Holymoly.com suggests that one of the rehearsal photographs of Michael Jackson, said to have been taken the night before he died, is fake. They point out that "the backdrop mysteriously disappears in between Michael's legs." They describe this as a "classic photoshop blunder" and suggest "this could be a fake composite, with Jackson's image being super imposed on top of another pic."
It does look unusual, but I wouldn't be so quick to label it as photoshopped. That may just be how the backdrop looks in that area. (You would need to see an unobstructed view of the entire backdrop to be sure.) And what would be the point of photoshopping the picture? Is holymoly.com suggesting that Jackson didn't actually attend the rehearsal? That seems unlikely as there are other pictures of Jackson at the rehearsal, and (presumably) witnesses.
Comments
The perspective position of the lettering behind Michael is more 'right on forward' than those to the left and right. If you measure the depth these would be as well as what the letters are behind him, that area would be dark (or seemingly missing) unless there was backdrop clutter that was also reflecting and there does not appear to be anything to the side to suggest there is. I do not believe this was photoshopped.
Perhaps somebody decided that the now missing piece of red "s" between michael's legs was distracting to the composition.
Looking at the wider angle photo, I have to say that it looks suspicious. Either that one "I" behind him is made in a totally different manner than all of the other letters (including two other examples of "I"), or else something was edited out or not added in.
The word behind MJ is "IS". It's clear that the lower part of the "I" is blocked by his right thigh.
But the lower LHS of the "S" (if you extend the LHS of it down using say an averaged angle of the descenders from the RHS of the "S" and LHS of the "I") would rather unfortunately appear as a bright red 8inch "sausage" shape down his left thigh... possibly with a white stripe too.
So yes, it was "shopped" out.
So either that one letter was made in a very different way, there's some sort of a cloaking device at work, or somebody forgot to add or remove stuff when editing the image.