Digital Imaging And Their Effects Essay Research

Digital Imaging And Their Effects Essay, Research Paper

The Process and Difference of Digital Imaging and Their Effects

The traditional photographic process that has defined image reproduction for over 150 years involves a long drawn out series of chemical reactions beginning with the capture of light on silver film and ending with the fixing of the image onto paper or a transparency through the development processing. The final image is analog, which means it is composed of continuous gradients that are analogous to the gradients seen in the world around us.

Digital imaging, however, requires a completely different process. The image must be captured electronically on a light sensitive silicon chip. Each silicon chip contains thousands of pixels, which is “picture” plus “element”, which measure light, color, and contrast. Because each pixel is a square and uniform in dimension, each individual one can be changes by means of a computer. The size of each pixel is determined by the resolution, which is the number of pixels per square inch. The key difference between an image on film and a digital image is the resolution. For example, when you look at a painting, you see many separate pixels that form the whole painting to form a conceptual process. When thousands of pixels are formed together in a digital image, you form one single image that leads you to view the photograph as a single view. In 1995 Kodachrome film had a resolution equivalent to 18 million pixels, the best digital camera had a resolution less than one tenth of this. As this capability continues to grow and improve, however, other means of digitizing photographs have become the medium choice for altering images. If an image is analog to begin with, it must me converted to a digital form, hence turning it into a series of 0.s and 1.s that a computer can read. A scanning device does this, before the image can be read on screen. When turning an analog image into a digital image, it changes the process of development from chemical to mathematical, because each pixel is represented my a number and stored in the computers memory for easy reading. This process makes the image true and impossible to tell how many duplicates of the image have been made.

Once information is in its digital form, it becomes very simple to save, alter, and duplicate. Because each pixel can be enlarged and changed on the computer screen, each piece of the image can be altered at will. Elements can be added or subtracted, changed in color, brightness, or contrast. Areas of the picture can be copied and moved to other areas of the image where other things have been removed, and this can be repeated indefinitely. People can be made fatter or thinner, the color of hair and eyes can be changes, or completely removed from a picture is so desired. When the image is finished, it can be printed or sent via telephone lines or satellite anywhere in the world.

Traditional photographs may be altered in four basic ways: in the set up of the model, camera, and lighting before the photograph is taken; in the way the photograph is taken; in the processing of the film; or by the addition or deletion of elements to the processed photograph, followed by retouching the whole image. Portrait photographers are especially adept at setting up the scene and subject so that it will appear in the most flattering light. Light sources such as from a fire; candle, neon tubes, or incandescent bulbs can dramatically alter the way we interpret personalities. Shadows can be filled in or deepened. Angles are carefully chosen, and subjects are positioned so the camera only sees their good side. Subjects can be places in front of any backdrop to convince the viewer of the subjects where about. It has been believed that historical photographs that have been found have been staged because the set up or subjects suggest image manipulation.

One famous example is photographs of the Civil War taken in 1863 by Alexander Gardner, where the same dead soldier in rebel uniform is seen behind a wall of piled stones nearly enclosed by a big rock foundations, his musket is still standing, and then again as a Northern soldier in a field, with a gun lying beside his head. Clearly the same corpse has been used twice for an aesthetic and editorial effect.

After the set-up is done, various other schemes can be used to further manipulate the image. In addition to warm diffused light or strident lighting, the camera lens can romanticize the subject through soft focus or “harden” the subject through sharp focus. Different focal lenses can bring the background into clarity. With a wide-angle lens, the field takes on equal importance to the subject or even comments on the foreground figure. They can flatten or blur the background into insignificance with a telephoto lens that has very shallow depth of field, which directly puts all the emphasis on the subject. Full color can make an image seem happy and festive compared to an image in black and white that would be depressing. Angle and distance have powerful connotations for emotional involvement and attitude towards the subject. The composition and what is included in the picture and what is left out can also deeply alter a person.s perception of the whole image. Before any photograph is taken, therefore, a number of decisions have already affected the outcome of the final photograph.

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