The Photo Fakeouts category of the Oyster Hotel Reviews blog is an ingenious service to anyone who’s planning a vacation. Oyster strikes a blow to deceptive marketing practices by posting the hotels’ official, professional, and sometimes doctored photographs alongside pictures taken by actual visitors in real world conditions. Here are a few samples:
In the professional photo, a couple strolls down a beach bathed in warm glow towards a hotel that sits among tropical foliage. In the real-world photo, cranes tower over the sand.
In the professional photo, happy guests are served food by a grinning chef at an appetizing buffet. In the real-world photo the buffet is an absolute mess.
In this particularly egregious example, the professional photo shows an intimate and joyful beach wedding while the real-world image reveals wrinkled and bronze beach-goers gawking at the ceremony from an uncomfortably close distance.
In all fairness
Many of these photos are truly deceptive, and if I were the traveler I would surely be infuriated. However, you should also consider that in some cases a poorly composed photograph by an amateur can be just as much a lie as a doctored professional image. Just as shooting people sitting on the beach at sunset creates a warm, pleasing photograph, snapping out-of-shape bathers on an overcast beach can create a sorrowful image that is just as much a lie.
Make your own decisions
The lesson here is that when you are researching a vacation to a place you have never personally visited, you should never trust the hotel or resort as your only source of information — seek out real-world advice from as many different independent third parties as you can find and come to your own informed conclusions. The “Hotel Photo Fakeout” blog is a fine example of the Internet’s power to level the playing field.
Link via “Oyster Hotel Reviews – Hotel Photo Fakeout” by A Photo Editor.
