No, not really. I mean pictures of him working or campaigning rarely capture his full face and are usually of lower quality. Also the official portrait scope would be way too narrow, considering this is the official portrait of him as president, and all it would be competing against are the senatorial ones. TonyBallioni (talk) 12:40, 18 August 2009 (UTC)[reply]
Oppose I'm perfectly fine with the scope and do not consider narrowing it down to official portraits to be helpful. However, what I dislike about the image is exactly the fact that it is the official portrait, for several reasons:
These are not necessarily realistic photos, but set-up in a dedicated studio, optimized by PR experts to make him look like they want him to look. I'd rather nominate a high-quality picture taken by a neutral photographer during Obama's usual activities.
The purpose of VI is encouraging photographers to contribute their rare and special images to the public domain - it's not encouraging anyone if we nominate a photo that was done by paid pros anyway and can easily be accessed by anyone on the president's website, rather than a good high-quality image that someone took by their own will.
Take a look at File:Barack Obama speaks at Camp Lejeune 2-27-09 3.JPG - an excellent shot I believe, more rare and unique than the official portraits; I personally value this contribution much more than that oficial one.
I prefer the official portraits precisely for the reason that they don't concentrate on the person Obama, but instead focus on him as president, and give a more neutral portrayal of him then the picture of him at Camp Lejeune, which was also likely taken by a professional (all five branches of the Armed Forces enlist professional photographers), and honestly looks like it could be a campaign photo (I know it isn't but in four years I wouldn't be surprised if I see it in an commercial) . Also I would disagree with your assessment of the American flag as propaganda, in this portrait it is barely noticeable, in fact it is far more noticeable in the image a Camp Lejune. TonyBallioni (talk) 12:57, 19 August 2009 (UTC)[reply]
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