Six Photographers Took The Same Man’s Picture, What They Captured Will Make You

[Schewe]

An interesting experiment about what you think about somebody can influence how you look at and photograph somebody...

Six Photographers Took The Same Man’s Picture, What They Captured Will Make You Think

When you hold preconceived thought and beliefs this can manifest itself in sometimes ugly ways and at the very least can skew your judgement. I think at some stage in our lives we have all been guilty of holding unjust prejudices against people for no particular reason other than something we have been told about them.

That’s exactly what this experiment is all about. Six photographers were told to photograph the same man but each of them was told a different background story about who the man was.  For example, one of them was told he was a self-made millionaire whilst another was told he was an ex-convict.

In reality, he is none of those things. The results of how the man was portrayed in their photographs was mind blowing and very revealing to say the least. Take a look for yourself.

The video is HERE
3:16

[Jim Kasson]

Good one, Jeff.

It's true of Landscapes, even. I don't photograph often with others, but when I do I am floored by how different the pictures are.

Jim

[Rob C]

Doesn't do it for me.

Watch with the sound off, and at the end, all that I see are six different snaps of the same guy.

I'm left with the sense that we, the audience, are being had in exactly the same way as the photographers were being had. Take away the mind-games (voice) overlay and there's nothing there to suggest anything remotely like the feelings or impressions we are supposed to infer from the pictures.

Knowing what the voice tells us we should think, perhaps the shot of the 'convict' works well to give the idea of life in a cell...

So what to conclude? That the photographers were not really affected by the subject identity they were sold? That if they were affected then they lacked the skill to translate that into part of their picture? That they were actually good enough snappers to be able to avoid their work being coloured by predetermination?

If anthing, it (the video) suggests that we all make the shots we are capable of making, regardless of anything anyone else may want us to make or express. We just do what we do because that's what we do.

This really fits in well with the parallel debate about combining images with words. Perhaps it also illustrates the power of media to sell belief.

I wonder, had Life at al. survived the economic and technical changes of today, whether the world would be in quite the political disarray in which it finds itself. The "American Dream" didn't just affect the States: you must remember that it also reached out to the rest of the sentient world and stood for something, some sense of aspiration. (I clearly remember being told that the main difference between Americans and Brits was this: in America, you didn't hate and envy your neighbour for being better off than you, you promised yourself that you'd work hard and beat him at his own game. On the other hand, in the UK, we were meant to feel that ¡f the other other guy was better off than us, then that was because he'd stolen from us. Does the American part hold true today? I think the Brit part holds, but now we blame immigrants from Poland for the "theft", for taking work we don't want to do or, alternatively, for doing work we do want to do but better than we do it.)

I suspect the "American Dream" has degenerated into a real version of tv entertainment.

Rob C

[pearlstreet]

Thanks Jeff. A very interesting experiment. I appreciate your posting it. Jim, I find the same thing with landscapes.

[Tony Ovens]

For a number of years I used to take photos for a local amateur drama club to advertise their productions. The same people played various role over those years and what a surprise, they looked a bit different in their roles but essentially they looked the same people, just like in these shots. Of course here it was the photographers who imposed the roles but it amounts to about the same and it seems most unremarkable really. But good fun!

[Jim Kasson]

For a number of years I used to take photos for a local amateur drama club to advertise their productions. The same people played various role over those years and what a surprise, they looked a bit different in their roles but essentially they looked the same people, just like in these shots. Of course here it was the photographers who imposed the roles but it amounts to about the same and it seems most unremarkable really. But good fun!

I think that those of us who have been photographing for many years know how big a role the photographer plays in the image, but I'm not sure the general public does. There's a saying that goes back a long way: "Photographs don't lie." That's clearly wrong. There's a saying among some of the photographers that I hang around with:"All photographs are lies." That goes too far, but it makes a good point.

Jim

[Rob C]

I think that those of us who have been photographing for many years know how big a role the photographer plays in the image, but I'm not sure the general public does. There's a saying that goes back a long way: "Photographs don't lie." That's clearly wrong. There's a saying among some of the photographers that I hang around with:"All photographs are lies." That goes too far, but it makes a good point.

Jim

Maybe to make them interesting, then little white lies are the least we can offer...

It's my general experience that the vast majority of people look decidely unimpressive. Isn't that why "special" guys get the gigs for the celeb work? To make them less ordinary? To fib a little? Which brings in the other lot, the bigger fibbers, the retouchers.

Photographs are always lies of one kind or another, or terminally boring. It's the choice, the gig. Crime-scene wpork may differ, but I'd be surprised if even that wasn't shot with a successful prosecutinm in mind...

Rob

[mecrox]

Great story, thanks for posting. I was at an event not long ago where a masterful photographer was discussing a series of his portraits. It was pointed out by someone who knew many of the sitters that he saw in each of the photographs something about the person he had not seen before. And that extra something could only be the character of the photographer himself. I think the same applies here.

[Alan Klein]

Doesn't do it for me.

Watch with the sound off, and at the end, all that I see are six different snaps of the same guy.

I'm left with the sense that we, the audience, are being had in exactly the same way as the photographers were being had. Take away the mind-games (voice) overlay and there's nothing there to suggest anything remotely like the feelings or impressions we are supposed to infer from the pictures.

Knowing what the voice tells us we should think, perhaps the shot of the 'convict' works well to give the idea of life in a cell...

So what to conclude? That the photographers were not really affected by the subject identity they were sold? That if they were affected then they lacked the skill to translate that into part of their picture? That they were actually good enough snappers to be able to avoid their work being coloured by predetermination?

If anthing, it (the video) suggests that we all make the shots we are capable of making, regardless of anything anyone else may want us to make or express. We just do what we do because that's what we do.

This really fits in well with the parallel debate about combining images with words. Perhaps it also illustrates the power of media to sell belief.

I wonder, had Life at al. survived the economic and technical changes of today, whether the world would be in quite the political disarray in which it finds itself. The "American Dream" didn't just affect the States: you must remember that it also reached out to the rest of the sentient world and stood for something, some sense of aspiration. (I clearly remember being told that the main difference between Americans and Brits was this: in America, you didn't hate and envy your neighbour for being better off than you, you promised yourself that you'd work hard and beat him at his own game. On the other hand, in the UK, we were meant to feel that ¡f the other other guy was better off than us, then that was because he'd stolen from us. Does the American part hold true today? I think the Brit part holds, but now we blame immigrants from Poland for the "theft", for taking work we don't want to do or, alternatively, for doing work we do want to do but better than we do it.)

I suspect the "American Dream" has degenerated into a real version of tv entertainment.

Rob C

I agree. I listened to the whole thing but still don't see 6 personalities in the 6 pictures.  Just different views of the same guy.  Clothes make the man.  So maybe if they changed his outfit and facial hair they could have made a difference. 

[Rand47]

An interesting experiment about what you think about somebody can influence how you look at and photograph somebody...

Six Photographers Took The Same Man’s Picture, What They Captured Will Make You Think

The fly in the proverbial ointment here, is that the subject "played into" and reinforced the "pre conception" given to the photographers.  Ergo, the photographers were influenced as much by what the subject said about himself as what they had "been told" (presuppositional frame) about the subject.

That contaminated the "experiment" as far as I'm concerned.  It would be interesting if the parameters had been more objective.  BUT, having said this, we all have a perspective that we bring to the work.  Whether that is "our own" or one "given to us in some way" may be interesting from an ethics point of view, but little else. 

Would have been fun to just ask them to shoot the subject, and then based on their own exploration of the subject (permitted to talk with him about anything other than personal history!) ask the photographers to comment on their own sense of the subject and posit guesses about his personal history / situation.

Rand