The documentary filmmaker, Errol Morris, interviews Hany Farid, a Dartmouth professor and an expert on digital photography, on using photography as a weapon.
Of course, we all know that doctoring (photoshopping) photographs to make them dramatic, misleading, or politically controversial is a widespread issue (problem?), but what about using captions to influence?
The photographs presented by Colin Powell at the United Nations in 2003 provide several examples. Photographs that were used to justify a war. And yet, the actual photographs are low-res, muddy aerial surveillance photographs of buildings and vehicles on the ground in Iraq. I’m not an aerial intelligence expert. I could be looking at anything. It is the labels, the captions, and the surrounding text that turn the images from one thing into another.