The Mystery behind the Obama Hope Poster

I was looking at one of my favorite image blogs today, The Year in Pictures, and there was a post regarding the original photographer behind the iconic image used for the Obama Hope Poster that we all know so well by now, and which I love myself. It seems perhaps the original image has been found...or has it?



After I saw the "original" I started to wonder why Shepard Fairey, if he had found the image from a Google Image search, would then take the time to flip and stretch, and add the suit, tie, etc. I've played around with similar conversions in the past myself and the process is really easy, it would have taken Fairey much longer to add the additional content than it would to do the conversion its self. So I did my own Google Image search and found the image above on the right here.

This image seems more likely to my eye. I copieda version into Photoshop and layered it over the Hope poster. Except for a little rotation, the Obama image seems to fit the Hope poster really well. Here are some examples with the opacity of the layer changed so that you can see the poster through the image.



It seems like a pretty good match. I'm currently trying to nail down who took the original image. If you have any thoughts let me know.

Update: It seems to be an AP photograph (using Tineye), still looking for a source credit...

Update 2: I found the AP image in a CBS article here. I've put in an image request to the AP, still waiting to hear from them.

Update 3: The image is Mannie Garcia's and currently the AP (who Mannie was working for at the time) is going after Fairey for copyright infringement, more here.