Ethics of prize-winning photo debated

If the caption said, "photography student retrieving props", there would not have been any awards.

Almost all these "photography awards" are tools for shaping public policy.

It's a crap image. And the judges need to be removed from ever judging anythinng again. Actually I don't blame the photographer as much as I do the judges.

This is good photography.

This is bad photojournalism.

This may be slightly off topic, but apart from their accuracy, aren't some of the captions in the portfolio possibly libellous?

"A man is arrested by the Rochester police after having assaulted his father with a samurai sword." Or how about: "An intoxicated man who was molesting passerbys is arrested."

Perhaps the people pictured in these images have different views on the matter and resent being labelled as "intoxicated" or "molesters" or as people who assault their fathers with swords?

The last time I attended journalism school in my country, they were pretty insistent that we didn't accuse anyone of anything unless it had been proved in a court of law. If we were to make such allegations, we needed to precede them with "alleged" since it was not our place to judge them, just report on the situation.

I take it such legal niceties are not required in the US, since these awards are even overseen by some important journalism institute?

Sham, sham, sham. No excuses are good enough for such a mishap at Magnum.
Shame.

As a long time journalist and photographer, and someone who remembers the great days of Magnum, I'm shocked and disgusted. The award, of course, should be withdrawn and Magnum should dump the chump. Research information phooey!

I do like the image as such, though, but I'm hard-prerssed to see it as being of award quality.

And a sniper with a shotgun? Nah!

Geeze - a below-average snapshot of some dude holding a SHOTGUN!
Look close at the bandolier - shotgun shells. I play BattleField 3, and I should know!! "Award winning"? OMG... How sad.

that dude does not look like a "former marine sniper"

That's an award-winning image? Really?

Fake!

(do we need any additional words for that?)

Back in my early years I shot a photograph and gave it to my editor and mentor for approval and publishing. It was a traffic collision where a car took out a stop sign and hit another vehicle. He saw the proof sheet and asked who it was that turned the back side of the stop sign to the front. I told him I did because it looked more dramatic. He wadded up the picture and threw it at me. He said as journalists we don't add things or take away things to look more dramatic. We simply observe and tell the truth and facts. And that was not the truth or a fact. None of my images ran even the one I didn't have a hand in. Hard lesson learned for me and it's something I still carry with me today when shooting journalistic style images. Perhaps Pelligrin didn't know any better but in the end the truth came out. Photographer of the year needs to go to the runner up, in my opinion. Hard lesson learned.

This should be labled a fraud. There is no way any police department would let someone dressed like this walk around in the worst neighborhood in the world cliaming he is proctecting the public. At worst he is a vigilante, and would be arrested. I've never been to Rodchester or the Crescent, but I'm guessing its in the inner city and is not a bastion of white middle class ethincity, which brings in the factor of racism. The editors who let this image through to judging didn't do their job of verifying the facts involved in this photo. In my opinion, as a former newspaper editor, both the editors and the photographers are a fault for perpetrating such a scam. Also, in my opinin for what its worth, its not even that good of a photo.

An excellent photo! Deserves an award, yes. But perhaps with a different title and a slight PhotoShop touch or two.

Proposed alterations:

1) Replace the gun with a fancy camera and the munition belt with a lens bag, but leave the shadow with the gun silhouette.
2) Title: either "Fanboy Reporting for Duty" or "Mr. Gear and Beer".

Winnings, prizes, glory, vanity... and various "experts" who create competitions out of communicative medium, that is to blame. When someone distorts the facts in an attempt to become "famous", it's a case of a severe lack of understanding of the photography role and purpose.
Quite aside from that, this photo has so many shortcomings that it makes me doubt my ability of judgement after decades of photographic experience. This looks like, and won't amount to anything more than a snapshot, even if it was shot by Chuck Norris.

Very average image.. anyone could have taken that shot...

The rest of his portfolio looks great. Trouble is, now we're wondering how many of the others were also faked. Reputations take ages to build, and no time at all to tear down.

By all appearances, the firearm in question is a shotgun, not a rifle. Far as I know, not many snipers use a shotgun as a primary weapon. So the image is contrived, at best. The image almost certainly drew notice due to the content, as the other aspects don't appear remarkable. And the content is staged.

It doesn't BEG the question, it RAISES the question. To BEG a question means you are using "circular reasoning", not simply "moving along to the next interesting point".

English speakers should train themselves to use the phrase "That raises the question ..." and forget all about begging.

Latin speakers, on the other hand, can continue to use the phrase "petitio principii", http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Begging_the_question

The sad thing about this is the JUDGES know they have made a mistake in giving an award and too proud to admit they have been HOODWINKED and made EL STUPEEDO by a contestant, they will not retract and probably distance themselves from the hoolabaloo.

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This issue reflects a greater problem evident in mass media today, the fabrication of facts to suit the agenda of the reporter. And there isn't a single news source immune from it. Take a look at any news outlet on any issue, if you can honestly say that what you see is impartial, as it was observed, the facts and only the facts, you are as naive as you are incredibly stupid. For example, to this day, it is still being reported that Adam Lanza used an AR-15 to shoot those kids in New Town despite a coroner's report lacking any evidence of the sort, along with conflicting reports that the rifle was even present at the scene. It's all about the spin. If it can't be proven otherwise, the media is content to draw whatever conclusion that supports their agenda. This guy [Pellegrin] knew exactly what he was doing. He was making a statement. Which is fine. It is editorial at best, nothing more. So don't call it journalism.

If I'd taken this pic, the next step would be the "DELETE" button. a 2 on the 10 scale....

The photo was contrived, and Pellegrin's reasons (excuses) sound like he's covering his ass. He had an idea (based on his own politics) that he felt he could illustrate by creating this photograph. That's fine in some editorial circles, but a "news" photo is unposed. If a photographer wishes to use angle, light or other techniques to emphasize one element or another, that's fine - at least he/she is capturing the moment as it is happening.

This photo is another thing entirely. He made it up. Maybe it works in the context of a photo essay. But journalism? No. He should be disqualified.

Why all the fuss? A similar photo, with dead children, won 2013 World Press Photo.

Was I supposed to know what a Magnum photographer is?

I had a chocolate truffle Magnum ice cream today, and I once bought a Magnum of champagne for a party (it's possible I also ate a magnum ice cream at the party, but I don't specifically recall).

I did watch a TV series staring Tom Selleck, and enjoyed the Dirty Harry series of Clint Eastwood films, but none of those seem relevant to this; perhaps the Tom Selleck character at a push, 20 years later with too much winter feasting under the belt (and over), a bit like Captain Kirk and TJ Hooker.

PS: I know now it's an agency, but that's only because this article made me feel small for not already knowing what it was, so I went and did some private investigating.

Isn't this site supposed to have an editor who looks for things like 'Magnum' and replace it with 'the Photo Agency Magnum'? Note please don't do that now, as my comment would then say 'I had a chocolate truffle the Photo Agency Magnum' which wouldn't really make any sense.

This photogrpah did not represent a real situation. It was placed and captioned such that the viewer would have thought it represented a real situation. It does not represent reality any more than an action movie represents realisty. It is a work of fiction.

Journalism is suppose to make the world a better place. This photograph, the story and the award destroy trust between the public and the journalism profession. This is a dis-service to the community. This does not make the world a better place.

I am appalled.

Award was purely for political reasons. I am not even sure the judges cared if it was faked or not. It's a journalism institute - the last place where you would expect anyone to care about journalistic ethics. It's all about promoting agendas.

Several years ago it was said that the picture does not lie. Nowadays both lie, photography and photographer. Much more than in the days of analog. Welcome to digital world fever.
If the judges are impressed by these works, much more impressed were the people who would not dream how much is done in this area. We will see in the next photos that want to go through real and consequently win prizes. However this was not the first nor the last to do something like this.

It's not a complex issue…people just make it so. The photo and caption together form what we call in Psychology, a gestalt; a pattern where neither is true or false without the other. The image/caption combination is either true or false. False is false. Since a photograph, unlike a painting, does not have the hallmarks of a "created" work vs. a "captured" work, it must either be completely "clean" or completely obvious as created, e.g. the work of Man Ray. Otherwise, it must be labelled as "created" and not positioned as captured. Capa's falling soldier was a hoax and while it may have accomplished his political and journalistic goals, it was ingenuous and insulting to real photographers.

Perhaps the photographer can be described with the words

1) Cheat
2) Liar
3) Fake
4) Fraud

Perhaps the judges can be described with the words

1) Suckers
2) Fools

There has always been fakers (Alexander Rodchenko for example). It's VERY hard to do it with film, and its usually in the print and not the negative. Soooo easy to do with digital and photoshop. Your imagination and lack of ethics are your only limit. All the photoshop fakers will be up in arms and together they claim "the old film guys did it!" With photoshop, faking is soooo easy! You try removing a small seagull from a clear blue sky on a 12" silver gelatine print? Go on digital fakers, have a go!

A falling soldier in 1936... very many of us remember the staged photograph from spanish civil war (by the famous Capa). So - this is a great temptation. A good photo needs an even better story. And if there is a good story - you can create a photograph to match it .

Of course the "truth" can sometimes need something extra, otherwise it does not come visible. I'm thinking about my "idol" W.Eugene Smith and his Minamata series. His carefully photographed art told the truth better than just some fast snapshots.
Moral is a difficult thing - mr Pellegrin does not get full 10 points from me. Not even close. He was not after the "truth" - what ever that is.... The image is well made.

I can tell he is no marine by the size of his waistline.
Looks more like a cabbie.

Proof photojournalism is irrefutably BS.

There's definitely much better stuff to be seen in the "Challenges" section of DPReview...

The photographer responded.

https://nppa.org/node/36604

He also noted that he thinks legal possession of firearms causes crime... wonder if that had anything to do with the inspiration of his photo and why it won a contest.