Fauxtography: How mad are your skills?
posted at 12:08 am on November 16, 2006 by Allahpundit
Nine out of ten, baby. Nine. Out of. Ten.
Anyone who scores less than five is a punk-ass Adnan Hajj wannabe.
Thanks to Conservative Blog Therapy for the tip.
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Ohh, this is exciting! I’m off to check it out now, though I don’t know if I can match 9 out of 10.
RightWinged on November 16, 2006 at 12:11 AM
8 out of 10… better than I expected of myself… now who’s going to go 10 for 10?
RightWinged on November 16, 2006 at 12:17 AM
7 out of 10
EnochCain on November 16, 2006 at 12:18 AM
I did better than I thought. I got 9/10… and the one wrong was the one I expected it to be :)
dead-duck on November 16, 2006 at 12:25 AM
Yikes! I only got 6 out of 10. I either need new glasses or should examine before opening that bottle of wine.
thedecider on November 16, 2006 at 12:25 AM
Just put me in the corner with a dunce cap. 3 out of 10.
Scot on November 16, 2006 at 12:26 AM
Dorko! Nice job.
marykatharine on November 16, 2006 at 12:28 AM
9 out of 10. The one I missed I would miss no matter how closely or how often I looked.
CliffHanger on November 16, 2006 at 12:31 AM
Matched the 9 for 10… damn BMW!!
Editor on November 16, 2006 at 12:31 AM
And I thought I had too much time on my hands …
Ali-Bubba on November 16, 2006 at 12:32 AM
8 of 10 I can hang with the Big Dogs Baby!
sonnyspats1 on November 16, 2006 at 12:33 AM
Ha, got me too. Not going to say whether it’s real or CG though so everyone else can have fun too.
Oh come on, you have to tell us your score MKH!
RightWinged on November 16, 2006 at 12:34 AM
9 out of 10, the BMW got me too.
mesablue on November 16, 2006 at 12:36 AM
Dang it! Tried again and got 7 out of 10. Finally looked at real versus fake. Those darn monkeys got me both times! They look so real.
thedecider on November 16, 2006 at 12:40 AM
I’m fairly certain this thing isn’t about how mad our skills are.
Editor on November 16, 2006 at 12:40 AM
It was the monkeys. The goddamned monkeys.
Allahpundit on November 16, 2006 at 12:42 AM
7 of 10 the first time. The got progressively worse. After the fourth try I was down to 3 of 10. Kinda like how I viewed the Republicans the past 2 years. Optimistic at first, then it started to go down hill. Fast.
Danilo on November 16, 2006 at 12:46 AM
Eight out of ten. I’m happy with that.
JohnJ on November 16, 2006 at 12:47 AM
Allah do you ever go to sleep?
Danilo on November 16, 2006 at 12:48 AM
9 outa 10. Missed the corkscrew. What can I say? I don’t drink booze. The BMW photo is very nice for a real photo.
AngryHank on November 16, 2006 at 12:49 AM
I wonder if there’s a trick to it. Is there something I should be paying attention to that would give away the cg from the real? I tried looking at the shadows and reflections, or maybe the outline. Still got me.
Danilo on November 16, 2006 at 12:52 AM
8 outa 10…missed the BMW and the peas (or whatever the green pic was).
F15Mech on November 16, 2006 at 12:56 AM
It was the monkeys. The goddamned monkeys.
Allahpundit on November 16, 2006 at 12:42 AM
Monkey detective ! check the wood grain on the bodies a perfect match.Not hapnin in nature .
Check the shadow/reflection on the chin Faux. Good fun man!
sonnyspats1 on November 16, 2006 at 12:57 AM
seven.
Alex K on November 16, 2006 at 1:05 AM
K, now that everyone is talking about each individual picture and kind of spoiling it for others, and sense I’ve already played (8 out of 10), I’ve used your linke, Alex K, to kind of cheat, changing out parts of the URL to pretend
10 out of 10!
RightWinged on November 16, 2006 at 1:12 AM
8 of 10, BMW = Awesome CG skills!
The one of Nancy Pelosi portrayed as a centrist is AMAZING!
Ha Ha..
186k on November 16, 2006 at 1:16 AM
8-10… That’s how I roll!
x95b10 on November 16, 2006 at 1:22 AM
RightWinged–Glad I could help! Remember, it’s not cheating, it’s being resourceful.
Alex K on November 16, 2006 at 1:24 AM
8 of 10 for me.
CP on November 16, 2006 at 1:26 AM
Any bets that Honora and Grebrook show up and claim 10 out of 10?
RightWinged on November 16, 2006 at 1:31 AM
9 for 10 ……one that I thought was too obvious tripped me up. Overthinking dammit.
TBinSTL on November 16, 2006 at 1:32 AM
10 fer 10 Niiiiiiice…
Big S on November 16, 2006 at 1:42 AM
7… I guess I don’t know how to spot a fakes as well as I thought I did. Maybe I was wrong about Bill and Hillary. Nah…..
RalphyBoy on November 16, 2006 at 1:42 AM
But 2 fer 4 in the bonus round.
Big S on November 16, 2006 at 1:43 AM
7… only three removed from Adnan Hajj-wannabe territory…
RD on November 16, 2006 at 1:43 AM
Ok, if it’s being spoiled…
…the car is the one that got me… I thought it was fake, but I went with real instead because I thought I was just being paranoid.
BTW Those of you who didn’t do as well as you hoped… it’s not your fault, just blame it on your monitor ;) “The screen wasn’t clear/big/bright/dim/etc enough for me to see the detail!”
dead-duck on November 16, 2006 at 1:48 AM
7. I’ll take it.
ReubenJCogburn on November 16, 2006 at 1:49 AM
A lot of big talk from people with no links. I call 3-4 on all of you.
Alex K on November 16, 2006 at 1:52 AM
I don’t, I believe everyone…. until the libs get here.
That said, I already showed you how easy it is to fake the link making it look like one got 10 for 10. Anyway, You could be right, but more pathetic than getting a crappy score would be lying about it here, so I’ll trust the honor system for now.
RightWinged on November 16, 2006 at 1:57 AM
80% for me. That BMW is awesome though.
rightside on November 16, 2006 at 2:08 AM
[Spoiler Alert -- but then, would any but the truly gutless read the comments first?]
8 out of 10 here, but at least I got the macacas. Hard to feel any shame about the BMW. The. Guy. Is. That. Good.
JM Hanes on November 16, 2006 at 2:10 AM
BMW: No wipers, funny liscence plate, window (on building) at lower right has a funny “halo” around it.
Big S on November 16, 2006 at 2:20 AM
Is that a Che poster?
Big S on November 16, 2006 at 2:21 AM
Dang- 7 out of 10, but then, I have never owned monkeys or a BMW.
Benthoven on November 16, 2006 at 2:21 AM
Big S: I thought black beemers were supposed to be so slick you didn’t need wipers.
JM Hanes on November 16, 2006 at 2:36 AM
8 of 10. Tripped on the same as everyone else, the beemer. Missed the swirly glass too. Sorry Allah, but the monkeys were easy.
Mallard T. Drake on November 16, 2006 at 2:38 AM
6 out of 10. Skilz not mad.
Spiny Norman on November 16, 2006 at 3:10 AM
10 for 10. First try.
3 out of 4 on bonus round. I’d give the link but I can only get one link in per post. Is that a defect on my end or just a part of Hot Air comment software?
The Apologist on November 16, 2006 at 3:19 AM
10 out of 10, although a couple were guesses.
elpresidente on November 16, 2006 at 3:20 AM
9/10 here too, and the monkeys were the one that got me. I can’t figure out how in the world I was supposed to be able to tell.
Patton on November 16, 2006 at 3:52 AM
9/10. I was taken by the Car. Only because I second guessed the moss detail between the rocks. My first guess was the stones in the road where not worn enough and to symetric.
The wood grain in the monkeys gave it away. The patterns were too different between the two, This showed it to be real. Most would have used the same texture for both monkies.
Egfrow on November 16, 2006 at 4:18 AM
I can’t believe you guys missed the monkeys, they look SO OBVIOUS to me. The fakes that are obvious are obvious because of the lighting: it is too perfect. In real life, lighting doesnt look like that.
The coffee, whisks, and monkeys all have the same lighting issue. They look too perfect. Contrast those pics with the green bell peppers and you’ll see what I mean.
The car pic is the only one I missed, and I nearly picked it to be fake simply because I smelled a TRICK QUESTION, but I figured trying to psych out the test wouldnt be fair, and I really couldnt see a damn thing in that car photo that I could point to to support my hunch.
kaltes on November 16, 2006 at 4:30 AM
Thanks for the fun. Aced the final four. Took a while to figure out the other two sets (had to bring out the reading glasses)…… But kudos for having us take a lesson on fauxtography!! Certainly opened my eyes.
cranura on November 16, 2006 at 4:38 AM
9/10 Darn Bimmer!
Scotsman on November 16, 2006 at 4:41 AM
Allah,
Congratulations on your nine out of ten!
I got six out of ten.
The site says that I am ahead of the game and did very well. I’ll take that with good feelings, even if I got less than you.
Nevertheless,
Congratulations on your 9 out or 10.
William
William2006 on November 16, 2006 at 4:45 AM
The first attempt I did not enlarge any of the small images and I chose all ten within about 40 seconds and got 6 out of 10.
I did not view the answers, I merely got my score.
Since I did not look at the answers I decided to go back and enlarged everyone, which I did not do my first try, and chose again.
This time I got 9 out of 10.
For what it is worth, what the heck!
William
William2006 on November 16, 2006 at 5:01 AM
Don’t know how I can back this up other than a screenshot of the results, but got ‘em all on the first try.
Not an artist or photog myself, but work very close with 3D modelers who use 3DS MAX8, MAYA, ‘Shop, Illustrator, Aftereffects, etc. After a while you can spot the lack of imperfections that indicates a rendered computer model. The artists I work with do their best to make the visible texture of models “organic”, making it harder to notice that the object isn’t real. That said, several of the fakes are outstanding work.
One of the things you can use to tell the difference is how sharp the image is. Often modelers will soften the render to make it harder to tell. In a reverse example, the trunk lid of the auto was well-focused, and had an orange-peel effect going on with the paint, and no 3D modeler would intentionally include that sort of imperfection. The BMW had perfect paint. And the spiked fence tips were obvious copies when zoomed in close.
Another giveaway is where scene lighting is too homogenous. While that can be managed in a studio setting, more often than not it is computer touched, even if it was a photo to start with. All of the fakes in that set are models made with 3DS MAX, Autodesk’s frontline modelling software.
Freelancer on November 16, 2006 at 5:07 AM
Just so everyone knows, the link for getting 10 of 10 will be an identical URL, so it doesn’t prove quite so much. Doesn’t disprove either, just saying, after I saw the page that came up I thought the URL looked like one of the links in a comment here, and sure enough.
On the monkeys, woodgrains are very big in the 3DS MAX texture library, so they were almost an immediate giveaway to me, that and the fact that the graining of the different wood pieces was a bit too closely matched. The angle of grain on the “face” pieces, for example.
In the bolt/nut photo, if you look at the tip of the bolt, in the end, you can see small imperfections that would take a modeler quite a while to replicate using software, because most texture maps are flat, and the tiny bumps on that bolt play to the light.
The corkscrew also, while the brushed steel surface it’s sitting on could have gone either way, there were just enough variations in the reflection of the twists, and a couple on the handle, that I couldn’t see it being fake.
The diamonds took much less time than any except the wire whisks to decide. Nice faceting and gradients of clear textures, but the lighting couldn’t come close to creating the sparkling internal reflections of a real stone. Too few variations in the lighting color seen inside the gems.
The bell peppers had me scratching my head, and I’ll admit guessing on that one.
The bonus four were actually easier than the first ten, though I was incredibly impressed by the detail work on one of them. 4 of 4
Freelancer on November 16, 2006 at 5:33 AM
7 out of 10… more study needed…
Zorro on November 16, 2006 at 6:34 AM
9 out of 10….first picture threw me. Heh.
DakRoland on November 16, 2006 at 6:50 AM
Darn, only 4 out of 10. I did get the Beemer right though.
Oh well, unless it’s a blackface job, I’ll just have to depend on you experts to point them out!
BacaDog on November 16, 2006 at 7:14 AM
10 for 10, but the BMW was a coin toss..
Viper1 on November 16, 2006 at 7:22 AM
8/10. I missed the BMW and the whisks.
Farmer_Joe on November 16, 2006 at 8:05 AM
Wahhhhhhh! 6/10……lack of coffee and sex effected my eyesight
Limerick on November 16, 2006 at 8:14 AM
10 out of 10!!!!
Only got 2 out of 4 on the bonus round though
Jared_MA on November 16, 2006 at 8:15 AM
That was my one miss too.
High Desert Wanderer on November 16, 2006 at 8:29 AM
I am the loser with 3 out of 10..I will qualify my ignorance by reminding you that I am the audience that Reuters and others bank on when they photoshop the news. I am also the grateful reader that depends on this site and many others to point out the photoshopped pictures being painted as actual news….
Pam on November 16, 2006 at 8:43 AM
7 out of 10. Not bad for someone who has never tried to determine a fauxtograph from a photograph.
MikeyB on November 16, 2006 at 8:44 AM
Missed the beemer like E-body else. Monkeys didnt get me.
Allah, there’s one giveaway on the monkeys, IMHO. Look at the top of the head of the left monkey. There seems to be a strong top-left light source influencing the right side of the dome of it’s head. However, all the shadows are generated from a strong, almost exclusively right-side source. So I went CG on that one.
I got 8 out of 10. Missing the aforementioned BMW masterpiece, and reading too much into the shadowing of the cork screw.
Thanks, fun excercise.
y2church on November 16, 2006 at 8:47 AM
9 out of 10.
Stupid peppers.
Slublog on November 16, 2006 at 8:54 AM
8 out of 10. Not bad for a technodufus.
RedWinged Blackbird on November 16, 2006 at 9:00 AM
8 out of 10 better than I thought I would do. I missed the diamonds and the Beemer.
vcferlita on November 16, 2006 at 9:02 AM
8 out of 10.
The BMW is fake? Spooky.
Theworldisnotenough on November 16, 2006 at 9:09 AM
Chumps
For the BMW I looked at the license plate. I didn’t recognize it so I assumed it was a fake.
JasonG on November 16, 2006 at 9:16 AM
Ditto on all counts.
Jaibones on November 16, 2006 at 9:17 AM
5. during coffee. i suck.
pullingmyhairout on November 16, 2006 at 9:20 AM
9 out of 10
Stupid BMW
james hooker on November 16, 2006 at 9:21 AM
*blush*
SouthernGent on November 16, 2006 at 9:28 AM
Six by purely guessing – no wonder I never did well on multiple choice tests!
Ann on November 16, 2006 at 9:30 AM
I got 5. But every single one of those were better than the Hajj fakes, especially the BMW. I just assumed the reflections would be too hard to fake. What do I know?
Esthier on November 16, 2006 at 9:31 AM
7 of 10. The BMW was very easy when I zoomed in (it also helped that I saw that image before and knew whether it was or wasn’t real – and no, unlike other blabbermouths, I won’t confirm which way that image goes). Missed the fruit, the monkeys and the diamonds.
More likely, they’re well below the 5-for-10 line. They’ll try claiming a perfect score.
steveegg on November 16, 2006 at 9:35 AM
7 out of 10.No enlargements of pics.Would I have been cheating if I used program to check pixels?I reckon I can be happy with what I got.Wish there was a real program that could decipher PSP without the “just do it” Nike slogan in the instructions.
spazzmomma on November 16, 2006 at 9:36 AM
I got them all. CG stuff has this look to it that makes it look a little different from the real thing.
zerodamage on November 16, 2006 at 9:36 AM
WhooooHoooo! 6 for 10! There’s a job waiting for me at Reuters! I. Is. A. Journalist! WhoooHooo!
GPE on November 16, 2006 at 9:45 AM
Got some bad news; you needed to get no more than 2 of 10. Getty Images might still hire you though.
steveegg on November 16, 2006 at 9:52 AM
10 out of 10.
The far background in the BMW shot gave it away. The corkscrew had a burr on the tip that seemed too real. The shadows for the whisks were too sharp.
Yeah! My 6+ hours a day of CAD work finally paid off. And I only had to put on 20 lbs and lose all muscle tone to get here!
a4g on November 16, 2006 at 10:06 AM
I can never tell real macacas from fake…9/10.
jdpaz on November 16, 2006 at 10:09 AM
9 out of 10 beemer blew it. Just like in Iraq…
Can I get a rim shot?
liberrocky on November 16, 2006 at 10:17 AM
I got five.
Esthier,
There’s the difference between real graphics pros and a hack with Photoshop on his laptop.
Pablo on November 16, 2006 at 10:20 AM
Me too, 9 out of 10, missed the beemer.
infidel4life on November 16, 2006 at 10:21 AM
I got a 10/10 but only because I had already seen the BMW. It’s every detail about that image that makes it look so authentic.
tnculp on November 16, 2006 at 10:22 AM
Six out of ten. yeah, there’s a reason I don’t go crying “FAUTOGRAPHY!!!”
cuz I suck at spotting it. Least I didn’t get less than five. Wouldn’t want to be a punk assed … whatever it was he said.
heh.
One Angry Christian on November 16, 2006 at 10:25 AM
4 out of 4 on the bonus round…A pathetic 8 out of 10 on the version 1: http://www.autodesk.com/eng/etc/fakeorfoto/v1/index.html
liberrocky on November 16, 2006 at 10:25 AM
4 out of 4 on the bonus, but a pathetic 8 out of 10 on version 1 quiz:
liberrocky on November 16, 2006 at 10:27 AM
Heck, I am afraid to even try. :)
Bob's Kid on November 16, 2006 at 10:33 AM
8 of 10. Missed on the screw and the diamonds.
honora on November 16, 2006 at 10:34 AM
bwahaha!
They left the metadata in the pics!
but I got 9/10 before I started cheating, so yay.
SaidinUnleashed on November 16, 2006 at 10:37 AM
7 of 10. But I did go 4/4 in the bonus round.
Evilwhiteguy on November 16, 2006 at 10:38 AM
Good lord I teh sux0r.
I think I just got pwned by Larry King’s mad internet skilz.
blogRot on November 16, 2006 at 10:40 AM
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