***scroll for updates, reax, and spoofs galore…plus another explanation from USA Today with new details…***

Hat tip: Tony J

The doctored photo of Condi Rice has been removed from USA Today’s website with this editor’s note:

Editor’s note: The photo of Condoleezza Rice that originally accompanied this story was altered in a manner that did not meet USA TODAY’s editorial standards. The photo has been replaced by a properly adjusted copy. Photos published online are routinely cropped for size and adjusted for brightness and sharpness to optimize their appearance. In this case, after sharpening the photo for clarity, the editor brightened a portion of Rice’s face, giving her eyes an unnatural appearance. This resulted in a distortion of the original not in keeping with our editorial standards.

More photog feedback from Brad:

I am a professional photographer and have used Photoshop on a daily basis for many years. This malicious retouch of Condi’s image is not only intentional, but must have cleared the photo director as well. In other words as a collaborative effort or a wink and a nod.

I don’t believe the eye treatment could be the result of over-sharpening alone, but probably involved some heavy handed levels or curve adjustment as well, and the eyes had been isolated from the rest of the image by selection or masking.

And Jason R…

USA Today’s explanation is bull. I’ve been working with Photoshop
professionally for years and I don’t buy it. If I was editing the image and
simply sharpened and lightened her face a bit as they explain, I would hit
Command-Z just as fast as I could if my result looked anything like theirs.
Trust me, it’s both amateurish and deliberate.

And reader KC…

Very interesting explanation from USA Today – what’s also semi-comical is that they’re in a tight spot as I would most of us would think brightening and sharpening a picture of Condi’s ethnic background could also be
construed as being racist.

Lots more reax at LGF.

***

Editor and Publisher covers the story here.

***

Condi hatred flashback from Jason Smith.

And a little Photoshop fun from California Conservative.

Best LGF spoof from commenter Terp Mole (remember Kim Carnes?):

All the Leftists think she’s a spy
She’s got Condoleeza Eyes!

She’s precocious and she knows just
What it takes to make you pro-Bush!

All the Moonbats think she’s a spy
She’s got Condoleeza Eyes!

More Carnes-inspired humor, plus The Omen III, at Power Line!

***

Lots of readers who e-mailed USA Today (thanks to all of you for taking the time!) are getting an interesting response from one of the paper’s executives. I also received the same e-mail in response to of my two still unaswered queries sent to photo editor Richard Curtis. Here it is:

Thank you for your e-mail of Oct. 26 regarding the photo of Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice that was published Oct. 19 at www.usatoday.com.

As you know, Rice’s eyes appeared unnaturally bright in the photo. I’d like to explain how this happened. USATODAY.com, like other news organizations, often adjusts photos for sharpness and brightness to optimize their appearance when published online. In this case, a newly hired USATODAY.com editor sharpened the photo and then brightened a portion of Rice’s face. Those changes had the effect of inadvertently distorting the photo and failed to meet our editorial standards. The photo has been replaced with a properly adjusted copy and an editor’s note has been published here[.] The photo did not appear in the USA TODAY newspaper.

The editors of USATODAY.com will make every effort to ensure that something like this doesn’t happen again.

Thank you again for your email and for your concern.

Kind regards,
Kinsey Wilson
VP & Editor-in-Chief
USATODAY.com

Reader Scott J. writes:

I’m a prepress manager with twelve years experience and this is my professional take on it. The ‘retraction’ claimed that they sharpened the
image and adjusted the brightness, they did not. The eyes were pencilled in
at the pixel level by hand. (VERY sloppy, I might add.) Their ‘retraction’
is nothing short of complete bullshine.

Here’s the two images, simply split down the middle and combined.

Note the forehead and color on the face. No change from left to right. Only
doctoring was done to the eyes.

I’m going to forward Scott’s e-mail to Kinsey Wilson and see if I get a non-canned response.

***

10/27 update. More spoofy good fun: Donald Rumsfeld’s eyes have been “adjusted for brightness and sharpness.”

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