A pigeon standing on a stone ledge beside water: real or AI?

As shared

A grey pigeon standing on a rough stone ledge with blue water behind it.

Diego Delso, delso.photo, License CC BY-SA · CC BY-SA 3.0 · Source

REAL

This is real.

How sure we areHigh

Based on 1 strong and 0 supporting piece of evidence.

What we found

The photograph shows a pigeon standing on a stone ledge beside water. It was taken by Diego Delso, a Spanish photographer who shares his work under a free licence, at Nymphenburg Palace in Munich, Germany, at about eight in the morning on 17 March 2012. He uploaded it to Wikimedia Commons, where reviewers rated it a quality image. The file page keeps the camera's own record of the shot: a Canon EOS Digital Rebel XTi with a 100mm lens, at 1/80 of a second, f/10 and ISO 100. The picture is used on Wikipedia pages about the rock pigeon in several languages, including English, Spanish and French. A sharp, clean photo of an ordinary bird can look as if it was made with AI, so check whether a named photographer and a camera record stand behind it.

Key facts

Original source: Diego Delso, delso.photo, License CC BY-SA
First published: Not recorded
Earlier appearances: Not recorded
The claim you saw: No caption recorded
Signs of AI: None that decide it

The evidence, strongest first

Strong Decides the answer

Original sourceWikimedia Commons file page, photo by Diego Delso, 17 March 2012↗

Supporting Points the same way

None.

Weak Shown, not relied on

How it looksThe neck feathers shine green and pink, as real pigeon feathers do in sunlight. The bird's shadow falls on the ledge in line with the light. The rough ledge shows small stones and worn patches. The water behind is softly blurred, as it would be through a long camera lens.

Detector scores are often wrong, so they never decide a verdict here.

What we couldn’t establish

Anything about the moment it shows beyond what the sources above record. If you know more, tell us.

Bottom line

Real: the original source shows it.

See the original ↗Think we’re wrong?

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