J. THOMAS ROGERS: Photoshop's Effect on Historic Moments

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23 August 2010

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The Heartbeat: A word from the publisher

   Eleven years ago a train heading from Serbia to Greece was bombed by NATO. It was the first time that I experienced what I call the "photoshop effect," a confusion caused by not knowing if an image you are seeing is real or photoshopped.thumb_CCbyTheFlyingDutchman_Wikipedia_SerbianEmbassyBudapest800px-Embassy_of_Serbia_BudapestSerbian Embassy, Budapest, Hungary
 Before I had heard about the bombing, I was walking downtown in Budapest, Hungary and noticed the flag of Yugoslavia atop their embassy. I approached to get a closer look and saw laminated photos posted along the length of the wall that surrounded the embassy. The pictures were of mangled bodies and aerial photography of the train bombing and the bridge NATO had targeted. A friend explained that the embassy wanted people to hear their account of the Grdelica train bombing. The Yugoslavian (now Serbian) government and media said that NATO was manipulating the footage they released of the train bombing in Grdelica, southern Serbia.

  NATO's photography and General Clark described the bombing as an "uncanny" accident. Serbian photography and news reports called it a war crime.
   "What should I call it?" I wondered.
   The train bombing happened during NATO's war with Slobodan Milosevic's forces in the Kosovo region of the Former Yugoslav Republic of Serbia. That generation of Serbs had been raised on communist propaganda. Disputed elections in the 1990's kept Milosevic and his cronies in place. The people had every reason to mistrust.
   One young couple I met there lived in an apartment building that had been rigged by the communist secret police with "bug" microphones embedded deep into the concrete walls. Years after communism, they told us that the bugs were still active. Because I had a friend with a laptop like they had seen in Mission Impossible, they accused us of being spies. Since I was still only a teenager, I found the whole spy accusation hilarious. But for them, it was real.
   These Serbian youth were looking for something to believe in--the pride of national identity. They could not accept what CNN said, because it meant that the people they loved were being destroyed on accident.
Breakup_of_YugoslaviaBreakup of Yugoslavia   To this day, the blame for the Grdelica bombing is a matter of opinion. The photoshop effect leaves a key moment of recent European history in a quandary.
  
  During the same decade that the Internet came alive, the nation of Yugoslavia ended. It splintered into seven smaller nations [see map]. Serbs, Croats, Bosnians, Macedonians, Slovenians, Kosovars, Montenegrans...each side had their own version of current events that was more informed by ethnic loyalty than by the television or newspaper reports.


Fuzzy History, Fuzzy Future

CCbyJoChristianOterhals_Photoshopped3104958433_1be544fa71CC design: Jo Christian Oterhals   A decade later, many discussions online are entirely devoted to debating the legitimacy of photos and footage. Was it 'shopped or not? If so, how? These are the subjects of endless discussions on youtube and photography sites. The "faked" moon landing, 9/11 and other conspiracy theories are prominent examples of how history goes fuzzy when the photoshop effect is amplified by conspiracy websites.
  If "those who do not know the past are doomed to repeat it"...what will happen to people who do not know the past or present?
  A simple solution presents itself: we need more pictures. If there were a way to provide easy access to as many as possible of the original footage and photography of major events, people could begin to trust what they see a little more. If footage from camera phones or other digital cameras were collected for shared viewing, photoshop doubts could be alleviated. How could anyone trick the lenses of a thousand cameras?
  Like witnessing for a trial or giving a reference for someone's job application, the collection of news media is going to become a responsibility citizens share with journalists. It is becoming all of our responsibility...if we want to know what is really going on.
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J. Thomas Rogers

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