a few “ly” words to a frame that may not have been as lively as it could have been. Where were the editors before the picture was published? Shouldn't they also be held accountable for letting the picture slip through the fact-checking process. Was Schneider's sky a misrepresented fact or a metaphoric device?
The editors believe that Mr. Schneider's manipulation of the image was in violation of the newspaper's policy on accurately reporting the news. Do using adverbs in a news story change the accuracy of a story? Not always, but they often do express the writer’s personal opinion.
What is clear to me is that the editor, not the photographer, has the ultimate power as judge and jury when it comes to determining what is real or not real in the newsroom. Somehow Schneider, by adjusting the color of the sky, allowed his opinion to creep into his re-presentation or interpretation of a news event just like a writer may have the urge to fatten up a thought with a few extra adverbs or descriptive adjectives.
Apparently, the editors in Charlotte are serious about holding feet to the fire when it comes to hyperbolic and excessive expression – textual and visual.
In this case, Thames may feel that he is protecting the interests of the newspaper by dumping a photographer who stepped a little too carelessly across the slippery ethical morass of news judgment, but then again, he may have only won a skirmish, not the war. Instead of firing Schneider, maybe the newspaper should invest in a little re-education, sort of like what you have to go through when you get a speeding ticket. Nevertheless, what is clear is that Schneider pushed the limits, and his luck, just a little too far this time.
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