A short while ago, this site and many others, led by Stella Kramer at Stellazine, protested the efforts by insurance giant AIG and US Airways to suppress photographer Stephen Mallon's Flight 1549 recovery pictures. Thanks to pressure from bloggers and from individuals, AIG and US Airways have relented, and allowed Stephen to publish the pictures again—with, in a few cases, the "US Airways" logo Photoshopped out of the pictures.
See the set at Stephen's site (go to Portfolios —> BACK ONLINE! THE SALVAGE OF FLIGHT 1549).
(Thanks to Stephen and KC)
Featured Comment by Dave Kee: "It was common practice in the early days of commercial aviation for an airline to physically paint over its logo on a crashed plane, and China Airlines did it as recently as 2007. Photoshop is so much easier."
Featured Comment by Gavin McLelland: "I do stuff a bit like this, heavy lift; we run a vessel with two 7000 tonne cranes and I've tried taking photos of the work but never succeeded in any satisfactory way. He really manages to capture the operation and the people. I can smell the gas axes and cable grease."
Well, that was fun, thanks! Lots of nice images, I have to say I enjoyed the portraits at least as much as the "industrial" images.
Another thing I enjoyed was realizing that, if I'd seen the gallery first, and guessed which image you would choose for the TOP header, I'm pretty sure it would be the one you did choose.
Why? 'Cause it's soooo late 50's - early 60's in feeling. Something about the color quality, the bulky cops on bulky Harley's with the huge, front wheel mounted sirens, the commercial strip with overhead wires - the look of everysmallcityUSA.
Before seeing the contemporary details, that's what it evoked for me.
Moose
Posted by: Moose | Sunday, 19 April 2009 at 12:09 AM
Wow, thanks for the link, these were very, very nice pictures, I hadn't seen them. He manages to turn drama into art. Or are they always the same?
Posted by: Vincent Mounier | Sunday, 19 April 2009 at 12:48 AM
Couldn't the terrorists use these pictures?
(I'm being ironic everyone.)
Posted by: misha | Sunday, 19 April 2009 at 06:15 AM
Well done, Mr. Mallon.
Posted by: Marty McAuliff | Sunday, 19 April 2009 at 10:03 AM
I missed the portfolio the first time around. It doesn't appear as if the US Airways logo was photoshopped out of many of the images.
Posted by: Bruce Appelbaum | Sunday, 19 April 2009 at 10:08 AM
Really neat gallery. I liked the mix of wreckage vs. human shots. It really adds to the story to think about the people involved.
Mike - Are you certain that the logo has been photoshopped out in any of those? The "US AIRWAYS" on the plane and the little flag logo seem to be in quite a few of them. Seems like one side of the plane is logo'ed and the other isn't, maybe giving the impression that things were removed? (I'm curious, because I'm not sure why they'd have some logos removed, and not others...)
Posted by: David Bostedo | Sunday, 19 April 2009 at 10:17 AM
David, Bruce,
I'm only going by what Stephen told me. He wrote, "I had to retouch the logo out of a couple of images but only 2 or 3."
Mike
Posted by: Mike Johnston | Sunday, 19 April 2009 at 11:48 AM
Asking him to retouch the logo out of only 2 or 3 images makes about as much sense as trying to censor the pictures - none. But AIG is not known for having good sense, is it?
Posted by: Lambert | Sunday, 19 April 2009 at 11:57 PM
My guess (total guess) would be that the re-touched parts were where the logo was mangled or otherwise distorted. Large companies are incredibly defensive about their branding and recognition, and this includes never ever showing a logo or company name that isn't the exact color/font/perspective/etc. I know of some companies not allowing logos (or even certain fonts) in email signatures of their employees, for fear that it would make the company less consistent and recognizable.
Posted by: David Bostedo | Monday, 20 April 2009 at 12:23 PM