
Two images of the miners' strike, an instant apart: so which is the classic? - prismatic
https://www.theguardian.com/artanddesign/2018/dec/06/photographers-scrum-winning-image-picture
======
theBobBob
There is a brilliant picture illustrating this. I tried to track it down but
couldn't find it anywhere. It is actually three "different" pictures. The
first is a soldier (I believe it was US soldier) giving a drink of water to a
very tired or distressed looking man (I think he looked Middle Eastern). The
second was a very tired or distressed looking man (the same one in the same
pose) with a soldier (different to the first one) pointing an assault rifle a
the unarmed man's head. The third was actually just the full pulled out
picture i.e. a soldier giving water to a very tired or distressed looking man
while another soldier held an assault rifle to his head. It very powerfully
shows that you can be reporting on facts but depending on how you frame it (in
this case literally) can completely change the message behind the "facts" that
you are reporting on. One picture showed the US army as a generous saviour to
this poor man. The other showed the US soldier as a monster that was pointing
a rifle at a poor distressed man's head. The third showed that is was actually
both or maybe neither. Really wish I could track that one down.

~~~
dessant
This is the uncropped image:
[https://i.imgur.com/hR2yEBe.jpg](https://i.imgur.com/hR2yEBe.jpg)

And these are the versions with different framing: [https://www.penser-
critique.be/wp-content/uploads/2018/01/ca...](https://www.penser-
critique.be/wp-content/uploads/2018/01/cadrage.jpg)

~~~
emeraldd
Looking at the full picture, that rifle is very likely not even pointed at the
man being given water. I wouldn't be surprised to find that the solder with
the weapon is facing away from the whole scene, and not watching the two
helping the man on the ground at all.

~~~
russh
I think it only looks like the rifle is pointed at the man because it was
taken with a telephoto lens that compresses the depth of the image a lot.

------
retSava
The famous photo of the Tank man from Tianamen square is shown in the article,
and it's the most common view. But, it doesn't convey very well what the
person must have seen. Standing up to a handful of tanks must require guts of
steel, but standing up to a battalion of tanks is surreal.

The following photo shows this much better:
[https://imgur.com/a/OkjFI6j](https://imgur.com/a/OkjFI6j)

~~~
SonicSoul
Whoa, I’ve never seen this one thanks!

------
finnthehuman
Pictures are how the press misleads us, in a way where they don't have to
acknowledge to us (and often not even to themselves) what they're doing.

Here's some interesting commentary on that:
[https://thelastpsychiatrist.com/2008/09/mms_chicks_oil_sex_d...](https://thelastpsychiatrist.com/2008/09/mms_chicks_oil_sex_drugs_and_a.html)
[https://thelastpsychiatrist.com/2010/07/did_bp_fake_a_pictur...](https://thelastpsychiatrist.com/2010/07/did_bp_fake_a_picture_yes_but.html)

~~~
Shivetya
they merely follow the lead of politicians and political machines everywhere.
both strive on strive. To do so requires separating people along ideals and
the first step to that is misrepresentation or distortion of a fact and then
exploiting that without backing off.

the internet turned a lot of that upside down while enabling more to begin
with. however in the end many more eyes on the news means it is possible to
get to the truth a lot easier than before

------
sureaboutthis
Television "news" used to be really good about providing cinematic images
instead of reality. A crowd of protestors on the street but, when the camera
pulls back, you find the "crowd" is about 10 people and no one else paying any
attention to them.

Fortunately, some are better about pulling back intentionally to show such
things but I still catch it occasionally.

~~~
sparkzilla
Or when a well-known TV anchor pretends a whole area is flooded, but is
actually standing in a ditch.

~~~
cannonedhamster
Please tell me you're not referencing the widely debunked Anderson Cooper
conspiracy theory.

[https://www.snopes.com/fact-check/anderson-cooper-
hurricane/](https://www.snopes.com/fact-check/anderson-cooper-hurricane/)

------
apo
Huh? The article does a poor job of answering the question posed in the title
(please, author, just tell me which is the "classic"). I've never seen the
image in question and just wanted to get that basic fact straight before
reading.

The article leads with two side-by-side images. The one on the right,
apparently, is the "classic" one. However, it has been cropped, which makes
the comparison pointless. The caption is no help either, just giving the
photographer's last name but not identifying the "classic."

Was the goal to force the reader solve the riddle for themselves? If so, it
ruins the rest of the discussion.

------
jlawson
I'm reminded of almost every image you see of Trump interacting with world
leaders.

Merkel A:

[https://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/americas/angela-
mer...](https://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/americas/angela-merkel-
donald-trump-photo-viral-g7-shinzo-abe-a8392186.html)

Merkel B:

[https://www.thenational.ae/world/the-americas/donald-
trump-s...](https://www.thenational.ae/world/the-americas/donald-trump-slams-
canadian-prime-minister-justin-trudeau-as-g7-summit-ends-in-farce-1.738392)

Trudeau A:

[https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/worldviews/wp/2017/07/01...](https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/worldviews/wp/2017/07/01/donald-
trumps-very-affectionate-tweet-about-justin-trudeau-
explained/?utm_term=.56fc14a67294)

Trudeau B:

[https://ottawacitizen.com/news/politics/watch-live-justin-
tr...](https://ottawacitizen.com/news/politics/watch-live-justin-trudeau-and-
donald-trump-hold-a-joint-news-conference)

When these are used to manipulate as they so often are, I consider these lies
just the same as if they were printed words. Imagine your friend sent you a
photo like this with the implication that the people were being aggressive
somehow, but it turned out to be an instantaneous facial expression in a
completely different moment. Such choice of image is a way for the media to
lie with some veneer of deniability, and they do it every chance they get.

It's even worse on Twitter. And don't remind me of the images of the Kavanaugh
hearing...

~~~
frabbit
Those are very good examples of how choosing from among(what must now with
digital cameras tens or hundreds of ) images can result in very different
perceptions of what an event truly was.

~~~
ianmcgowan
Meta: can we ever know what "an" event truly was? Or are there as many events
as there are people there? This whole thread reminds me of
[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Talking_It_Over](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Talking_It_Over))
which goes over the same events from three different perspectives. There's a
rich tradition of trying to figure this out through art...

~~~
CamperBob2
_Meta: can we ever know what "an" event truly was?_

Einstein put an end to that comforting notion a hundred years ago when he
showed that simultaneity (and thus causality) are meaningful only to observers
in the same inertial reference frame. How often does _that_ apply in politics?

------
everdev
A picture is worth a thousand words, but also a thousand questions. It's
amazing how we can craft an entire narrative for an event from a split second
of light exposure.

~~~
mbrumlow
This is where things went wrong.

It was the job of the journalist to do this, eg, pick the best images that
convey what really happened.

Along the way the news and journalist changed. Now they are all politically
aligned and do their best to pick the images that best align with their
political agendas.

At some point we are going to have to put a stop to bias reporting and force
news organizations to either not be called "news" or report un framed -
unbiased --- facts.

I don't need to hear the reporters, or anybody from the news organizations
opinion on the matter. I just what the raw information.

~~~
frabbit
I disagree with the idea that: 1)journalists were ever not politically
aligned; 2) that it is possible to have unbiased reporting.

I think it is more honest to admit that we are all highly political...
especially the people that claim that they are not, or that a particular
question is not political. In fact the latter is one of my bug-bears about HN
culture. Frequently it is claimed that discussing politics is divisive and/or
uninformative. I consider this to be a veiled (possibly unconscious) desire to
claim that there are objective realities about non-physical/mensurable
observations.

All is politics.

The most honest journalism is that which admits its bias and makes its best
explicit case for how well its model fits the world.

~~~
mbrumlow
Sure, you could say it is all politics, and it would be hard to separate out
any biases and political views form these organizations.

But I think most can read between the lines. These things are on a scale, say
from 0 to 9. At some point in the past - bias and political charged reporting
and news was was closer to say a 3. But today our news organizations have
cranked it up to a 11.

~~~
larkost
I can't speak to other places. But within the U.S. the "mainstream" media
really has not changed. Here I am talking about organizations such as ABC,
CBS, NBC, NPR News, The new Your Times, and the like. All of which are fairly
conscientious about separating out their biases (no one is perfect, but they
all make concerted efforts).

However, Fox News was then created because conservative groups did not like
the coverage (it did not agree with their biases). They called the rest of the
media "left wing" or "liberal" and so re-framed Centrists as Leftists. Their
success prompted a couple of organizations to veer a bit to the Left (e.g.:
MSNBC), but that has not taken nearly as much of the viewership as it has on
the Right.

And then more recently you have the rise of conspiracy sites like The Drudge
Report or Alex Jones/Info Wars that have started to dominate Republican
politics. There certainly are similar sites on the Left side of the spectrum
(there are always fringe sites), but they don't have the heft or following
withing mainstream Democratic politics that has happened in Republican
circles.

So we still have the good news organizations, but now we have some really bad
ones, and they are screaming the the good ones are bad. It is sad that people
are believing this.

~~~
vkou
> but they don't have the heft or following withing mainstream Democratic
> politics that has happened in Republican circles.

That's because the Democratic establishment is scared shirtless of the party
being taken over by actual leftists... While the Republican establishment
doesn't mind their party being taken over by the fringe right. Business will
continue as usual, for them.

So, one side pretends their populist arm doesn't exist (And keeps losing
elections, because it has nothing to offer it), while the other side is happy
to embrace it.

~~~
frabbit
The DNC looks like they still have not got the message. The only question
really is whether the left can take over the party machinery or would be
better off third partying.

------
benj111
So I suppose these prove that photography is art? (down to our interpretation,
provoke an emotional response).

So that leads on to other questions.

Why hasn't photography developed the same delineation between 'documentary'
and 'art', that film seems to have developed?

These images seem quite stylised,and emotive in a way that tv news isn't (even
those pictures of African kids with flies in their eyes).

Even in text theres stylistic differences between 'news' and 'novel'.

To put it in perhaps a clearer way. I could see these hanging in an art
gallery. I wouldn't expect a newspaper to win a literature award, or a news
item to win a film award. And yes there are many exceptions to both those
examples :)

~~~
fetus8
Photography has developed a very defined delineation between "documentary" and
"art". For reference, compare the work of Dorothea Lange versus Robert
Mapplethorpe.

Lange's body of work definitely consists of many works of "art" but I think it
all fits nicely into the category of documentary and photojournalism.
Mapplethorpe on the other hand produced many pieces of "art" but rarely did it
fall into the category of documentary. There are some artists, perhaps, Diane
Arbus, who made art out of documenting marginalized peoples.

The point being, photography has developed a delineation between documentary
and art, but there's also quite a bit of overlap. That overlap exists in film
as well. There are a variety of documentary films that would also be
considered works of art.

~~~
benj111
"Lange's body of work definitely consists of many works of "art" but I think
it all fits nicely into the category of documentary and photojournalism"

That kind of proves my point?

Yes Mapplethorpe's work is definitely 'art', Langes work isn't definitely
'documentary', to the point that if you saw a picture in isolation, I'm not
sure you could reliably say which it was /supposed/ to be.

I'm aware the line between 'art' and 'documentary' are very slippery. Thus the
inverted commas, and thus (I would argue) the need for clear delineation.

As I said in my prior post, there are plenty of exceptions, but I'm not sure
you can get much past generalisations without defining art. And I've yet to
see a definition of art without exceptions, to the definition.

Edit: To expand further. Think of films like District 9 or Blair Witch
Project. Both are shot in a 'documentary' style, but both are 'art'. But both
are A. Notable for being in the opposing style (they're exceptions that prove
the rule). B. Understood that they aren't really real (they aren't seeking to
mislead).

You don't really get that in photography, although the limitation of the
medium doesn't really allow you to do that set up.

~~~
fetus8
I wasn't trying to prove opposition. I was simply providing examples of where
there's a clear delineation between documentary and art, and how they can
overlap and share aspects and details.

However I don't agree with your statement: "Langes work isn't definitely
'documentary', to the point that if you saw a picture in isolation, I'm not
sure you could reliably say which it was /supposed/ to be."

Looking at her work, knowing that she's documenting real people and
understanding that the "art" in her work doesn't inherently come from the
subject, which is what defines her work. It's not supposed to be anything. She
took a photo, using her best judgement in that split second, to create an
everlasting image. That's the art. I am not going to a gallery to see her work
so I can say, ah yes, this is what art is supposed to be. I'm going to see
what she saw, and how she documented it, which due to her form and style, is
the artwork.

Defining art and the words used to define it, open up an immense rabbit hole
that I don't particularly find interesting or worth getting into.

The films you mention I think are terrible examples. District 9 barely falls
into a documentary style. Think about a true documentary, something like La
Soufrière (Herzog) which becomes a work of "art" due to the laborious efforts
of our film maker to show us people who've accepted their incoming demise at
the hands of a Volcano on the verge of eruption. The film is considered a
piece of art due to nature of the documentary which explores confronting death
through the eyes of real people and their real situations.

Also Blair Witch did in fact attempt to mislead people with it's initial
marketing campaign and release. It was an incredible marketing campaign that
made it one of the most successful Independent films ever.

Actually, photography does allow people to create fictitious stories and
narratives, designed to look like documentary and other styles. Look at Cindy
Sherman. She spent years, and hundreds of photographs creating fictional
versions of herself, in tons of styles.

Edit: The core of what I'm ultimately trying to convey, is that art, can be
anything. Any style or genre descriptor your throw at something, can still be
a work of art. It's the craft, and thought, and construction of something that
makes it a piece of art, whether it's a photograph, an carpentry project, or a
line of code.

~~~
benj111
"Looking at her work, knowing that she's documenting real people " That
requires context outside of the work though? (how do you know it is
documentary?) Your example of Mapplethorpe wouldn't require that
clarification.

The point I was trying to get to (badly) in my original post was that images
like Lange's wouldn't look out of place in either a newspaper or an art
gallery. That's a problem because you don't know if its supposed to be 'real'
or not. A film like district 9 despite blurring the boundaries is clearly
'art', in film there is a division between 'art' and 'documentary' which the
film plays with, but it can do that because it clearly isn't real.

"The core of what I'm ultimately trying to convey, is that art, can be
anything" Agreed, that's where it gets messy. 'documentary' should try to
inform though? 'Art' may try to inform, or may not, so its important to know
the difference.

------
bobthechef
Manipulation and outright lying with the help of photographs is common. A
recent example I came across were the (by now routine) claims of independent
day events in Poland marred by fascism in Poland. The Western or Western-owned
media (80% of Polish media is German-owned) will throw up an image of a
tightly cropped image of a few shouting people holding flags of meaning
unknown to the Western eye and make frankly slanderous claims in the article.
Knowing people who actually attended the festivities can help, and by their
accounts there was no such presence and such questions have only provoked
quizzical looks. Further investigation revealed that there indeed was _a_
group of protestors, but that it was very small, was present somewhere on the
periphery for a very brief period of time, and were not fascists but
nationalists (i.e., those who believe in the sovereignty of the nation state,
etc, though I realize that fascism and nationalism have been tirelessly
conflated by globalists either out of ignorance or malice). In a word, this
was nothing but a routine and frankly unnoticeable presence of a group of
people most people probably don't even know exist. But now you have people
unjustly believing Poland is an emerging fascist state which gives globalists
leverage.

Basically, while fake news is a problem, we should not be too eager to believe
the corporate and official media that present a simple, comfortable, easy to
believe, self-serving narrative to us.

~~~
vkou
How do you know that there were only a few nationalists, and no fascists
present at the celebration? Does your news source of choice not have an
agenda?

