The Manipulated Editorial Photograph

How to standardize the public’s knowledge & transparency in imaging.

I suppose we could argue the ethics of manipulating photographs for days upon end, but in reality im not sure thats the question we should be asking. Not only is it not the question, but the denial of these activities, such as in some totalitarian state scheme to standardize the ability to manipulate image will be virtually impossible to carry out, the pockets of image revolutionaries will always persist, in sleeper cells deep in the forests and caves of the world. So ultimately the question is how to inform the populace with as much transparency, and clarity as possible as to the changes that have been made to the visuals that they are seeing.  These changes so ultimately pervade our culture already, just as much as the images themselves do, that it becomes ever more difficult to pinpoint as the technology and multiplicity of the manipulations reaches a critical mass, and the realized world falls and gives way to a completely mediated “reality.”

This of course is the worst case scenario where a large feedback loop establishes itself that serves the purpose of establishing a non-existant world of consumable imagery that’s “substance” replaces any direct visual connection to the natural world. But if a level of transparency can be achieved then the visual facade can be in essence cracked. The difficulty of this implementation lies in having to convince both sides of the issue that the transparency is acutally in their best interest. The “establishment” side of the issue

In implementing any sort of cross-societal standard (No Smoking), the greater populace first must be able to understand what is changing, why it is changing, and how the change will effect them directly. (Gas prices are only the top news story when the prices are on the rise) There is this literacy of the issue needed, but also there is a more literal literacy needed, and this is not always easily able to be provided. This is to mean that the populace-side implementation.