There has been surprisingly little historical research into the role of illustrated reports in the media arena of the First World War, despite the fact that illustrated weekly magazines already played a key role in the shaping of public opinion (and thus of war developments generally). Illustrated reports should not, however, be equated with photo reports; the illustrations were ideologically charged messages formulated by the illustrators, not by the photographers. But one should also be wary of using simple undifferentiated „propaganda” terms to analyse the photo reports. The various illustrated magazines fought fierce battles on both a national (within Germany) and international level, each competing with their own layouts and messages. These, occasionally very creative contributions, should be viewed in terms of their dialogue- and duel-like nature, an effect which cannot be achieved by the usual fixation on selected individual images. In this respect, Germany was a provincial backwater. It is true that at the beginning of the First World War interesting commentaries on mobilisation and the Russian invasion of East Prussia were produced and that these had a mass impact; however, in terms of pointed propagandists formulations, at times already guided by the concepts of public relations, the German picture press had little to counter Anglo-Saxon competition, with the result that, with the invasion of Belgium, Germany had already lost the media war. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]