Interesting to see this unfold & I must say I found the image incredible but its yet another story in what appears to be the never ending tale of people stopping at nothing to achieve success. So many of us were sucked in that is of course if the real truth is that the photographer actually used a tame animal to get this shot; as good as it is!

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/sci/tech/8470962.stm

Ups, so that story end in that way ... i think we talk about this some time ago here on 1x.

The smart guys never have a "long life" ... but the problem is they never learn

The story sickens me. I can't stand maliciousness and I can't stand liars.

Alex, just another smart ass tragic end story ... :) I like it :)

This only sickens me when smart ass win, like a Portuguese idiot who wins a important photographic prize here in Portugal last year with photos made by his wife, and later NY Times during a exposition found he manipulate his photos and made a big scandal worldwide brrr

What is shocking is that the judges didn't see this straight away ! I'm not trying to be clever but
as a wildlife photographer as soon as I saw it months ago I couldn't believe the image. Frankly
it looks ridiculous and makes the judges look very bad indeed. In no way is this natural behaviour.

Sadly another image of lightening in Australia was published here...it won $1000 (AUS) and is so
clearly a creative edit.

Its the way of the world !

Stephen, when i see that photo for first time, i think "my dog do exactly that" and i spend a lot of time to teach him :))))

The big problem in this story, is not exactly the wulf, is the place. That place is a zoo in Madrid and a lot of people know it and that fence the dog is jumping over

That's funny, there's a degree of human idiocy involved. But in the case of the fox picture, there's not much to laugh about. Just an all-round show of saddening behaviour.
Competitions will soon become like airport security.

Hi Gerard,
Well this guy sure has dug a deep hole for himself! To have been caught out like this is shameful in the extreme but to then deny any wrong-doing shows just how little honour or integrity this guy has.....

I feel sorry for the other entrants who no doubt worked very hard to get their images the "right" way only to have their chance of winning stolen by a cheat who probably convinced himself that no one would ever notice, after all, one wolf looks much like any other....dosen't it? . I for one am glad he has been found out and although it is easy to say in hindsight it is a shame that the judges concerned didn't question the image earlier on in the competition.
Besides the lifetime ban from the BBC WPOTY competition, i wouldn't think his work is going to find much favour in any other prestigious photographic competitions unless he changes his name!!!

Reminds me of the old addage........."cheats never prosper"........

Ref. earlier from post 22 here: http://1x.com/discussions/14054/animals-in-captivity/#unread

Well Vic it certainly is a case that proves that point! but I can't say that I am not surprised so often during my life in this planet I have seen people stoop to cheating to win sport is a good example. I do believe that at the judging stage outside experts were bought in to validate the judges choice which brings into question their credentials but lets be fair its a convincing image regardless of the foul play. I for one could never have thought that there were tame wolves for hire!

I have dabbled a bit in "wildlife" photography here in London in particular with taking shots of the herons in Regents Park frankly I got so close I could hardly call them wild they are now so used to humans. It is definitely a fine line between feral & domesticated... More fool this guy its blotted his copybook & thrown the competition into a rather large spin & yes who now gets the top honour?

The big problem is the exact place where the wolf is jumping ... there are lot´s of family cliches photos taken in that exact place in all internet.
If it is not the same tame wulf who lives there, someone put there other wulf :) Or maybe is a undercover goat dressed with wulf clothes, because the animal is jumping exactly like a goat do :)))

Now, lets go to do some forensic analisis to this story :

Interview to José Luiz Rodrigues, in Photo Radar :

http://www.photoradar.com/blogs/article/interview-with-jose-luis-rodriguez-winner-of-wildlife-photographer-of-the-year

Excert :

Amy Davies : Where you there when the image was taken?

José Luiz Rodrigues : No, I wasn?t, I used an infrared barrier to shoot the image. I went to get some sleep! I don?t know what time the photograph was taken, but judging from the light I think it is early in the night.

hummm ... lolllllllllllllllll

Must have been a goat in wolves clothing as you say Rui & on that basis there were another twenty all waiting behind to follow the first, probably all being chased by some forlorn Portuguese goat farmer!

:-)

By the way and talking about goats, the "THE GOAT" website have all story, and also photos from the location where photo was taken in a Zoo near Madrid :

http://thegoat.backcountry.com/2009/12/30/fake-maybe-nature-photograph-of-the-year%E2%80%99s-authenticity-questioned/

So, goats will rule the world :)

But about my other posts with interview with the smart ass : if you do this photo with a IR barrier during night and you are not there, the second thig you do after see the photo on LCD isn´t see the EXIF and the time ???

Aside from the criteria for the competition, I think it is a wonderful picture no matter how it was shot, made, created. If I just view it as an image then I think it is striking and interesting and questioning as well. I did ask myself when I first saw it how it was achieved and thought it must have been remotely triggered but this just added to the curiosity/ingenuity of the image for me.

I think the location is pretty much unanimously decided on that it is a park area and that indeed there is or are tame wolves there from the evidence that some local photographers are very keen to point out but is it not inconceivable that this could possibly be a wild animal caught doing something unexpected?

With my limited knowledge of the place or evidence, I'm just giving the guy a small modicum of the benefit of the doubt...

John, i´m not a "nature" or "wildlife" photographer, but i think there are wildlife contests where the juri ask for many profs to photog about images, like original raw file, the place, etc etc.

Wildlife photography are not only the pictorical side of the image, but also the cientifical side too, because many of that photos are used in cientifical books, studys, etc and can´t be fake at all.

I agree with you is a nice image, can be winner in a other kind of competition where the pictorical side is more important.

But i agree we are talking about a process that we don´t know nothing about. Juri of BBC wildlife contest ask him proofs about this image ?

The original raw file like NGS do allways ?
A photo of the exact place where photo taken ?

Also, some specialists in nature tell in the process that wolf is a Ossian one and not Iberic, for me don´t look at all a Iberican wulf, and i know since i´m very young the iberic wulf, but the colors of wulf in photo can be improved in PS, and that is also against rules of wildlife photography.

The same specialists sayd the wulf in night time never jumps the fence, just surround it.

I just discover that this Jose Rodriguez was here in Portugal at some time ago giving "Wildlife Masterclass Workshop" invited by a nature association.

I will contact that guys to invite him again to give a "Fake Wildlife Masterclass Workshop" , maybe i learn to improve my goats in photos :-)

oh he cheated!

still its a great photo, but not wildlife anymore!

Hi Rui, I do understand the competition's decision and am not against it, they may have overwhelming evidence to come to their conclusions and so have made a correct decision.

When you look at other images from the photog you have to start wondering, this one looks completely unrealistic to me. http://www.pbase.com/cazadoresdeluz/image/82546912 but then again I'm no expert in these matters...

JP

It's the same wolf like in the incriminated shot and the photographer wanted it to look like a rabbit but he's not so good in PS yet therefore the rabbit looks like a deer. Nay, if this is a nature shot next time I'll take the photograph of a flying guinea pig.

. http://www.pbase.com/cazadoresdeluz/image/82546912 but then again I'm no expert in these matters...

Ouchh ... that guy have a zoo full of animals jumping in same way over that same fence. Next ones will be an elefant, then a goat and after a crocodile and then and for last a T-Rex.

he already did the T-rex Rui and he entered it into the comp. But one of the judges suspected that it might be a creative edit, apparently there was a texture on the pic that gave the game away...

lol :D

Jumping wolf...pfuh...I've captured a jumping elephant!!!
http://twitpic.com/z44dj

LOL!

I'm not sure if anyone else has seen the exhibition but there was some truly outstanding work there, I never could understand why this particular photograph won and that was before it was disqualified. We could rant and rave about how disgusting this cheating was but in the exhibition there was a section for 11-16 year olds (I could be somewhat off with this range), in which a lot of entries were using top of the line digital SLRs paired with 400 to 600mm lenses. I guess with a bit of difficulty an eleven year old could lift this sort of gear but I'm not entirely sure. Where they got the money from is quite another matter...

A lot of the photographs were fantastic but the placards underneath each photograph with the name of the photographer, what they shot with and brief snippets of information often didn't quite add up.

I don't see any problems with making images like that in a zoo or wildlife park, But to post them as taken in the wild..

So, this one became famous..
Much like a Norwegian film photographer some years ago. Filming bears, claiming it was real nature, but later showed to be from a bear park. Strangely the guy disappeared from TV..

I never understood either. I've not seen the real exhibition but seen lots of the images online. This one might be rare, if it was taken in nature, but I can't see it is outstanding photography.

That blows.

Indeed, I agree. And they are supposed to talk about photography aren't they ?

I can't find a link to it now but I remember reading that the wolf jumping image was actually shot on medium format film, so there wouldn't be any EXIF data with it.

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/culture/photography/photographer-of-year/7036631/Wildlife-Photographer-of-the-Year-stripped-of-award.html

EXIF data