In Our Own Image

Here is my notes in Kami again.

(p11) Early development of photography and computer

• daguerreotype seemed more influential to photography than computers as heavily text-based (The daguerreotype银版照相 was the first commercially successful photographic process (1839-1860) in the history of photography. Named after the inventor, Louis Jacques Mandé Daguerre, each daguerreotype is a unique image on a silvered copper plate.)
• computers digitalize photography (restructured into pixels and became easily manipulated/transmitted)
• photography losing objectivity while being manipulated (fidelity replaced by “fluidity of the digital”)

(p12) Implications of new technologies

• e.g. automobile
• possible revolutionary influence of digital photography, e.g. photography from painting
• e.g. reliability of documentation and familiarity with genetic modification, “increasingly omnipresent surveillance, synthetic movies without live actors, a disbelief in the news”

(p12) “If there was one to what “reality” would it refer?”

• interesting how photography was designed to record “reality” and then it could be manipulated
• “reality” seems to become fuzzy since the universality of the internet in general

(p13) Examples of photograph manipulation in journalism

• credibility of Doctors Without Borders
• stereotypes of African-Americans
• ex-spouses in family photos

(p14) The paragraph of radio and sound

• sound artists also manipulate audio
• similar to literature where people imagine pictures, but authors also manipulate literature greatly
• people also manipulate appearances beyond the digital world
• there has been critiques about manipulation being unnatural and unreal, but also the opposite that people should be allowed to pursue whatever they want

(p15) The example of not controlling how one’s photo will be edited

• if I were a farmer growing veggies, do I need to decide if they are going to be fried or steamed
• or, as I paid tuition for college, do I need to know or decide how they are spending every penny
• if they posted his unedited photo on the magazine, what about the magazine’s design choice/style/sense of professionalism
• what about manipulation in the photographing process, such as ISO, aperture, shutter speed

(p18) The paragraph of labeling edited photographs

• the era of guaranteed transparency has been long gone, or I wonder if it ever exists due to intransparency of human minds, such as in interpersonal relationships, when internet companies accessing personal information
• as for labeling, what about people with manipulated appearance, foods, social media posts
• what about the intentions behind manipulation, augmentation of human imagination such as after effects?

(p19) “However the malleability of the image, the ephemerality of the internet, the concentration on screen and speed, on the world of image vs. the world of things, will lead us into another conceptual space. What we are calling the digital revolution—putting information into integers—is a prelude to a much larger change in consciousness.”

(p125) Criticisms of photography

• “vanity medium”
• “in power can take advantage of its enhanced capability to deceive and more expertly project their own worldview, camouflaging it as reporting.”
• “They have long been decontextualized, misdirected, cynically relied upon to confirm certain values by those who control their use.”
• “The reader, unable to detect the alterations, can be deceived most of all.”

(p128) Thoughts of photography

• “various aesthetic, ethical, and journalistic dilemmas”
• “To what extent will these technological advances be employed to enhance the development of a derivative, postmodern culture, devouring its own past as it substantially alters our own collective memory? To what extent will they be used to control us, or self-aggrandizingly to promote a “God complex” among their users?”
• “The discussion should question the nature of photography and its potential role in our evolving society.”