Found: Justin Trudeau in your latest photo album.
Lost: the proper definition for “photobomb.”
Last week brought the latest polaroid for Trudeau’s public relations scrapbook, when a picture emerged of a group of teenagers standing by the Vancouver waterfront before prom just as the Prime Minister casually jogged by in the background.
Cue the international headlines: “Canada’s Justin Trudeau photobombs students’ prom picture” (BBC), Trudeau Just Casually Photobombed This Epic Prom Picture Full of Teens (Time); Justin Trudeau Prom PM… Photobomb Master (TMZ); Justin Trudeau Photobombs A Prom Picture, Which Makes Him King (Huffington Post).
Not to get all technical, but the definition of a photobomb is: “to ruin a photograph by appearing in the image without the photographer’s knowledge.”
And the Prime Minister would have a hard time arguing that he photobombed kids getting ready for prom when the picture was surreptitiously taken by Trudeau’s own personal photographer, Adam Scotti.
“This is part of a little side project to document the places we go and the runs we go on,” wrote Scotti on his Instagram account, offering some backstory to his widely-circulated photo. “Sometimes it’s just scenic shots, other times, it’s running past an unsuspecting grad group—half clued in, others were more distracted by the ginger with the camera.”
If anything, the prom goers photobombed Trudeau’s running picture, since only Trudeau and his photographer knew the picture was happening.