HDR and Photojournalism: Part 1 - Against the Use of HDR

The front page of The Washington Post with the "culprit" HDR photo.

Note: This is part one of a two part post regarding the ethics of HDR photography in photojournalism.

In 2012, The Washington Post ran a High Dynamic Rage (HDR) photograph on the front page of the Jan. 13 issue of its newspaper (see image image above).  The image sparked a debate among photojournalists as to whether or not the HDR photo violated photojournalism ethics.

So, what's the problem with The Post running the HDR photo?  To understand why an HDR image may be considered unethical in photojournalism, first people need to understand what an HDR image is.  Simply stated, and HDR image is an image that is usually comprised of, three or more images, of different exposures, of the same scene laid on top of each other in some photo editing software.  When combined, these multiple images produce one image with greater color saturation and greater shadow and highlight detail.

With that bit of background knowledge, that then begs the question, is HDR photography ethical in photojournalism?