Instead of hiring a photographer to shoot original images, Samsung has recently been caught in the act of "artfully" (read: shamelessly) replacing an iPhone with a Galaxy S4 in an advertising campaign. It's not that they can't do this kind of thing as it's not illegal, but more the fact that they did it at all, and that it was over an original image featuring their main competitor. Really Samsung?
Originally discovered on a Tumblr dedicated to outing Samsung copies of Apple ideas, the funniest thing about this is that because the Galaxy S4 features a 5-inch display, the ratio of phone to person in the image implies that the model has enormous frying-pan-sized hands. So not only did the graphic artist not really understand the size of the phone, the overall finished product is pretty shoddy. Odd how in-focus the phone is compared to the surrounding image. DOF fail.
Sigh. Like I mentioned, this isn't illegal. Most stock images are free to manipulate as the buyer sees fit. But that doesn't make it ok. It's really lazy, and of course is resulting in some pretty embarrassing PR. All of this could have been avoided if Samsung just hired a photographer to recreate the image. I know of several talented photogs who would have loved to take on this campaign.
[Via Cult of Mac via Mac Daily News]
The depth of field isn't even realistic....
The worst part is that the light doesn't match :-)
How is this even a "story"?
Good question.
I miss when Fstoppers had good posts that I could learn from. Posts like this make me want to unsubscribe.
Bye - don't let the door hit you on the way out.
As do i Kim, I will say that ever since Jaron started posting the quality of the posts has gone down hill.
Wow since 2011?
Jaron, Its just that i have seen posts that you post late that were on petapixel or on SLR lounge. It seems that the "original post" have gone away.
Jaron Schneider must be an Apple fanboy? It's probably news worthy to him.
I am a apple fan boy and i could care less.
I'm almost positive that there isn't an article on the internet about a cell phone that does not have a commenter bringing up another brand's fanboys. If it exists, I've never seen it.
"Ohhai, I burnt out the highlights and compressed the skintones, much bettar rite" ??!?
As you can see it's actually a photo of a photo. So maybe the original isn't that bad.
Why even have a comparison "Original and Edited" then? Besides, the edited version isn't even the same shot as the "original".
The thing with samsung is they have great technology but no real concept, and no class. That doesn't only show in their marketing, but in their products too.
That point was never more evident then at their launch party for the new phone.
Are you talking about the gangnam style launch? If yes, that party was done by an operator - reliance communications. Samsung India's communication work is handled by Cheil and Leo Burnett in India, neither of whom wouldve even sent that idea for approval to a client. Reliance did that and if you'd bothered looking up a translation of the lyrics, it'd be obvious to you.
Stealing people's images for ads and now this? Oh Samsung, maybe you should give up...
you use the term "artfully" really lightly there. Like others have pointed out the depth of field is really bad. its as if a 5th grader did the shop work.
This post is ridiculous. Is this image even used in Samsung's campaign, or is it just some random image the writer found on Tumblr? If so, it's obviously some random person that Photoshopped it. Why are garbage articles like this popping up on FStoppers?
Considering Samsung essentially manufactured the iPhone, this isn't too far of a stretch...
Jaron your posts stink ... stop posting samsung's lame PR stories
Typical of samsung, instead of coming up with something original they just rip off the competition.