Ritchin refers to the “fluidity of the digital” to describe how digital imaging allows photographs to be easily manipulated and transformed in ways that analog photography did not permit. An example of this fluidity is how digital images can be easily edited by altering colors, adding or removing elements, and combining multiple images into composites. In analog photography, any changes to a photo required re-shooting or costly chemical processing, rather than simple edits on a computer.
Ritchin suggests that while photography was once seen as objectively capturing reality through a mechanical process, digital technology undermines this notion of photographs as transparent windows onto the world. Photos can now be manipulated to better suit an agenda rather than just document what was captured. This challenges the assumption that the “camera never lies” and erodes photography’s aura of veracity.
At the same time, Ritchin notes that photographs have never perfectly captured reality either, as what is included or excluded influences the story a single photo tells. Even unedited photos require interpretation. Other media also represent reality through subjective viewpoints and narrative frameworks.
While photography can irrefutably show us what something looks like, it provides only a two-dimensional slice of reality lacking full context. Videos add motion and duration but also only a limited perspective. Texts rely entirely on descriptive language rather than visual depiction. Virtual reality and simulations constructed from combining digital assets aim to immerse us in hypothetical scenarios rather than document things that truly existed.
In all of these media, the fluidity and manipulability of the digital erode claims of objectivity even further. Yet no medium alone can perfectly or completely capture the full complexity of reality. The strength of photography lies not in assertions of objectivity but in using images to spur conversations about how we perceive and understand the world.
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