Interesting (Bizarre) article on Joe O'Donnell's Photographs

[Lee Hamiel]

See:

http://digitaljournalist.org/issue0708/the-bizarre-story-of-joe-o-donnell.html

Interesting story - only thing is I think the LBJ shot is from a slightly different angle - maybe it's another photographer's shot as well.

He supposedly took the shots with a Speed Graphic.

I'm interested in other people's opinions about this story.

[Mark Sawyer]

I'm amazed he got away with it for as long as he did, given how well-known some of the images are. And given it all came out following his obituary, I suppose he got away with it.

Hmmm... perhaps I'll load a bunch of the more famous Adams and Weston photographs into my cell-phone camera. Then I can hand it to people and say, "look at the pictures I took today!"

[tim atherton]

There appears to be quite a bit more to it than Fulton's article, which looks like it went off pretty much half cocked and not terribly well researched

check out these for starters (especially the letter from his son):

http://www.editorandpublisher.com/eandp/news/article_display.jsp?vnu_content_id=1003634662

http://stateoftheart.popphoto.com/blog/2007/09/correcting-the-.html

http://www.pdnpulse.com/2007/09/the-photo-feed-.html

etc

[John Kasaian]

The letter from his son is believeable. The fact that the NYT doesn't concern itsself with credibility is also believeable. Add to that a journalist looking for sensationalism and we've got a curious little tempest in a teapot.
Look past the sensationalism and the pointing of fingers and it is a very poignant look at the last days of a photographer. I'll bet Joe was a cool old guy. I remember the first time I saw the atomic city pictures and I really don't care who shot them any more than I care about who shot the John John picture. The very fact that someone was there to capture these haunting images for history is enough.

[Jim Galli]

I find it very easy to give Mr. O'Donnell the benefit of the doubt after reading his son's very nicely written letter. I would chose to believe there was no ill intent. I also am painfully aware that the so-called "news media" will misconstrue facts and re-frame them as half truths in order to spin a more fantastic story than the truth would have been. The bottom line question is of intent.

[Lee Hamiel]

Thanks for the input guys - Tim - your links are great as usual.

Initially I had a knee-jerk reaction to the story & then after reading & examining the shots I was not so sure - hence I submitted the original post for other's opinions and feelings about it all.

The response from his son is very interesting & it may simply be a combination type story that gets amplified in one direction due to memory issues which call into question all the rest of his shots which may be unfair.

I have no vested interest in any of this - I merely found the subject matter interesting with regards to photographic history and it's a change of pace between the usual digital vs. film debates that get so old.

With that said - documenting your whereabouts along with copyrighting important images is paramount.

Funny that I saw no mention of copyrights anywhere in the articles/emails - maybe I missed something. Right now I'm too tired to re-read it all to check so correct me if I'm wrong.

Regards

[tim atherton]

With that said - documenting your whereabouts along with copyrighting important images is paramount.

Funny that I saw no mention of copyrights anywhere in the articles/emails - maybe I missed something. Right now I'm too tired to re-read it all to check so correct me if I'm wrong.

Regards

If most of his stuff was shot for the USIA (sic) it would be Public Domain/Gov copyright. In addition, he would probably have often just handed off the film with some caption notes at the end of the day, wherever they were - Washington, overseas or wherever. These notes quite often eventually got separated, as did the details of who actually took the photographs.