Computer assisted editing

July 29, 2009 by pmelcher.

One of the hardest and most lucrative task in photography, is editing.

It is hard because it is not a science with clear established rules. Trends, fashion, moods, seasons, local culture, a lot can interfere in the process of finding the best image.

It is lucrative, not because it’s a profession that pays well (some, like photographers, do not get paid to find their best images in a shoot), but because it can find the gold nugget in an incessant photo stream.

While it is extremely subjective  exercise, we do all seem to agree on the majority of the basic foundation : composition, lighting, subject, contrast, focus, all have to be balanced in a coordinated resonance. And it seems to work since the greatest we all seem to agree on the majority of good to great images. We all like them.

Regardless, it is a time consuming, labor intensive activity. In the microstock, RF or Commercial Stock world, it is the only non automated, high cost division. A editor can kill or save a shoot. Not unlike book editors.

Enters science and computers: How can we automate editing ? How do we teach a computer to learn what is a good image from a bad one? How do we make such a subjective task into one that a computer can understand?

Since 2005, professors at Penn State University have been working on that task, with some limited but interesting success. It is called Acquine, and its an automated photo editing engine.  To simplify the process to its extreme, the system will not judge an image based on its cultural significance, nor by the beauty of the human subject. It is purely a “dumb” editing that seems to only worry about colors, light, form, contrast, rather than any identification of object or person in an image.

It will not be judging the World Press images anytime soon.

On the foreground, it is very simple . Upload an image and it will grade it anywhere from 1 to 100. The rules applied are not divulged publicly. The result is then publicly shown with a tool for a human being to also rate the image. The assumption is that this information is then retrieved to compare the computer and human reaction to an image and adjust the algorithm.

It is a slow and long process. The results are somewhat predictable. For example, the computer seems to give high ratings to photographs with a frame . Why? because people like the delimitation of a frame. It is a known fact. It also seem to appreciate Black and White images over color, probably because it easier to analyse and simpler in contrast and definition. A lot of computer assisted object recognition cameras only work in B/W for the same reason. Finally, it seems to prefer simple compositions with not too much content and color variations. I wouldn’t be surprised if object shots would get a high rating.

This is a very new and unexplored field. After computer assisted keywording with content recognition,  automated editing is another el dorado of the photography workflow. Imagine if all you had to do was shoot and leave the process of keywording and editing to a computer that would automatically select your best images for upload. The time and the reduction of cost, specially for photo agencies who deal with a large volume of images, would be tremendous.

In searches, it could quickly retrieve the “right” images in libraries of millions of images. In fact, one of the professors has been hired by Google. It could help during a shoot, by telling a photographer if the image they are seeing is even worth taking. Here again, another professor from this project has been hired by Kodak. It could be embedded in a program like photoshop to not only select the best images, but alsio advise on the changes that could be done to make the image more perfect.

We are still a very long way to see this applied in our daily lives as it is still very much in its infancy, but make no mistake about it, it’s coming our way. You can see and play with Acquine here. And you can learn more about it here.

Posted in Search, technology, commercial stock, keyword, google, Royalty free, flickr, Microstock | Print | No Comments »

Google: Friend or Foe of Photographers?

July 26, 2009 by pmelcher.

If you think it’s just one among the numerous search engines that landscape the Internet and help you search for what you’re looking for, well, you couldn’t be more wrong – Google, to put it mildly, is a search engine giant. And going a little overboard, you could say that it sets the standard for search engines, in terms of quality, innovation, efficiency, and continued improvement. I think it’s a safe bet to assume that more than 90 percent of Internet users depend on Google for their daily forays down the information highway. So you would think that this search engine is probably the best friend for anyone who is searching for tips and information on photography, ranging from tricks of the trade to the best schools that teach this subject.
But there is a darker side to Google, as most opponents of this dotcom giant’s controversial venture, Google Street View, will tell you. They’re sick and tired of all the “snooping” that they think Google is doing and are protesting against the invasion of their privacy. Google sends out its camera cars, which are equipped with revolving cameras that are fitted on the top of the vehicles, into random neighborhoods across certain countries of the world and then puts up these images on its website. While some people do like searching for their homes and themselves on this application, there are others who are aghast at this blatant invasion of privacy.
Of course, Google does argue that the faces and other sensitive information like number plates of vehicles are blurred out, but that does not stop people from recognizing you or deter thieves from scanning neighborhoods using this application before they hit it. If you don’t like what you see, you can certainly have it removed, says Google’s privacy policy, but when people have already seen what you don’t want them to see, why go to all the trouble of trying to remove the evidence?
Now this high profile candid camera has ruined the good name of many a photographer who is just randomly shooting pictures of streets and people for their own reasons, especially when they’re of places that are famous as vacation haunts or which have historical significance – people become suspicious immediately and are at your throat threatening to take away your equipment.
But, Google does have its advantages too – Google Earth is a useful tool if you’re a wildlife photographer who is looking to research the availability of animals in the location where you’re headed for a shoot.
As with any technology, Google too is a friend or foe depending on how it’s used – the more wisely we use it, the more benefits we gain.
By-line
This guest article was written by Adrienne Carlson, who regularly writes on the topic of photography colleges . Adrienne welcomes your comments and questions at her email address: adrienne.carlson1@gmail.com

Posted in lens, technology, google, editorial, law | Print | No Comments »

And so it ends ( updated )

July 23, 2009 by pmelcher.

Gamma, recently renamed Eyedea by its new owners, Green recovery, is closing forever. The official date will be the 28 of July, 2009. This is a very sad day for photography worldwide. The “corpocrates” have won. They have succeeded in destroying one of the most beautiful photo agency in the world.

Hopefully we will see a rebirth of Rapho and others thanks to the will power of its photographers.

 Update : an article, in French, confirming the story. More to come

Update number 2 :  “In wanting to preserve it, Hachette destroyed it ” Raymond Depardon, Founder of Gamma. Read the short interview here, along with a quick reaction by Eyedea current CEO.

Posted in photojournalism, magazine, transaction, editorial, france, news | Print | No Comments »

A rock in Jupiter

July 22, 2009 by pmelcher.

When an  amateur astrologist discovers an impact on the planet Jupiter, no one screams the end of professional astrologists, so why is it that when an amateur gets an image that pros did not get, it is the end of professional photojournalism ?

The Universe is huge and not even the sum of all professionally managed telescope can monitor it entirely. The Earth is certainly not that big but it is still a big place and certainly cannot be monitored by the sum of all pro photographers. So yes, and this is no newsflash, amateurs have, and will always get pictures that pros don’t have.

So why the big deal ? Well, here and there, companies spur out, claiming loud and far, that they can help any amateur make a fortune by bypassing all the traditional photo agencies, because, after all, they are all crooks.

These “new” companies claim they are the only option for amateur to sell their news pictures. They try to position themselves as the crowd sourcing photo journalism. The thing is, if anyone has a great news image, and hands it over  to any of the top  news agencies, they will make great money and be published everywhere. Reuters, AP, Getty, Polaris, Sipa and so on will gladly accept a great news picture from anyone, as long as its relevant and truthful.

Furthermore, these new citizen journalist companies, also use traditional editorial photo agencies. Mostly because they have no client base of their own. So all they do is become brokers between the amateur photographer and the established photo agency .

Their business model is the same as microstock and well explained in the long tail theory : make money with the sum of the multitude and not the single bestseller. These “best sellers” are just “call items ” creating an initial appeal, allowing the company to widen its client base.

Green and misinformed pro-journalists seem to get really confused by all this and like a fly is attracted by bright lights,  get their little wings burned in the process. That is normal. Like a lot of other pros journalist, they got their degree in a school, not in the streets. The world they monitor is whatever appears on their company screens : If it is indexed by Google, then it must be real.

Pro and amateur photojournalism are not opposites . Its like saying there is a difference between women and men photo journalist. News does not care who took the picture, nor does the publication that wishes to use them. They are complementary, like amateur astrologists are extremely useful to the whole astrology community. Sure they will be a little annoyed that they didn’t get the picture, but that is mostly because they weren’t physically there.

So, please, lets stop getting excited every time an amateur gets an image published on the cover of the NY Times and proclaiming the end of pro photo journalism. It will happen, over and over again, like the sun rising every morning. Amateur photography brokers will continue to appear on a regular basis, playing on the general public ignorance’s of the market of photography and its real players. No big deal.

Posted in license, Search, Jupiter, magazine, technology, SIPA, google, editorial, news, transaction, wire service, photojournalism, getty | Print | No Comments »

Selfish self promotion

July 16, 2009 by pmelcher.

Supreme court justice nominee  Sonia Sotomayor,  it  was just revealed yesterday, was  one of three judges who handled the Chris Usher/ Corbis case we had mentioned here extensively . It should be noted that if she is appointed, which she probably will, photographers and photography will undoubtedly be mistreated if any case bubble up to the Supreme Court.

The New York Times broke the story with an extensive article which happens to quote one of my entries :

read all about here.

The best part is when the Corbis lawyer compares photography with nails:

“Why would photographers be immune from the laws of economics?” he said. “If I had a 20-year-old business selling nails, and you were interested in buying my nail business, would you not look at how it performed? Would you not look at the gross revenue over 20 years and at the net and what the competition is, in order to fix a price? Why would photographers think they’re immune from these things? It’s a commodity.”

Indeed, Corbis, photography is a commodity. You must be proud of that statement.  If so, why don’t you license all your images at $7 ?

Posted in copyright, celebrity, photojournalism, editorial, news, corbis | Print | 3 Comments »

Photo-snobism

July 15, 2009 by pmelcher.

When photographers go out of business, there is no announcement on PDN. After flickering a while, they just vanish off the photo firmament, like an unknown star in the huge emptiness of the photo universe. Most will pick up another job, to be never heard about ever again. Only the biggest of the biggest stars get a royal treatment and their bankruptcy allowed to be handled with all the glory of a newspaper crashing.

2009 will certainly see a huge amount of people leaving our profession in quiet desperation. We will probably never hear about it.

Photography has its social classes, almost like a feudal society. It has its kings and knights ( in shinning armor, no less), its jesters and courtesans, and of course, a huge amounts of peasants. If you want to play in the court of the respected and approved, you have to follow some well established rules:

If you risk your life to get images, you get a huge boost. Conflict photographers are treated as heroes, regardless of the quality of their images. Because they have chosen the most dangerous  and difficult aspect of our profession, they deserve respect. It is not so much what they bring back that matters, but what they go through to get it. They even get more credential if, G~d forbid, they get wounded or killed. The path to legendary status is then almost a given.

The other way to obtain royal credentials is to gain celebrity status. Much, much harder to achieve . The best way is to be an incredible schmoozer ( def: To converse casually, especially in order to gain an advantage or make a social connection.) Again, not important to be a good photographer here. Actually, it is completely irrelevant. It is all about who you know. The best of those do not take pictures anymore and have assistants doing it for them. No one seems to mind.

A third way is to do the same thing for a long time.  Like anything that has been around for a long, very long time, people start respecting you. Not for your talent, but for the mere fact that you have been around for so long.  Not a guaranteed path, but then, nothing is.

What is also important also, is that you do either news or documentary photography. Or commercial bordering on the “fine art”, meaning  that your images seem to carry a hidden message that no one understands. Or they are “disturbing”. Or both.

You have to make sure that  somehow, somewhere people talk about your images.

If you are a photographer with a lot of talent shooting everyday because people hire you all the time, then you are a “peasant”, a laborer. Especially if you work in the celebrity field. There are no celebrity photographer in the photography court. Although everyone will tell you that it is what sells these days, it is considered a sub art form, a dirty job, like cleaning the sewers.

Some news agencies will not touch it at all, as if it carried a deadly virus, while others will do some only to make enough money to finance news coverage. Kind of like prostitution. You would think that, as business people, they would produce what the market demands, but no. Instead more news, more documentary photography is produced, ad nauseum, rotting away on the unvisited pages of desolate websites. A crappy documentary photographer is 20 times more respected than the best red carpet photographer. Celebrity photography is completely ignored in photo festivals, trade shows , photo museums and even workshops. Like it doesn’t exist, like a family member you are ashamed off and keep locked in a closet in your basement.

When was the last time you saw a multimedia on celebrity photography produced by Mediastorm ? Or an article on PDN. or an exhibit at any photo gallery? at ICP ? or at a photo festival, like Visa or Look3 ?

No other reason than photo snobism.

It used to be editorial photographers would jump from one story to the other as long as they was an interest. News was news, whether sports, conflict, celebrity or natural disaster. They could shoot a head of state one hour and a celeb the next . With the same talent, the same intense dedication to quality. Today, photographers auto-categorize themselves in self assigned niches.  News photographer hardly talk to sports photographers. They all have their group, association, blogs, and forums.

It is fascinating how this profession has become so compartmentalized by none other than those who work in it, for no other reason than to try to declare their field so much better than the other. A good photographer is a good photographer in any situation. Actually, that’s what makes a good photographer.

so the recap, here is the gradual ladder of photography “respectionalism”:

Royalty :

- Conflict Photographer  ( the bigger the scarf around the neck, the more important. It’s like a medal of honor)

- Fine art ( The more the academic titles and the longer the list of awards, even unknown, the highest the ranking. Books, exhibits, talks are also instrumental in the height of the ranking)

Knights :

- Documentary photographers ( even one photo story on dying children in Africa will get you there. Multimedia a plus)

-  Magazine cover photographers ( although the end product is highly retouched by computer hands, those in that category envoy high privilege status)

- Corporate photographers ( taking pictures of CEO’s and Lawyer’s bring respectability)

- Commercial stock shooters ( the higher the nose is pointing, the more important)

Peasants:

- Sports photographers ( it’s a dirty job)

- Wedding photographers ( it’s so plebeian)

- Celebrity photographers ( its the basic laborers)

Robbers, Thieves and Low lifers:

- Paparazzi photographers ( How dare they take picture of people without their approval !!!)

- Amateurs and microstock shooters ( How dare they think they are photographers !!)

Posted in celebrity, commercial stock, license, multimedia, editorial, photojournalism, news | Print | 3 Comments »

And the winners are

July 10, 2009 by pmelcher.

Sometimes it is not a good thing to be too busy. Somehow I missed this, when no one should. The PX3 winners have been announced and I didn’t know. Well, better late then never.

For those who do not know, the PX3 awards are considered the most prestigious and important awards in photography, in Europe. Far from the trends and blends of US photography, it is one of my favorite, along with the World Press, as the winners always have true talent. Europe lives far and away from intellectual esoterism in photo journalism and tends to have a very diversified taste.

See the winners and the others for yourself ( click on image):

Posted in photojournalism, slideshow, editorial | Print | No Comments »

Towards a common commodity

July 7, 2009 by pmelcher.

There is a lot of talk these days that photography has become a commodity.

According to Wikipedia, “A commodity is something for which there is demand, but which is supplied without qualitative differentiation across a market. It is a product that is the same no matter who produces it, such as petroleum, notebook paper, or milk. In other words, copper is copper. The price of copper is universal, and fluctuates daily based on global supply and demand. Stereos, on the other hand, have many levels of quality. And, the better a stereo is [perceived to be], the more it will cost.”

Doesn’t seem the same, does it? Photography, most of the time, is not  “supplied without qualitative differentiation across a market”. Each and every photographer tries hard to have quality in  his images in order to create a qualitative differentiation.

Nor is it “a product that is the same no matter who produces it”. Even if I wanted to, I couldn’t not reproduce anyone’s work, if only because the moment has past forever.

However, these are not the only characteristic of a commodity. Wikipedia goes on by saying :

“One of the characteristics of a commodity good is that its price is determined as a function of its market as a whole. Well-established physical commodities have actively traded spot and derivative markets. Generally, these are basic resources and agricultural products such as iron ore, crude oil, coal, ethanol, salt, sugar, coffee beans, soybeans, aluminum, rice, wheat, gold and silver.”

Is photography priced as a function of the market as a whole ? Well, this is where the lines get blurry. Because of subscription models, like the one offered by Getty Images, the perception is certainly that it is. With all images priced not according to its individual value but rather as a part of a whole as well as the fact that it doesn’t not fluctuate neither by content nor volume, it is certainly treated as a commodity. Bundling images from different photographers and pricing them as a service certainly does make photography appear as a interchangeable commodity.

Not that it has have an active trading spot, for now, like crude oil or corn currently has, it certainly going in that direction. From Newscom, to Pixpalace, followed by Gumgum or Picapp, there are more and more places trying to become the De Facto central trading points, like a giant photography trade market.

another blurring point worth of attention is, as described by the same wikipedia:

“Commoditization occurs as a goods or services market loses differentiation across its supply base, often by the diffusion of the intellectual capital necessary to acquire or produce it efficiently. As such, goods that formerly carried premium margins for market participants have become commodities, such as generic pharmaceuticals and silicon chips.”

This is what we have already seen in the RF market where the incessant proliferation and inter-redistribution of brands have made them indistinguishable from one another and completely lose any differentiation. RF has become generic, opening the door to microstock, the epiphany of generic photography.

As we can see, it is not the photography that has become a commodity, but the way it is marketed. The real culprits here are the photo agencies that do not differentiate between their photographers and price there offerings as if it was a commodity. The real culprit of photography’s prices taking a hit is not the buyers market but the sellers who have come to beleive that they are selling commodities, when, in reality, they are not. They have successfully dissociated value from pricing and are even convincing buyers that the real value of their offering is in the service of supplying photography, rather than selling amazing photographs.

Thus, for a photographer, the choice is clear. If an agency offers subscriptions, or talks about photography as a commodity, than it is not your friend . It is just trying to add you to a flow of image and bundle your work in a prepackaged deal.

The same is true for image buyers who have nothing but benefits to accept a subscription or bundle deal. There will be diamonds in the constant flow of rocks and there will priced as rocks.

A image seller that dissociates the value and the price of a photograph is actually serving this self-fulfilling prophecy:

Photography will become a commodity if you want it to be.

Posted in celebrity, license, magazine, Pacific coast news, commercial stock, SIPA, prosumer, getty, editorial, transaction, finance, Microstock | Print | 1 Comment »

A visual wedding

July 5, 2009 by pmelcher.

This is a different kind of multimedia. No, not the guy on the radio talking, but what he is talking about. A photographer and a graphic novel artist got together to create a book that mixes photographs and graphics. The graphic story is about the photographer and the photographs are taken by the photographer so that the whole narrative is essentially visual. Since very often in photojournalism, the story of the photographer is almost as important as the stories they photograph, this is a great way to embed each one into the other, with, however, a clear demarcation.
One doesn’t have to rely on text, the antithesis of photography, but rather can surf the flow of the story in a fluid visual format. Just think if magazines had thought about t this. The next step would be to bring this whole experience online.

see below :

Posted in multimedia, magazine, photojournalism, slideshow, editorial, france | Print | No Comments »

Rip it !!

July 3, 2009 by pmelcher.

Who needs microstock anymore ? Thanks to a new plug in for Microsoft office, it has become child play to easily rip an image found with Google Image and include it into a presentation or word document.

There are absolutely no copyright warning and nothing to advise the user that they might be breaking the law. See explanation video :

The news and description of this plug in was announced on TechCrunch website and the comments are rolling in regarding the legal issues. This falls into the “whatever is on the internet” is free to use, a perception widely popular. It is also a sad example on how easy companies like Google makes image grabbing easy. Sure, that would be a great application to have if it was linked to a photo agency portal, or even Flickr’s collection of Creative Commons. If people decide to offer images for free, then let it be.Since Microsoft offers a similar service on their website for Office users, albeit only linked to some microstock comapnies, it will be interesting to see if they will challenge this new plug in .

Finally, this is not the last of these application using Google Images that we will see. Unfortunately.

Posted in copyright, technology, commercial stock, license, Search, flickr, web 2.0, google, Microstock | Print | No Comments »