FAKE FOTOS FOR FASEBUK  By Jean-Rivel Fondjo

Technological advancement and modernization have crippled lots of small-scale photography businesses in my community, especially among those who could not meet the standards of the digital world due to either lack resources or education. Others though still in business are struggling to make a little for sustainability and livelihood.  It has led to unemployment the biggest canker every government is trying to eradicate. Photographers are no longer required to cover birthday parties, corporate events; baptismal ceremonies. People in an attempt to cut cost will prefer using their personal cameras, phones, and iPods to execute the job.

In an attempt to survive, sustain and remain in the photography business, I created “FAKE FOTOS FOR FASEBUK”. It involves taking clients photographs, especially students “photoshopping” and uploading them onto their profiles in a popular social network called FASEBUK. They say they are looking for friends, others husbands especially from Europe and Obama’s continent, their dreamland.

 (Photoshopping is a slag for digital editing of photos. It is widely used as a verb both colloquially and academically to refer to retouching)

Fortunately or otherwise, my photo studio is located on a university campus in Kumasi, Ghana. Some years ago I used to take an average of 30 portraits of students a day, which was good business for me. With the advent of digital photography my client base dropped drastically to 10. The world has changed, FASEBUK surfaced, point and shoot digital cameras made in china invaded our local markets, phones had incorporated digital cameras, editing software were created; the other hand of the camera (computer) became the new tool for the modern photographer in this modern world, people’s mentality changed. Its globalization, I had no option but to change as well, learn how to make FAKE FOTOS, it’s in vogue, it’s fashionable and appealing to their eyes just for the sake of FASEBUK.

Every day as I sit in my studio, they troop in, in their numbers wanting to take the photos in vogue. It took me some time to be fully equipped: digital SLR camera, computer loaded with editing software ready to face the market.  As they step in, this is what they say:

“Please I have pimples photoshop my face” Others will say “make my face smooth I am using it for FaseBuk” and another will say “make it color and black and white please”. Their request well noted, I pose them, a little fake smile and the shutter is released.  Generally their hair, make-up is all fake but they look good. An ordinary photograph cost 2 Ghana cedis (one dollar fifty cents) but I charge extra 2 Ghana cedis for editing, yet they are prepared to pay. I happily go back home with a lot of money but have to spend sleepless nights behind my computer to fulfill my part of the agreement.

By the next day, the photographs would have undergone digital surgery: faces look smoother, color tones appealing but all faked. As they look at them, they are happy for what they are not but for what they dream to become. They wish God would remold their faces according to their specification. I am a” small god” at that moment; my creations will be on FaseBuk. That is the world we are living in, a world of illusions, where people have unrealistic dreams, people are continually losing their cultural values and ego because of modernization and globalization. I am only recording the moments but I am also guilty, I am only doing this to survive in this  world.