I read this entry today over at the Switched blog, where author Tim Stevens questions the credibility of photographic evidence of extraordinary claims:
http://www.switched.com/2008/08/22/with-photoshop-a-click-away-can-photography-be-trusted/
Photoshop isn’t always the culprit; as we’ve seen recently with the Bigfoot hoax down in Georgia, sometimes juicy photos that show just enough of something, but not enough of anything to make it distinguishable, can sometimes get enquiring minds working without the use of digital manipulation. Still, the convenience of having sofware of this sort has made hoaxing even simpler than dangling a hubcap UFO horizontally from fishing line.
Dudley Do-right used to say, “If it’s in the paper it must be true.” On the other hand, ole’ Mark Twain proved that one wrong more than a century ago, and now even photo evidence can’t be trusted. Does this mean that those wishing to prove the discovery of cryptozoological mysteries, UFOs, and other phenomenon will have to resort to other means of believably “capturing” what they’re after? In the case of things like Bigfoot (and once again, in conjunction with this recent