Episode 427 – The Ross Lowell Memorial episode

This week, 500px announces a data breach.
You’ll hear in the podcast that I had to record an addendum to this story, as I think lightstalking may have muddled the details of the story. They were after all, recounting what they’d picked up from dpreview!
Anyway, the Lightstalking link is here.
But the official announcement from 500px (more likely to be accurate) is here.

Troy Kasper sent us this intriguing story of how 2 photographers captured almost the same moment in time, looking at the same lighthouse!

David Marland wrote in to tell us about the M.C. Escher exhibition currently on in Melbourne.

Adam told us about Vitec’s acquisition of Syrp,
the guy who shot 50,000 images of the moon, and then created an 81 megapixel composite,
and Adobe’s confusion over what a Nikon looks like.

He also sent these 2 stories, but we’ve covered them previously.
Unsplash, and AI-generated portraits.

Glynn mentioned the band, OK Go!
I THINK the song/video he was thinking of was “The writing’s on the wall“.
And the one I mentioned, which was shot inside the vomit comet, was “Upside down and inside out“.
The namesake of this episode was Ross Lowell, who passed away this week.
Bowens is back in business… kind of. Godox is releasing new product under the Bowens name.
Then there’s the wide-angle lens so wide, it can see behind itself!
This week, Tamron announced 3 new lenses, which has Glynn re-assessing his pack for Africa.
The sailor who kissed the girl in New York’s Times Square after the announcement of the end of World War ll, also died this week.
And the story that just doesn’t quit…. the ongoing Lisa Saad debacle here in Australia continues to open wider and wider with each passing day.
John Swainston (President of the AIPP) released this letter:

“The Australian Institute of Professional Photography has made a further determination on images submitted by Melbourne-based photographer Lisa Saad in the Annual APPA and State Print awards, following an initial disqualification for her 2018 Commercial Photography entry last week.

The added images are from the 2015, 2016, 2017 and 2018 AIPP State & National Print Awards. Ms Saad was given a further week to provide adequate evidence to support her entries’ continued validity; the requested files were not made available by the nominated time. Not admitting guilt, she requested the images be withdrawn. Such an action automatically disqualifies the images and all respective awards. The matter was immediately referred to the AIPP Compliance committee, as foreshadowed in an earlier announcement. After an extraordinary meeting called last night the AIPP Compliance Committee has made the following recommendations, which are accepted by the Board of Directors of the AIPP.

With immediate effect Lisa Saad’s membership of the Institute will cease indefinitely; all accumulated points, Awards, Titles and Prizes are rescinded. Ms. Saad will not be permitted to enter future AIPP State or National Awards.

The Institute finds that there has been an ongoing breach of rules over a number of years, which have not only now brought the AIPP into disrepute through no fault of the AIPP, but more importantly, adversely affecting all those who might otherwise have been announced as winners or awardees at the time.

The AIPP is now going through the large number of categories and awards over the relevant years. It will soon announce revised winners in a number of State and National Awards. The AIPP has the required judging records and point scores from the relevant awards events. To the best of its ability the AIPP will work to make good on the rightful winners and category entrants directly affected. The scale of the corrective action required means not all matters can be resolved or adjusted immediately.

The AIPP has studied a sample of images judged by Ms. Saad in recent years and is satisfied that the remainder of the 5-member judging panel plus panel chair and assisting chair would have drawn similar outcomes after deducting her input, due to the way the scoring system adjusts for any one of the five judges and chair surveillance. As a result, no changes to awards points for an individual picture of which Lisa Saad was a judge will be made. It should also be noted that judges are not able to question an image’s validity in the Awards after its acceptance. The acceptance relies on the entrant’s firm agreement to rules. Judges have worked within those guidelines and there is no basis for some of the unjustified attacks on judges that have appeared in social media in recent days, which the AIPP deplores.

The Institute has discussed whether there is a need for any changes to rules. If someone agrees to the rules and acts in good faith the rules remain effective and do not need changing. What will change, in progressive steps, is additional audit and review processes of images, using additional independent checks and technology. As some 70+ awards globally have been involved across 6 different awards bodies, this is not isolated just to Australia. This must be seen as an opportunity to further strengthen validity of entries for the benefit of the vast majority of honest and compliant photographers entering photographic awards.”

John Swainston, National President.

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