Visual Epic Poetry: How Digital Technology Destabilized The Image.
We must abandon the traditional conception of an art world populated by stable, enduring, finished works and replace it with one that recognizes continual mutation and proliferation of variants -- much as with oral epic poetry. - William J Mitchell (The Reconfigured Eye, pg 52)
Part 1: Sturken & Cartwright, Ch 4: Reproduction & Visual Technologies
Mini-Summary Sturken & Cartwright's chapter on Reproduction and Visual Technologies outlines the history of the visual image and imaging technologies. They invoke Walter Benjamin in considering mechanical reproduction of images, but largely abandon him when it comes to digital imaging, turning instead to the phenomenology of Husserl and Merleau-Ponty. In particular, they examine the phenomenological differences between various visual media and the way these differences influence the way we assign value to images within those media.
Recap: Walter Benjamin & Mechanical Reproduction
According to Benjamin, Authentic art has "aura." This is good. Authenticity cannot be reproduced. Copies don't have aura, so copies are less valuable. Mechanical reproduction shifts the practice of art from ritual to politics.	Critique... Valuing originals over copies doesn't even make sense in many cases. For instance, a live TV broadcast consists of many copies (simultaneous images on many televisions), but there is no original. Likewise, digital images are perfect copies, indistinguishable from the "original" file. This is inherent in the nature of digital data.
A changing model for value Premechanical image: value is based on uniqueness. Mechanical image: value is based on reproducibility and distribution. Digital & virtual image: value is based on malleability and information capacity.
Themes	Ask Me About My Meta Rubric
Authorship / ownership Photographic truth (particularly in relation to semiotics) Traditional photos are indexical, digital images are iconic Traditional photos have a referent, digital images may not. Virtual space as an unmeasurable and unmappable space. Phenomenology of mediums (perception, memory & imagination) Examples of phenomenological differences between mediums: viewing the original Mona Lisa is a much different experience than viewing a 320x240 image of the Mona Lisa on a website viewing the earth on a paper map is a much different experience than interacting with it on Google Earth
Part 2: Mitchell: The Reconfigured Eye
Mini Summary In The Reconfigured Eye , Mitchell takes up many of the same themes as Sturken & Cartwright, and also provides a lengthy but dated overview of digital imaging technology, 2D editing, and 3D rendering. His principle interest, however, is in the end of the "false innocence" of photographic truth, due to the rise of digital imaging. Mitchell also spends a substantial amount of time on the variety of ethical and legal issues that digital imaging raises, ranging from falsification to copyright infringement.
Photographic truth	Other issues raised by Mitchell
For Mitchell, the basis of photographic truth is the "adherence of the referent." "One way or another, a photograph provides evidence about a scene... and most of us have a strong intuitive feeling that it provides better evidence than any other kind of picture." This intuitive feeling is destabilized by digital photography, since digital images are much more easily manipulated. In both cases, it is the adherence (or lack of adherence) of the referent that is the basis for our sense of the photo's truth. Slain Rebel Sharshooter (left) and Fallen Sharpshooter, Alexander Gardner, 1863 Photo-free Example: John Locke painting Counterexample: Digital Photo Challenge Guidelines	Falsification or creative license?: As manipulation of images becomes easier, what should be the standards for accurate use of images? Example: OJ's Mugshot Appropriation, derivation and copyright: If there is no longer a fixed, original material image, what sorts of uses of copies of those images are acceptable? What constitutes fair use, particularly in 2D compositing and 3D texturing? Appropriation of the Cafe Verona environment map from http://www.debevec.org/ReflectionMapping/
Complications & Discussion Topics
Returning to a question from early in the semester... what role should 'doing' play in visual culture studies? In order to detect the many types of falsified images that Mitchell describes, some sort of technical expertise is needed... in the case of highly sophisticated digital imaging tools, can that expertise be gained through any means other than actual artistic practice? Both readings place digital in one category and analog in another, but do these categories make sense? Obviously, the category boundaries are murky no matter what, but I'm inclined to group digital advertising composites with traditional printmaking, for instance, rather than with digital photography... which might in turn be more accurately grouped with traditional photography. Similarly, both readings emphasize the maleability of digital images, but they both use examples of the manipulation of traditional images. To what extent is the distinction between the manipulation of digital and analog images simply an issue of quantifiable ease, not qualitative difference?	Example: Lighting Assignment And one more example, which I am prepared to show at great personal expense.