Toronto Star Big Picture Month

[Warren Toda]

So there I was, again, casually flipping through a daily newspaper when I started laughing and shaking my head in disbelief, again.

Each day in August, the Toronto Star runs a "big picture" on page three. Supposedly, this is to emphasize quality news photography from Toronto and around the world. Although, the phrase "big picture" isn't necessarily accurate as other pictures in the paper can be the same size or bigger. Nevertheless, so far so good.

Today's Star (August 2) is proof that editors at that paper are asleep, (except for one  )

The headline is:

"BIG PICTURE MONTH     A 31-day celebration of eye-popping photographs reflecting our local and global communities."

And the picture is a close-up of a shooting victim who was ... wait for it ... shot in the eye.

(The bullet grazed the guy's eyebrow and his eye is forced shut. Doctors says he will probably regain full use of the eye.)

If this guy had a functioning eyebrow, I bet even he would be raising it over the publication of this "eye-popping photograph".

To make it even more fun, the Star is making a big push to sell copies of this photo.


My point is that the Toronto Star editors goofed. Don't they even look at their own paper? Don't they understand the point to its own "Big Picture" feature?


Side note: if the Star was smart (ha!), it would run this feature every day. Plus, get rid of the stupid EXIF data which is absolutely meaningless!  Replace it with a small headshot of the Star photographer who made the picture.

Promote/market your own people. In turn, this will help market the paper itself. As the photographers get more recognized, it *will* benefit them and the paper. Think of it this way, little headshots are a form of social media. It will help form a connection with readers. People *always* want to know with whom they're dealing.

Photographs are important.






Link to the Star's Big Picture gallery. Each day, a new picture is added to this gallery.



Edit 1: added a link to the picture.

Edit 2: added a link to the Big Picture gallery.

[Warren Toda]

You know, it's all fun and games until someone loses an eye.

I'll assume you read the previous post about yesterday's Toronto Star's choice for its daily "eye-popping photograph" being a picture of a guy who was shot in the eye.

Well today, the Star editors chose a picture of a woman with a tennis ball stuck on her eye. Are you sensing a theme here?

But who said Toronto Star editors are asleep?

The ball was in their court today and the alert Star editors kept their eye on the ball and served up an ace with today's eye-opening photo.

First, they removed the words "eye-popping" from the title's sub-head.

Second, knowing that the Canadian Open women's tennis starts in Toronto in two days, they smartly chose a photo of a woman with a tennis ball in her eye to help promote the tournament. (Or maybe it's to promote the fact that August is National Cataract Awareness Month in the USA?)



Sometimes a photo is worth a thousand words and sometimes not. There's a wonderful story behind this tennis-ball-in-the-eye picture and there's a tie-in to a local Canadian story (stories). This picture launches a ton of questions. But the Star, in its infinite wisdom, chose to ignore them all.

Oh well, it's still a nice photograph.


Side note:
1) Do Canon cameras have a manual shutter speed setting of 1/64?
2) October is national eye health month in Canada.

[James MacLennan]

Did the print edition have this "eye popping" typo too?

[Warren Toda]

Did the print edition have this "eye popping" typo too?

Yes it did.

But if you Google the word "photgraphs", you'll get lots of hits. If it's on the Web, it must be true.  I believe that "photgraphs" is just the short form -- the short form for "we don't use any spellcheckers or proofreaders."


Added: it's now been changed from "eye-popping photographs" to "eye-popping photos". I guess "photos" is easier to spell.

[Warren Toda]

Sigh.

I'm happy to report that in today's installment of the Toronto Star's "Big Picture Month", no one has suffered any eye injuries. Although, Star editors need to have their eyes examined.

Today's picture is quite spectacular. If you've seen it before, it's probably because it was widely-circulated across the Web two days ago.

The original AP caption reads: "In this Tuesday, Aug/ 2, 2011 photo distributed by Vilnius City Municipality press service, Arturas Zuokas, the 43 year old mayor of Vilnius drives over a car parked illegally on a main street in Vilnius city center with a military vehicle. The mayor took the drastic action after becoming infuriated with motorists parking  their luxury cars  illegally around the city.. (AP Photo/Vilnius City Municipality, HO)"

The Star newspaper caption read: "Arturas Zuokas has had it with owners of luxury cars parking illegally wherever they please in the city centre of Vilnius. On Tuesday, the mayor of the Lithuanian capital got into an armoured military vehicle and hit the streets to make a point. Here he's driving over an illegally parked BMW on a main street."



Okay here we go:

• It didn't happen on Tuesday but rather last weekend. The handout photo was released on Tuesday.

• The mayor wasn't making a point but rather he was filming a stunt for a TV comedy show. The Star's web site got this correct. (The mayor is a well-known advocate of cycling which is probably why he's shown crushing a car positioned in a bike lane.)

• The mayor wasn't driving but the guy next to him was.

• It's not a BMW but a Mercedes. Note the plainly-obvious Mercedes logo.

• Didn't anyone look at the photo and notice the bad photoshopping? What happened to the guy in the blue shirt standing behind the mayor? *****Important to note: the Star did NOT alter this photo. This is the photo that was handed out.

You know, just as sure as August has 31 days, I'm sure the Star will get one of these Big Pictures right.

[David Chidley]

wow, three days of missing the boat.  Is there an editor who really doesn't care for this feature and is letting it show?

[Warren Toda]

Whadda'ya know, the Toronto Star's Big Picture was done right today. 

...missing the boat. 

Speaking of missing the boat:

1) The Star ran a correction notice today about yesterday's Big Picture of a Lithuania mayor (see a previous above). The correction mentioned that the car was a Mercedes and not a BMW. The Star obviously felt that correcting the make of car was more important than pointing out that the photo was a doctored, set-up, handout photo staged by a TV show.

2) In today's paper, marvel at that amazing crocodile picture. Does this picture look familiar?

What the Star didn't mention is that this picture was quite the global sensation four-weeks ago, after the local newspaper photographer shot the picture back in early July. Is there a shortage of current news photos?

The Star could've "updated" the picture by mentioning the ongoing controversy surrounding these tour boats and this type of stunt.

The Star also fails to understand that digital cameras do not capture anything on film. In fact, digital cameras don't even use film! Really.



It would be easy to pick on the other papers. For example, I could point out yesterday's fake photo on the Toronto Sun's front page or the fake one on page three or the fake one on page four. But that's too easy.

The Toronto Star is supposed to be a newspaper of record. The Star is supposed to gets things right. Especially the easy things.

[Phill Snel]

It's probably foolish to weigh in on this....but here I go anyway....

Today's (Sat, Aug 6, 2011) page A3 "Big Picture Month" image is of a man and his five-year-old daughter playing in their backyard pool. Nice enough, as it's a split image with the top half above the water with dad splashing, and the lower half submerged showing the child underwater mugging for the camera. Cute.

The thing that is bothersome on the page, and not the image itself, is that next to the photo there's a statement of "BUY THIS PHOTO" and a link to a website. The Star has made sure that it offers only its own images for sale (no wire images, etc), but why should it make available to anyone who wants an image of a child? For that matter, they've also made available a portrait of a shooting victim. Any of their images can be yours for $25 per 11x14.... a framed 11x14 will cost you $190.

Sure you have to agree to use a photo that you order for personal use only....but who would want their child's photo for sale to anyone out there? Personal use only...what sort of personal use would someone make of an image of a child not known to them? Some nasty, pervy people are out there ....and what weirdo wants a photo of a shooting victim, not known to them, with a bullet graze to the head? This is weird stuff. Just for the experimentation aspect of it, a web surfing trip to a local Ontario newspaper revealed that they'll sell just about anything too - including a fatal accident scene image complete with twisted metal and police on scene. That gives rise to more questions about this process of offering anything for sale via the web - it seems that the web ordering eliminates the human process of making a judgement call.

The whole idea may be legal, but is it moral? Should any photo taken for the newspaper automatically be offered up for sale to just anyone?

There. Let the web fury fly!

Phill.


Link for all images for print sale: http://library.torstarphotos.com/gallery.tlx

Link for "Big Picture" gallery:  http://library.torstarphotos.com/viewdir.tlx?albumid=221583

[Adrien Veczan]

Side note: if the Star was smart (ha!), it would run this feature every day. Plus, get rid of the stupid EXIF data which is absolutely meaningless!  Replace it with a small headshot of the Star photographer who made the picture.

Edit: added a link to the picture.

Look at today's paper Warren; they listened to you!

I, for one, don't mind the EXIF data. There are lots of photo enthusiasts who would be curious to know more about how pictures were taken, and the technical aspect of it is a first step.

Now for that to be relevant it would need to actually be a "celebration of photgraphy". It'll be hard to top the doctored, posed, captioned inaccurately and deceitfully, PR handout Lithuanian photo. But we can have faith; August ain't over.

[Warren Toda]

Look at today's paper Warren; they listened to you!

I, for one, don't mind the EXIF data. There are lots of photo enthusiasts who would be curious to know more about how pictures were taken, and the technical aspect of it is a first step.

All the Star has to do now is to get new headshots for its photographers: first, send the photogs out for a make-over and then for a "glamour shots" portrait.

Exif data is rarely important enough to publish. Would a paper ever list how a story was written? For example: "MacBook Pro, 3-GB of RAM, Microsoft Word 2008 with Spelling on, Grammar on, AutoCorrect off. Typed at 45 words per minute."

If someone looks at a picture and the first thing that comes to their mind is, "I wonder what exposure mode the photographer used", then the photographer has failed.


Technique can be important to mention but technique and Exif data aren't the same thing. Meaning, (exif) numbers alone don't tell the story. Two photos can have identical Exif data and yet be wildly different in appearance.

A few days ago, the Star's "Big Picture" featured an underwater photo by Vince Talotta. The technique behind this picture would've made for a nice story. Most folks probably don't know that you can take pictures with a fish tank.



The Toronto Star still has to decide what the point is to its "Big Picture" feature. Is the point to feature a unique photograph or is the point to run any picture big?

Remember the old saying: if a photo isn't any good, blow it up. If it's still not interesting, blow it up even more. If it's still not good, then frame it and hang it on a wall.

It would be nice to be able to pull a "Big Picture" from each day's assignments. But unfortunately, daily assignments can be ugly. Press conferences, high school sports, business portraits, product shots, limited time, limited access ... 

While some days might be diamonds, many can be dogs. Sometimes, special photos require special planning.


Speaking of big, if you want a photo to look big, it's always better for that picture to be more wider than deeper. All things equal, a wide and shallow picture will seem to be bigger than a narrow and vertical picture.

It's due to the way our eyes/brain work. (Hey, there's a reason why TV sets, computer monitors and movie screens are horizontal).

If you're publishing a "Big Picture" and want it to look really big, stop with the vertical photos. A horizontal (or square) picture that runs full page-width will seem bigger than a vertical image that occupies the same square inches.

[Warren Toda]

Well, we had a good run of a few nice "Big Pictures".

Now we're back to "eye-popping photos" of eye injuries. Today's picture shows a deer lying on a Toronto street after the deer was struck by a car. A woman is shown covering the deer's bloody eyes.

Why not run this sad but routine news picture with the routine news story that ran on the next page?

The Star removed the "BUY THIS PHOTO" promo from today's Big Picture. Why? Don't they think anyone will buy a photo of a dying deer? Or was it an admission that today's picture missed the mark?


BIG HINT TO THE TORONTO STAR:

Read your own newspaper.

The headline says: "BIG PICTURE MONTH   A 31-day celebration of eye-popping photos reflecting our local and global communities"

Note the key word in that headline.

Instead of running just any picture to fill the big hole, choose photography that creates joy, tickles the imagination, inspires comments (the "Hey Martha" factor) and makes the reader look forward to the next day's paper.

No, this isn't easy to do on a daily basis. But the Star has both the resources and the talented photographers to pull it off.

If this is to be a celebration of news photography then stop with the depressing, injury-filled, not-dead-yet pictures. Save these images for other pages in the paper.

There are three basic needs in life. A good newspaper can help with one of these by offering readers a reason to hope.

[Warren Toda]

Who said Toronto Star (and AP) editors are asleep?

Thirteen days later, the Star today published an AP story admitting that the picture of the Lithuanian mayor in a military vehicle (see the fifth post in this thread) was a doctored photo from a staged publicity stunt.

Sadly, the AP story published by the Star had some wrong information. I presume the Star (and AP) will soon issue a correction notice for this correction notice. But I suspect it may take a few weeks.



Today's Big Picture is so big, it has little pictures holding it up, (only in print, not online). Maybe the Star had to do this because the National Post featured the same pictures on its site yesterday.

While these hidden camera photos of animals, taken over the past three years, may be interesting, how do they differ from similar pictures/similar project by another(?) group two years ago?

If the Star had called National Geographic, it could've got pretty colour pictures!  NatGeo photographer Steve Winter is the guy who photographed the snow leopard for Apple's 10.6 operating system.

The problem with featuring wire photos as a "Big Picture" is that any interesting photo will be published online in hundreds if not thousands of sites before the next day's paper comes out.



If you want to know how to take secret pictures of animals then look here. 

Or for photographers on a budget, here.

[Warren Toda]

Today's Big Picture is interesting not because of the photo but because of the person who shot the picture: Richard Fitoussi.




Link to the Star's Big Picture gallery which has captions for each photo.

[Warren Toda]

Today's (Aug 28) celebration of photography had this eye-popping picture from Tripoli. Not only does everyone have an eye injury but in fact, they don't even have any eyes, or faces or limbs or...

Ah yes, the stench of death in the morning. Pass the sausages, please.


Just to add: each day, the Star's online gallery of Big Pictures opens with the most recent photo and then plays through the pictures in reverse order, back to the start of the month. But for some strange reason, the gallery doesn't open with today's big picture. Must be a coding error, right?

[Warren Toda]

Oh, man.

The Star had the ultimate eye-popping photo for its Big Picture feature and it didn't go for it. This picture has the best eye trauma yet!

Obviously, the editors didn't need a poke in the eye to know how good this picture is because the photo was made "Editor's Choice - Picture of the Day" (not to be confused with the editor's choice of Big Picture of the day).

Take a look.


Why are the Photo Editor's pictures of the day waaay better than the newspaper's Big Pictures of the day?


Also, why is the navigation messed up for the Photo Editor's Picture of the Day pages? At the bottom of each page, the reader has to click "Next>>" to go backward and "<<Previous" to go forward.

May I humbly suggest that the blog template be changed. Maybe try something radical like "Newer Posts>>" to move forward and "<<Older Posts" to move backward. It might also be nice to have the "backward" navigation on the left and the "forward" on the right. The few people in the Western World who read left to right, or who use a web browser, or who use a Mac, or who still read books or newspapers will be much happier.