Ethical considerations for digital manipulation of sports photography

The idea that photos can be manipulated has been around nearly as long as the art itself. In the days of the darkroom photos were burned, dodged, cropped and even spliced together to create a desired image. Today photos are taken digitally and easily manipulated through the use of computer software programs like Adobe Photoshop. This ease of manipulation brings ethical considerations into question more than ever as photographers and photo editors can now manipulated an image in ways that not only change the message of the photo, but can also alter the reality the photo once represented at the time it was taken. This thesis seeks to study the ethical considerations that should be taken by photographers in the world of sports photography. The literature reviewed provides examples of why this research study should be undertaken and why this topic of research should continue to be studied, as the medium will continue to evolve. The study was conducted using in depth interviews of several photographers from both national wire services and local newspapers on both the East and West coasts. The research showed that while ethics is an important factor in the manipulation of sports photographer, more can still be done by photographers, editors and other editorial staff to make sure that the highest of ethical standards are being followed at all times from the moment the image is captured to when the image is published. It is important to note that this study focused solely on editorial photography at both the national and local levels and did not examine the growing use of social media and related mobile apps such as Instagram.