Have you ever noticed how the pictures of hotels in brochures and websites look nothing like how they are in real life?
Oyster.com, a hotel review website, noticed the same thing.
Just below, are over forty comparisons of hotel promotional pictures compared to their real life counterparts.
As Church media architects, we need to make sure we don’t do the same thing!
There is a fine line between taking a good photo or capture a great video, and spinning real life into something that’s fictional.
After going through these photos, I noticed that hotels tend to spin and fake photos of gyms and pools the most.
What piece or part of the “Sunday experience” do you see Church creatives spinning, manipulating and faking the most?
[via Oyster]
Tre Lawrence says
Oh. Wow.
Eric Dye says
I know, right!?!
carlos says
I have to take exception to the idea that the photos are somehow deceptive. It would seem that the difference is not so much (in most of the cases) that the places were not the same but that the photographer was not as good. Taking images at a boring angle makes boring images. It doesn’t mean that the scene is different. In some cases, like the pristine beach, that may be true, but in many of the images it’s not.
If I take a photo of the pool area after it’s been cleaned up and you take one after a bunch of kids have just left it strewn with towels and pool toys doesn’t make my image false. To think so would be to ask that all family photos from now on be taken immediately after waking up with everyone’s hair in disarray and in wrinkled jammies and rumpled robes, eyes half-lidded, unwashed and unshaved…..
As a musician I was always distressed by the attitude of others that they didn’t have to work hard on a song because it was just for church. I always felt that I should do my very best because it’s for God…. I’m not saying we should be deceptive, but what’s wrong with showing something at its best?
Eric Dye says
I agree.
Not all these photos are “fakes.” There are a number of them that are artful, just as you pointed out.
But when you start Photoshopping light poles and buildings out of the picture …
carlos says
I don’t have a problem with removing light poles when you’re trying to show the building any more than I have a problem with removing a blemish on the face of a portrait client. And I saw no photos where buildings were removed, but I saw plenty of examples where the non-professional photos were taken from a different angle that either showed buildings not in the original or cropped out things that were in the original.
Eric Dye says
Well, there was moving the Capitol closer: http://cdn.churchm.ag/wp-content/uploads/2011/10/hotel-11-620×231.png
The entirely different skyline: http://cdn.churchm.ag/wp-content/uploads/2011/10/hotel-12-620×230.png
The building and crane hidden in the clouds: http://cdn.churchm.ag/wp-content/uploads/2011/10/hotel-20-620×231.png
The window and waves that did not exist: http://cdn.churchm.ag/wp-content/uploads/2011/10/hotel-21-620×231.png
The removal of a building: http://cdn.churchm.ag/wp-content/uploads/2011/10/hotel-30-620×230.png
carlos says
The capitol likely wasn’t moved closer in post production. A long lens will compress the distance between foreground and background objects.
The skyline being different could be because the rooms were on opposite sides of the building.
Cranes are not a permanent part of the landscape. So maybe the pro was there before the crane was. Also, look at the perspective between the two. The pro took his/her shot from a much lower angle. That drops the building below the deck.
The window and waves could be another long lens at work, but it does look like it could have been added. Who says the other photographer didn’t shoot toward the windows because they didn’t know how to control backlit scenes?
The building was likely still there. The pro’s shot was taken from a much higher vantage point and quite a bit to the right, leaving the building out of frame to the right.
Most pros prefer to get the image as close to finished in the camera. Nobody likes to spend hours hunched over a computer cloning things out unless there was no other way.
Most of these perceived ‘deceptions’ were merely a matter of perspective change. I see the same thing in the church when people talk about someone else and don’t bother to alter their perspective at all to see if perhaps there was another explanation for what is happening in someone’s life. Instead of love we see judgement. A person condemning another isn’t in a position to help them. So, in a way, there is still an excellent lesson to be learned here that can apply to the church.
Chris Ames says
“Most of these perceived ‘deceptions’ were merely a matter of perspective change. I see the same thing in the church when people talk about someone else and don’t bother to alter their perspective at all to see if perhaps there was another explanation for what is happening in someone’s life. Instead of love we see judgement. A person condemning another isn’t in a position to help them. So, in a way, there is still an excellent lesson to be learned here that can apply to the church.”
This is constructive! Good point.
Eric Dye says
You’re a real photog pro, Carlos! 😀
carlos says
Hahahaha….. Well, I try.
John Saddington says
#LOL
Chris Ames says
I agree that we need to make every effort to show a balanced view of the Christian life. And we should do it in our programs, our title packages, or worship song selection, our baptisms, the segues between elements of our services, and especially in scrutinizing every word the pastor will say in his sermon, or at least having a review session with the pastor after every sermon (yes, I mean 3 times in a row if he speaks 3 times on a Sunday).
We’re carrying the most important message of all time and we are responsible to deliver it in a manner conducive to being received.
Eric Dye says
Amen.