Photo tampering in ads...

[liquidleaf]

Ok. I'm not going to post this on the BOI because I'm not interested in purchasing this snake.

However, I use Photoshop every day for my job, and couldn't help but double and triple-take when I saw this image on the KS classifieds:

http://www.boas2balls.com/Boa-02AlbF_07-10-07_pic_4.jpg

.. which appears here...

http://market.kingsnake.com/detail.php?cat=8&de=552249

I can't not say something about it. At first I noticed that the shadow around the snake doesn't look right. I've seen Laura's photos on that blanket before, and a thin but SUPER DARK shadow like that just didn't make sense, even with a flash. A soft blanket like that can't really produce that sort of hard line, no matter how the flash was used.

Then, I noticed something funny about the tail area. Take a look - is this a special "transparent" albino?

Photoshop's clone tool was used extensively. That, paired with the dark weird shadow, makes me think that she silhouetted (outlined just the snake) and messed with the contrast to accent the color.

It just bothers me seeing this in an ad. Here's a blown up shot of what I'm talking about in the tail area:

http://www.faunaclassifieds.com/photopost/data//627/boa_ad_detail.jpg

Yuck.

[hhmoore]

I don't know anything about Photoshop, but in addition to the "fuzziness" you point out, the far left border of the snake is flat (as if it was cut off by the photo, or cropped).

[KelliH]

Well, do a search for Laura Van Alyne aka "Starlight Specialties", that's who Boas2Balls is. FWIW those photos look like they have been photoshopped.

[SPJ]

Could it just be a simple mistake where all they wanted to do was cut and paste a good picture of the snake onto a different background to make it stand out more?

I'm very cynical lately but this might just be a case of thinking the snake would look better on a different background not realizing it could become an issue.

[liquidleaf]

Could be, but start photoshopping an image in an ad, and how do you tell someone how far you went?

Especially with a morph where representing realistic color matters... Dunno.

Take the "real" background away, and you lose a point of reference for telling if the photo's color is off in some way (whether the person that took it just had bad lighting, or if they manipulated the colors in the photo purposefully).

I mean, if I wanted my hypo's colors to "stand out more" by blasting the contrast to "bring out the red", it would be considered misrepresentation by most people.... don't you think?

So now, we can't tell if that snake really is as yellow as it appears.

[Clay Davenport]

Could be, but start photoshopping an image in an ad, and how do you tell someone how far you went?

Especially with a morph where representing realistic color matters... Dunno.

Take the "real" background away, and you lose a point of reference for telling if the photo's color is off in some way (whether the person that took it just had bad lighting, or if they manipulated the colors in the photo purposefully).

I mean, if I wanted my hypo's colors to "stand out more" by blasting the contrast to "bring out the red", it would be considered misrepresentation by most people.... don't you think?

So now, we can't tell if that snake really is as yellow as it appears.

I agree completely. Beyond simply adding text to a photo for copyright information, or ID number, weight etc, any amount of photoshopping is unacceptable to me.
If that snake looks better on that background, then another photo should have been taken using that background.
The snake itself might not have been altered in any way, but knowing the pic has been altered to the degree it obviously has, you never know.
All sorts of possibilities present themselves as reasons for such a thing. Was the picture taken in the cage and the cage was filthy so the snake was cropped out and the background replaced?
I'm not saying she's trying to pull anything at all, it's just the questions that are automatically raised when an obviously photoshopped pic is used in an ad. I always have to wonder why, and as a result when I see such a pic in an ad I pass it by with no further thought.

[liquidleaf]

Right. It brings to mind another ad that a different seller had posted with an albino burm, the ad exclaimed how yellow the burm was.

But the newspaper in the background of the photo was PURPLE... indicating clearly that the photo's color had been tampered with.

If that person had cropped out the funny-colored newspaper and replaced it with a different color, it wouldn't have been so obvious.

Was I right in not putting this on the BOI, or does this belong there as an inquiry? I just can't stand blatant attempts to doctor photos like this, so perhaps I get more angry than I should.

[liquidleaf]

Btw, love your sig graphic. ;)