In May 2021, an image supposedly showing a mermaid that washed ashore along the River John in Nova Scotia in the early 1900s started to circulate on social media. When we first encountered it, we had two quick thoughts. First, that isn’t real. Despite loads of mermaid “sightings” over the last few centuries, this mythical underwater creature remains decidedly in the myth category. And two, who created this modern piece of folklore?
That would be Eduardo Valdés-Hevia, a digital artist from Spain who creates “dark and surreal images through photomanipulation,” according to his website. We sat down with Valdés-Hevia to discuss what goes into creating these pieces of art, how to make a convincing piece of folklore, and how internet users can spot manipulated images.
Origin
In May 2021, a photograph circulating on social media supposedly showed a mermaid that had been discovered along the River John in Nova Scotia in 1918:
This was not a genuine photograph of a mermaid, but a digitally altered image of a beached whale.
It was created by Eduardo Valdés-Hevia, a digital artist whose Twitter bio states “my pictures are slightly edited.”
Here’s a comparison of the doctored mermaid image (left) and the genuine photograph (right):
The genuine photograph on the right comes from the “Picturing Canada” collection, a series of photographs taken between 1895 and 1923 that were digitized by the British Library in 2012 and made available via Wikipedia. Details for this specific image are scarce. The only information available comes from the title: “At River John, Nova Scotia, August 1918. [Beached whales.].”
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