Adobe PhotoShop forensics: sleuths, truths, and fauxtography

381 Pages·2008·166.223 MB·English

by  Baron, Cynthia

Adobe
®
Photoshop
®
Forensics
Sleuths, Truths, and
Fauxtography
Cynthia Baron
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ISBN-10: 1-59863-405-4
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To my husband, Shai, who never
complained and was always supportive.
Acknowledgments
I
owe an enormous
and permanent debt of grati-
tude to all the investigators whose work is cited in these pages. Each spent significant
time providing me with examples, answering my sometimes ill-formed questions, and
brightening my e-mail with good humor and collegiality.
In particular, I send my thanks to Hany Farid for sharing his work and time and to
Neal Krawetz for his boundless enthusiasm, insights, and generosity. I learned much
from our conversations and hope to continue them.
In addition to the investigators, several others gave of their time and intellectual prop-
erty. A big thank you to photographer and camera collector Regis Boissier, to bank-
note maven Mike Jowett, and to peripatetic photographer John Pettitt for their kind
release of artwork.
Thanks also to Katie Ullmann for her modeling services and to Karen and Dennis
Vaccaro for their warm friendship, their electron microscope slides, and the use of
their Maine retreat when my spirits flagged.
Thanks to Sarah Nelson, Pacific Alaska Region Archivist for NARA, and to Joe
McCary of Photo Response, who added a personal touch to navigating the Library of
Congress.
I appreciate the support of several people at Northeastern University. In particular,
thanks to Bruce Hamilton for his aid on our photo shoots, to Jay Laird for strategic
help at a critical moment, and to Dean Mary Churchill for providing me the time and
space to finish this project.
Thanks to the Course Technology PTR team: Publisher Stacy Hiquet, Editor Dan
Foster of Scribe Tribe, and Technical Reviewer Mark Abdelnour. It was a pleasure to
work with you.
My assistant, Mitch Weiss, deserves a special note. Many of the original photographs
in this book (in particular the case studies in the last chapter) are his. He translated
my requests and direction perfectly and was a joy as a collaborator.
And last but not least, thank you to my agent Neil Salkind, who brainstormed this
idea with me and helped make this book possible.
iv
About the Author
C
ynthia Baron
is Associate Director of the graduate
program in Digital Media and the undergraduate program in Multimedia Studies at
Northeastern University in Boston, MA. Formerly she was the Technical Director for
the Department of Visual Arts, and she has been teaching courses that integrate digital
tools with design and creative imaging for 20 years.
Cynthia is a designer and photo imaging artist who has been the executive vice presi-
dent of a Boston-based graphic design and typography studio for more than a decade.
She also holds an MBA with a concentration in Marketing from Northeastern
University.
Cynthia was editor of Rockport Publishers’ Design Whysbook series and a contribut-
ing editor forCritique: the Magazine of Graphic Design Thinkingand for Computer
Graphics World. She has edited, authored, or co-authored more than a dozen books,
most notably Designing a Digital Portfolioand The Digital Photography Field Guidefor
Pearson Education.
v
Contents
Introduction xiii
P I
ART
C
OUNTERFEITING
L
AND THE AW
Show Me the Money 3
C 1:
HAPTER
Lead Us Not into Temptation 4
Opportunity 4
Knowledge 4
Greed 5
Harder Currency: Counterfeiting for Cash 5
The Treasury Strikes Back 6
Strike and Response 8
“Of Course I’m 21. See My Card?” 11
A Novelty Idea 13
Official but Anonymous 16
Hoodia Want? 16
Fake Drug Packaging: Murder by Mouse 23
Ten Ways to Recognize a Fake Drug Package 24
Paying for What You Get 25
vi
Contents
vii
Admissible in Court 27
C 2:
HAPTER
Photography, Psychology, and Reality 28
Fair’s the Objective 28
Is Image Editing Fair? 31
Creating a Digital Process 33
Now You Don’t See It… 35
Now You Do 35
An Ink of a Different Color 38
“Put Your Hands Up and
Move Away from the Mouse” 46
Tick, Tick, Ticket 47
Back Dating 49
Insurance Fraud 51
Artifakes 59
C 3:
HAPTER
Arts and Craftiness 60
High Stakes in Fakes 61
Sympathy for the Devil 61
The Flip Side of Forgery 65
Shoppin’ Around 66
Auctions 71
Understanding Feedback 74
After the Purchase 75
Collecting Problems 76
Adobe Photoshop Forensics
viii
Vintage Photos Cheat Sheet 84
Daguerreotype 84
Ambrotype 85
Tintype 86
Albumen Paper Print 87
Antique Scamming 88
Putting the Faux in Daguerreo 89
P II
ART
P M
ROFESSIONAL ISCONDUCT
Make Melds and Influence People 95
C 4:
HAPTER
Politics and Photo Fraud 96
The Birth of Propaganda 96
Out of the Studios and into the Streets 105
Image for Propaganda 107
Enter Photomontage 107
Spotting the Propaganda Fakes 112
Source 112
Quality 112
Benefit 112
Likelihood 113
The Best of the Worst 113
Fonda Fakery 113
A Presidential Flip-Flop 114
Appropriation Is the Sincerest Form 115
Help for the Height-Challenged 117
A Great Way to Increase Enlistments 118
It’s the Middle East—You Can’t Trust Anything 120
Contents
ix
C 5: Editorial License Revoked 129
HAPTER
Fauxtojournalism 130
Setting and Enforcing Standards 132
Self-Policing 132
Software Analysis 133
The Slippery Slope versus the Sliding Scale 137
Intent 137
Extent 139
Result 139
Sanctioning 140
Staging 140
Guidelines Applied 142
Verdict: Artistic License 143
The Eyes Have It 145
Verdict: Misdemeanor 147
Verdict: Felony, Part 1 151
Verdict: Felony, Part 2 151
Verdict: Capital Offense 152
C 6: Weird Science: Faux Findings 157
HAPTER
Getting Experimental 163
The Method and History 164
Testing the Limits 171
Cheating Ways 172
The Neverending Fraud 174
The Korean Stem Cell Scandal 174
Moving Forward 177