Nikon Singapore held a contest in early February for photographers to submit their work for a Nikon trolley bag. The picture that Nikon selected was by a man named Chay Yu Wei. He was walking around Chinatown with his friends when he spotted some ladders and decided to take a picture when, supposedly, a plane flew straight overhead and was captured perfectly in the view between the ladder.
When this picture was put on Nikon’s Facebook as the winner, people could tell it was clearly photoshopped. As shown between these two photos, the brightness was enhanced around the picture of the plane. Yu Wei claims that he “inserted the plane with PicsArt and uploaded it to Instagram. That’s how I use Instagram, sometime it’s to showcase the work I’m proud of, sometimes just to have fun.”
What I find interesting about this whole thing is that even if Yu Wei posted this a joke, he still submitted it to Nikon knowing it was a photoshopped picture. And clearly, from the picture on the right shown above, it’s blatantly obvious that photo manipulation had to happen in order for it to look like a cohesive picture. While both Nikon and Yu Wei apologized, this still makes me wonder about other situations like this. How many people submit things like Yu Wei in order to win?
Having this picture be highlighted really does make a bad impression on the photography community. Photography is a beautiful art form and when things are photoshopped, it defeats the whole purpose in my opinion.
Read more about the issue here: Photoshopped Nikon Picture
To Photoshop or Not To Photoshop 