controversy

As a photographer, videographer, and drone hobbyist, I follow with great interest all the media attention drones have received lately. Unfortunately, drone news coverage here in my country, Colombia, has been skewed towards the negative, with stories of isolated incidents like the Connecticut "Gun-Drone" and the Mexican "Drug-Drone" making big splashes on every possible media outlet.

So I wasn’t surprised two weeks ago when our FAA equivalent, the Aeronáutica Civil, released a new iteration of its National Drone Regulation. I knew it wasn’t going to be good, what I didn’t anticipate is that it would be a collection of some of the most absurd, abusive, illogical laws I’ve ever seen.

It is said that printer ink costs more than black market human blood. With such high costs involved, you might expect that printer companies help you squeeze every last drop from an ink cartridge before you're forced to replace it. Unfortunately, that's not the case.

The folks over at Bellevue Fine Art in Seattle recently decided to find out exactly how much ink their high-end Epson 9900 printer wastes. The answer: a ton.

Apple and Adobe sparked some unintended controversy yesterday after unveiling and demonstrating the new iPad Pro. Adobe mobile design director, Eric Snowden, took to the stage and showed off a new app called Adobe Fix, which offers powerful face detection features for mobile photo retouching. This is the mobile Photoshop app that was previously referred to as Project Rigel.

As an example of the app's powers, Snowden showed how the app can easily turn a woman's neutral expression into a smile. The demo drew some chuckles from the audience, but journalists and commentators immediately turned to social media to condemn the demo as sexist.

A Hungarian journalist and camerawoman has been fired after photos and videos of her tripping and kicking fleeing refugees spread far and wide on the Internet.

Photographers are up in arms this week over an online battle between a DJ and a wedding photographer. At the center of the controversy is the question of whether or not a DJ should be able to shoot and share wedding photos when the photographer has an exclusivity agreement with the bride and groom.

Facebook has deleted a controversial page called "Project Harpoon," which posted photos of plus-size models and celebrities next to Photoshopped versions showing what they would look like if they were thinner. The page gained thousands of fans during its short existence, but it also attracted a loud outcry from the public and from the women seen in the photos.

The August 17th issue of TIME magazine contains a cover story about the ongoing rise of virtual reality. Unfortunately for TIME, it's not the story itself that has everyone talking -- it's the cover photo.

Florida-based photographer Kiersten Grant was at the Miracle Strip Amusement Park with her daughter Mylie recently when she came across a board near a ticket line that featured a girl that looked surprisingly like Mylie.

After taking a closer look, Grant was surprised to discovered that it was Mylie.

After my public response to Taylor Swift’s open letter to Apple, I didn’t quite expect the phenomenal reaction it received. I knew it was provocative. I knew it was going to be risky and could possibly harm my chances of getting access to other concerts in future, but it needed to be said -- out loud. When I thought hard about the possible consequences, and restrictions on my access to future work, I asked myself “What point is there in going to work if I can’t be paid for it, yet everyone else gets to benefit from my labor?”. The answer?

There was nothing left to lose. When you’re faced with a choice of working for free to save a millionaire having to pay a reasonable fee, or not working at all, what would you do?

Associated Press photos of presidential candidate Ted Cruz sparked controversy and criticism this past weekend after people noticed that they showed a handgun pointed at the Texas senator's head. The blurry gun was part of a poster that was in the background of the scene.

A family in Wisconsin says that they've received threats online after pictures from a recent family photo shoot went viral. The shots show the family dressed up in superhero costumes and acting out a rescue scene on railroad tracks.

Vietnamese photojournalist Doan Cong Tinh is apologizing for a Photoshopped Vietnam War photo that he "mistakenly" sent out and had published in an international exhibition.

One of the fixtures of NBA games is the row of photographers and cameraman sitting under the hoop near the baseline -- something the players have complained about for years. That debate was reignited during Game 4 of the NBA Finals last night when LeBron fell into the row of cameras and slammed his head straight into the lens of a heavy broadcast camera.

Last month Flickr proudly announced major new features, a slick new redesign, and 112 million members, but the service may have rolled out a disappointing change as well: increased compression that reduces the quality of photos.

If you've downloaded a copy of GIMP for Windows from SourceForge in recent days, you may want to double check to make sure you didn't get other programs installed as well. Some copies of the "open source Photoshop" were apparently being offered with for-profit adware bundled with the installer.

Richard Prince has caused quite a commotion over the past week after it came to light that he has been selling other people's Instagram photos for upwards of $100,000. Now, one of the people he took from is responding in a clever way: she's reselling Prince's artwork for $90 instead of $90,000.

There have been a number of controversial bills and laws lately, some of which have been pulled or vetoed after protests from photographers and the public. The latest legislation to raise eyebrows comes from the state of Wyoming, which passed a new law in March that prohibits collecting data about the environment to share with the government. Problem is, the wording is so broad that it infringes on photographers' rights.

No matter how difficult your client is, you probably shouldn't go public online with your differences. A wedding photographer in Australia has generated a firestorm of criticism after calling his client "the ugliest bride I ever photographed" and "Bridezilla."

Samsung's new S6 and S6 Edge smartphones were recently found by DxOMark to have the best sensor quality of all smartphones on the market, trumping even the iPhone 6. Good news, right?

Turns out it may not be all roses for Samsung: smartphone owners are reporting that some of their phones contain Samsung sensors instead of Sony's highly regarded ones (and perhaps the one that was tested?), which is reportedly leading to differences in image quality between different units of the S6 and S6 Edge.

Yesterday we shared a startling video in which a woman who was pointing her smartphone camera at a group of law enforcement officers had the device snatched from her hand, smashed against the ground, and then kicked back at her. It turns out the man who did it is a deputy U.S. marshal, and the U.S. Marshals Service says it's now investigating the incident.

The photography and music worlds are at odds in a dispute between a music photographer and a popular band. Photographer Pat Pope was miffed by a request from the band to include his photos in an upcoming book without any payment, while the band Garbage argues that they've already paid Pope for his work, and that they were simply giving him a chance to have his work represented in the publication.

Instagram sparked controversy this week after deleting this photograph of a woman lying on a bed with menstruation blood seen on her clothing and on her sheets. She's now demanding to know why other more graphic or risqué photos are allowed on the service while images of a fully clothed woman on her period are not.

Texas House of Representatives lawmaker Jason Villalba sparked quite a controversy earlier this month after proposing a bill that would make it illegal to photograph a police officer from within 25 feet. People were so angered by the idea that Villalba has received death threats from angry members of the public.

Bloomberg Politics is apologizing for a bad Photoshop job after readers noticed that a promo photo shared by the publication featured a strange-looking shot of Hillary Clinton.

The tumult surrounding the World Press Photo awards for the last couple of weeks has been quite earth-shaking. An Italian photographer, who had been awarded for “Contemporary Issues” was, finally, disqualified for having mis-labelled where a picture was shot (not in the town of Charleroi which was listed on the entry but 30 miles away in Bruxelles.)

Photographer Vanessa Hicks is fighting back today after being chastised and harassed online for using an American flag as a prop during a baby photo shoot. It was a simple Facebook share that has gotten quite a bit of national attention.

This photo of President Obama leading a commemorative march in Selma, Alabama, was featured on the front page of the New York Times this past weekend. The event was attended by notable politicians from both sides of the aisle, including former president George W. Bush, who was also on the front line of the march. Times readers who noticed that Bush was notably absent from the photo began to criticize the paper, and soon news organizations began to report on this omission as well.

Photos of a frog riding a beetle have been flooding the Internet over the past month. Think it looks cute and adorable? Reactions to the series of photos have been split between blind praise and outrage over the authenticity of the photo-story and welfare of the subjects. So, did this scene really occur naturally as claimed? We don't think so, and here's why.

In a surprising turn of events, the World Press Photo organization has announced that it will be withdrawing the 1st prize award it had given photographer Giovanni Troilo for his Contemporary Issues series "The Dark Heart of Europe." This comes one day after a new claim surfaced that accused Troilo of misrepresenting where a photo was shot.

Update: World Press Photo has decided to strip Troilo of his 1st place award.

Things are getting messier and messier for World Press Photo. After investigating a 1st prize winner due to accusations of unethical staging, the prestigious contest defended the photographer this week and stood by its award decision (much to the dismay of many in the photojournalism industry).

There's a new twist in the story, though: a new accusation is now being made against the photographer, causing WPP to reopen its investigation.

“World Press Photo is committed to supporting and advancing high standards in photojournalism and documentary photography worldwide.”

That's what the "About The Foundation" page on the World Press Photo says. Now follow this timeline of recent events.

We shared last week that the Belgian town of Charleroi was protesting after a series of photos casting it in a bad light was awarded 1st prize at the prestigious World Press Photo contest. According to the town's mayor, Italian photographer Giovanni Troilo had gone out of his way to stage shots for the purpose of painting the city as "The Dark Heart of Europe."

Today, after investigating the claims against the photographer, World Press Photo announced that it will be sticking by its decision on the controversial award.

Charleroi is a town of about 200,000 people in Belgium that has fallen upon some tough times in recent years due to increases in unemployment, poverty, and crime. Italian photojournalist Giovanni Troilo pointed his lens at the city last year, capturing a gloomy photo essay titled "The Dark Heart of Europe." The images were recently awarded 1st prize at the prestigious World Press Photo contest in the Contemporary Issues category.

The contest, which already got a black eye after 20% of the finalists were disqualified for unethical photo editing, has another messy problem on its hands: the town is accusing Troilo of staging his winning photos.

Illinois representative Aaron Schock is facing serious scrutiny over accusations that he has been misusing taxpayer money for expensive travel and entertainment. His downfall came in the form of Instagram photos: the EXIF data gave him away.

Update: We have removed the photos after receiving a takedown request from the photographer.

Less than a week after an unretouched photo of Cindy Crawford leaked onto the Web, a set of untouched photos from an ad shoot featuring Beyonce has emerged as well. Just like with the Crawford photo, the new images are causing quite a discussion online about the role Photoshop has in creating perfection for advertisements.

A small Florida-based photo editing tool business called Seasalt & Co. is causing some big controversy after announcing an upcoming Photoshop Action pack that many photographers are finding offensive. Titled "The Hanging Tree," the collection was touted with a dark promo image featuring a noose hanging from a tree.

Here's one of the stranger copyright controversies we've come across. It all started with a photo contest and an accusation of copyright infringement.

Bibury is a Cotswolds village in England that's famous for its picturesque stone cottages that are the subject of many a photographer's photos. Lately, however, photographers are complaining about their photos being ruined by an "ugly, yellow car" that's often parked in the area -- a car owned by one of the residents.

A popular Muslim cleric from Earth's most populous Muslim country is causing quite a stir due to public comments about the sinfulness of selfies. Felix Siauw of Indonesia warned his nearly 1.2 million followers on Twitter against the practice, saying that it opens the door to a multitude of sins.

Stock photo service Dreamstime announced today that it has been selected as a "beta provider of stock photos for Google display ads." Through the agreement, Dreamstime contributors are initially paid roughly $2 per image for use in Google's ad network. Some photographers aren't too happy about the terms of the new arrangement.