Surely This Cannot Be Real

[scott_fleming1]

Either this is the best most dramatic telephoto compression shot of distant hills I've ever

seen or it's a composite fake. I think it's a fake. This many valleys in one photo would

mean the field of view was at least a hundred miles.

 

http://story.news.yahoo.com/news?tmpl=story2&u=/050105/photos_us_rank_afp/

050105220155_jftgigkm_photo0&e=11

[mskovacs]

<a href="http://story.news.yahoo.com/news?tmpl=story2&u=/050105/photos_us_rank_afp/050105220155_jftgigkm_photo0&e=11">LINK</a>

[david_eppstein]

Looks like a real pic from an airliner to me. Here's one I took a few years ago, I think over

southwestern US (was on a flight from Los Angeles to London), not as good as your link

but it shows the same compression effect.

<p align=center><img src="http://www.ics.uci.edu/~eppstein/pix/bar/2s/GreatBasin-

m.jpg"></p>

[kevin_hundsnurscher]

I was about to respond with something like, "Photojournalists aren't supposed to 'doctor' photos," but then I realized I should know better. It doesn't look faked to me.

[scott_fleming1]

Thanks for posting the link Mike.

 

I wasn't sure if that was legal.

 

I count 19 valleys. Just seems like too far to be able to see. But I hadn't thought of it

being an ariel. Or perhaps from a very high peak in relation to the distant landscape.

Still. 19 valleys!

[simonpg]

While I prefer "genuine" shots, does it matter? Looks great.

[rich815]

It's a beautiful, dramatic shot for sure. I think it's not a fake. Probably taken with a 300mm or even a 600mm lens.

[mike_elek]

For what it's worth, most photographers have precious little time to do the type of chicanery to which Kevin alludes.

 

News photographers generally get about two hours per assignment, which includes getting to the location, finding the person in charge, quickly scouting the locationg, get people comfortable, set up gear, knock off about 50 to 100 shots and then on to the next assignment.

 

In some cases, the photographers simply dump their card where techs take over and handle all of the post-processing work.

 

Very much like the old days of Life magazine, where most of the photographers simply mailed or couriered exposed film back to New York for processing and printing.

 

I agree that this was like shot with a telephoto, and if you're shooting on a 1.5x or 1.6x digital, then the field of view is even narrower.

 

This isn't to say that newspapers don't composite photos. But that usually happens when the art director gets involved -- largely liberals with few scruples.

[mike_elek]

... now, do you see how stupid that last sentence sounds?

[steve_armstrong1]

Looks like an out the window plane shot....

[mike dixon]

<i>I count 19 valleys. Just seems like too far to be able to see.</i><P>

South Korea has some extremely mountainous terrain. I live halfway up the side of one mountain range--it's only about a kilometer from the top of this side to the peak of the mountains on the other side of the valley. Most of the mountains aren't especially tall, but they are quite steep.

[ed_nazarko]

And if you'd not have had the label saying "Korea" it would have been one of the two or three places I'd have guessed. There's an awful lot of terrain crammed into that peninsula. A couple places in far South America, and in Nepal, you could get similar shots, but at much greater altitude.

[scott_fleming1]

I would pay for a print of this. In fact I really have to have one. I'm putting S. Korea on

the list of places I have to travel to. Can you imagine this as a 30 by 40 print? Anyone

who didn't stop cold and just stare into it for at least a minute I would suspect of having

no soul.

[w._h.1]

You could try contacting the photographer to see if he'll sell you a print. He seems to be a pretty well known press photographer in S. Korea.

<br><br>

Kim, Jae Hwan

<br>jh.kim@afp.com

<br>(019)290-7353

[art_arkin]

Slightly OT but on the subject of long lens compression, I once saw an extremely high resolution satellite photo of the Eifel tower from directly above. People on top of the tower looked almost exactly the same size as those on the ground, all in focus. The tower itself a compressed 2d mesh of lines.

1cm resolution from space, you could see hair styles and colour clear as day. Try to fathom that next time you are in Paris...

 

This is one image i'd very much like to see again, has anyone else come across it by chance?

[jim_gifford]

<<1cm resolution from space>>

 

Not likely. Sorry. If the resolution is better than 50cm, and you are looking at it without a government security clearance, it's not from a satellite, and it is almost certainly a photo from an aircraft.

 

Nobody is launching any satellites that are significantly bigger than the Hubble Space Telescope. You would not be too far wrong if you thought of the Hubble as a spy satellite pointed the "wrong" way.

 

Be a scientist here for a minute...

 

Assume you optimise the optics for focus at the the short distance from orbit to surface, as opposed to interplanetary or interstellar distances.

 

Assume, just for grins, that the entire diameter and length of the spacecraft is available for your optics.

 

Assume the best clear skies between the surface and the satellite.

 

You still won't get 1cm resolution. You cannot really read a license plate from space.

 

You can see and learn a LOT, but not so much as the writers of military thrillers, or the conspiracy theorists, believe.

 

Be well,