Lady Di and the New Photographer
| Lady Di und der Neue Fotograf
Free study work on the changed working conditions of a photojournalist in the emerging digital age and the associated dissolution of the authenticity of photography using the example of photojournalism.
"... can be connected to an electronic image archive. There he finds Lady Di, Prince Charles, the Cathedral, and enough audience to create his event completely synthetically. The production of a supposed reality is perfect again. Actually, Lady Di no longer needs to appear at the scene of the event. The digital picture appears in the newspaper, whether it is left as it is, slightly altered or completely synthetic, remains unimportant. The published image doesn't seem to differ much from a conventional photograph, but one thing is lost: certainty, that's how it was. The historical documentary value of the picture is lost."
Research project: Lady Di and the new photographer
Thesis:
With every technological advancement of digital photography up to a synthetically produced image of an event, the authenticity of photography steadily disappears
Submitted by Bernd Arnold, Dortmund in January 27, 1988
University of Applied Sciences Dortmund, Winter semester 1987/88
Translated with www.DeepL.com/Translator
Table of contents
Introduction
Description of digital image recording in comparison with conventional silver halide technology
A brief explanation of the concept of authenticity in photography
History of photography, especially photojournalism in relation to technical development as a degree of appropriation of reality
The effect of the authenticity of photography on the recipient
The loss of authenticity of the image through digital image recording using the example of daily news reporting
Bibliography
Introduction
At the Photokina 1986 in Cologne (1), a new image recording technology was introduced that will bring about a fundamental change in the authenticity of the photograph in the field of photojournalism.
I will largely limit the change in the authenticity of photography brought about by the introduction of digital image recording to the field of the daily newspaper, since there is a special closeness to the authenticity of photography in the daily news field.
I would first like to describe in a brief form the new digital image technology in comparison to conventional image recording. In the following, I will explain the concept of authenticity in relation to photography in order to go into the historical development of photographic processes. In doing so, I will explain the connection between new developments in photographic technology and the degree to which reality is appropriated, taking authenticity into account. Building on this, I will describe the degree of reality of authentic photography in order to use the example of a photo taken on a daily basis as a transition to the loss of authenticity of photography through digital image recording.
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1 "The revolution in visual communication" was how the introduction of the Still Video System was heralded in Canon's Photokina News 1986
Description of digital image recording in comparison to conventional silver halide technology
The progressive development of chip technology has also resulted in a new image recording technique in the photographic field. The previous recording of the image or reality by silver halide crystals (which are chemically agglomerated by the light reflected from the object and thus make up the tonal values of photography) will be replaced by digital image recording in wide areas of photography in the near future. The fundamental difference to conventional photography is that the new technology digitally records a section of reality on a disc, i.e. converts reality into electromagnetically stored information. The decisive change brought about by the new Still Video System (SVS) concerns the image carrier.
The pixel or image point, which, like a mosaic stone, is a unit of information in the digital image, can be reproduced on the screen (what was previously an electromagnetically recorded unit of information) or printed out as a paper image. On closer inspection of the image, the structure resembles a Roman mosaic floor. The current resolution of the digital image or the CCD chip is about 1 million pixels. A chip with a resolution of 15 million pixels would be necessary to achieve the quality of a 35 mm emulsion. The current resolution of the CCD chip can be compared with a disc image (2). With a camera modified for pure b/w photography, one can expect a 25 percent improvement in image reproduction (3). Within daily newspaper photography, the resolution of the digital image is thus already within the range of the tolerable.
With the digitisation of images, it is now possible to change photos as much as other digital information. In connection with a computer, the captured section of reality becomes a raw material that can be used in a variety of ways and is variable in terms of its sharpness, resolution, perspective, lighting, colourfulness, size and contrast. Whole parts of the image can be shifted, disappear or be collected in an electromagnetic image archive where they are available again for other images. The transition to the synthetically produced image becomes fluid. The image loses the character of authenticity because there is no longer any controllability as with the negative technique. The information "captured" in the silver halide technique in a chemical-physical process can no longer be changed without a loss of quality. This "error" in future standards is, however, a fundamental precondition for the credibility of the photo, that the section of reality is authentic or truthful.
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2 Lohman, J.: Gegenwart und Zukunft der Forschung in der Fotografie, in: ProfiFoto March/April 1986, p. 62 ff.
3 Visuell 1/88, p.22
A brief explanation of the concept of authenticity in photography
"... to say to the moment, do linger!"(4) has become possible with photography in 1839. The reflection of the light of real existing objects is captured analogue on a negative. A section of reality that lasts only a moment, the time of moving reality, is stopped and fixed for a moment. Every photograph, regardless of its technical quality or degree of staging (5), is the fixation of a past section of reality. At the moment of photographing, reality freezes into a historical moment, no matter how banal the reality captured may be. What is decisive is the credibility, the testimony of the photograph. Even a subjective perception of the photographed object does not prevent the analogue translation of light onto a paper image. The section of reality becomes a piece of reality for the viewer of the picture. The portrait of a friend is not a photo, it is the friend! One searches in the face for mood, for change, one searches in the past reality, in the historical moment, as if it were present "here and now".
The photograph is a trace that bears witness to the past. The negative as the bearer of the trace assures us of the credibility, the authenticity of the past. Because a subsequent alteration of the photograph is verifiable and the authenticity of the photographic document is thus assured.
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4 Baus, H. and C.: ...zum Augenblicke sagen, verweile doch!, Cologne 1985
5 "Politician visits..." is a typical media event staged only for the press, but the political culture staged here with the knowledge of the politician is readable.
History of photography, especially photojournalism in relation to technical development as a degree of appropriation of reality.
Taking reality home with you, knowing the Alps in your own four walls, the Adriatic Sea, the pyramids, plus an elephant and other small images, make the world your own experience. With the invention of photography in 1839, it was possible to reproduce the world with unprecedented precision: "the tenderness of forms... - the elaborateness of the most minute details, - all this is expressed in the highest perfection." (6)
Until the first daguerreotypes, the first illustrated weeklies produced around 1830 relied on illustrations that, in keeping with the naturalism of the time, were intended to be an accurate description of the event. "... to make time stand still..." (7) was an important stylistic device in painting to enhance the appearance of authenticity. Photography was anticipated by trying to capture the momentary in the picture. In this way, it was possible to create a more accurate image of reality. At the same time, an attempt was made to increase the credibility of the narrative. After 1839, illustrations were increasingly produced from photographic originals, since until the use of the autotype, the photograph had to be traced and transferred to a wooden stick in order to be reproduced. What is amazing about this is "...the reader's knowledge of the photographic original as a guarantor of the veracity of the reproduction of events and circumstances." (8) The thought that the event exists as a photograph and is therefore always available as evidence is sufficient to believe the event depicted in the newspaper. "So then, under the pictorial reports of the illustrated papers, the note - Drawn from an original photograph - appears more and more frequently." (9)
The first published photograph appeared in 1880 in the New York Daily Graphic, a daily newspaper that used the new process of autotype for the first time ("...decomposition of the photograph - into minimal particles by means of a grid of lines placed in front of the photographic plate.") (10) . The inventions of the dry plate in 1871, the shorter exposure time in 1878 to a time of 1/25, the open flash in 1887 and the improvement of lenses were prerequisites for a photography that could make social life its subject. However, it was to take until the beginning of the 20th century before photography was able to establish itself in the daily newspapers (since the clichés were still produced outside the newspaper for financial reasons and this naturally led to delays that were rarely broken for reasons of topicality).
The emerging press photography was limited to simple illustrations, mostly showing people from all important social circles and giving them the opportunity for self-portrayal. The exception were illustrations of marginal social phenomena, such as those by Jacob A. Riis, who succeeded in describing immigrants in the slums of New York. Likewise the sociologist Lewis W. Hine, who used his photography in a documentary way. "I wanted to show the things that needed to be turned off, and I wanted to show things that needed to be recognised."(11) Hine photographed child labour, working conditions of miners and other marginalised groups to show them to the public with the consciousness of wanting to change.
Photojournalism in the modern sense, however, did not emerge until the 1920s. Two of the most important factors here were prerequisites for revealing social phenomena in all their shades in detail, or for bringing the world and its events into people's homes and making it available for further generations. One factor was the production of small cameras with the possibility of several shots per film, telephoto and wide-angle lenses, closed flash technology and more sensitive films - they expanded the technical possibilities to such an extent that photography could be used in almost any situation. Now, with a few exceptions, reality could be depicted.
However, the basic photographic technique, the principle of capturing reality through silver halide photography, has only changed in its perfection to this day. Despite the development of colour photography, the slide technique or Polaroid photography, the characteristic of the image carrier of being the guarantor of an analogue translation of reality has remained.
Another branch of development was the emergence of mass illustrated magazines. In the 1920s, illustrated weekly newspapers appeared in all of Germany's larger cities, with a total circulation of 5 million in 1930. (12) The mass dissemination of the world through photojournalism was able to begin. The topics of the day covered all social phenomena, depending on the political orientation of the newspaper. Whether it was "Parisian People's Balls", "Rescue in the Gassed Shaft", "School for Artists", "Car Racing on the Nürburgring", "Arabs and Jews - Problem of Palestine", "Karl Valentin in Private", "Small Town Life", "Adoption Centre" or the "Bachelorette of Today" (13), everything became important if it was original, exciting and new.
The recipients were exposed to a veritable flood of images: "... because we are rather surrounded by images, because we are exposed to a constant rain of images. In the past there had been images in the world, today there is "the world as an image", more correctly: the world as an image, as a wall of images, which catches the gaze without pause, occupies it without pause, covers the world without pause." (14)
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6 Kunstblatt, 24 Sept. 1839, quoted in: Peters, U.: Stilgeschichte der Fotografie in Deutschland 1839-1900, Cologne, 1979, p.22
7 Schopenhauer quoted in: Peters, U.: Stilgeschichte der Fotografie in Deutschland 1839-1900, Cologne, 1979, p.134
8 ibid., p.149
9 ibid., p.149
10 Gidal, T. N.: Deutschland - Beginn des modernen Photojournalismus, Lucerne & Frankfurt 1972, p. 8
11 ibid., p. 8
12 ibid., p. 20
13 ibid., p. 19, 22
14 Anders, G.: Die Antiquiertheit des Menschen - Vol. 2, Munich 1980, p. 250
The effect of the authenticity of photography on the recipient
"During the short existence of the Commune, its defenders liked to have themselves photographed on the barricades. Almost all those who could be identified in these pictures by Thier's police were summarily shot." (15)
It is hard to imagine the influence of photography on social life in a more drastic way. The photograph was evidence. There was no chance for the communards to fight back, because the authenticity contradicted any denial. After the shooting, more photos were taken showing the former communards laid out in a row; but now photographed by the executors. Those laid out are dead, irrefutably captured in silver halide collections.
Today, one can examine these photos in books or museums and only - or especially - the past is visible. One looks at the photographed past with a curiosity and tries to find out what it must have been like before and after the captured moment. Perhaps through photography, with the help of one's own life experiences, one is able to understand that past life in that one moment, to even recreate it.
Looking at photographs is always also looking at the objects on them, which testify to their existence in an almost perfect illusion. It is difficult to resist an illusion and so it is always, depending on one's own experiences, one's own existence, a "going into oneself" when looking at the photograph, because that is where the meaning of photography lies. The photographer, the client, the object, the viewer, they all use the photograph in their own sense. Completely subordinated to the function for the beneficiary, it changes its face, like a chameleon.
The images of the communards defending themselves could be a nice souvenir for one or the other grandchild, or convince a girlfriend of their extraordinary courage, or quite "banally" be the piece of evidence for a death sentence. The consequences of the images of reality could have been very different, or the influence of photography on the real living environment leads to different, even contradictory experiences of reality. The boundaries between experiences of reality through the real environment and experiences of reality through images are fluid. The world of images has crept into our consciousness and taken possession of the present without effort. The past in every picture also implies the present, and so the view of the photograph is both historical and contemporary.
Today, we are too caught up in a world of images to close our minds to past images. One looks at the image of one's sister or one's friend and believes oneself to be aware of their presence. One can walk around in the photo, one goes into the time before and after the photo was taken. One walks with one's gaze in the space of the picture without noticing the difference between the illusion and the reality. Perhaps it is the surface of the paper that brings the illusion back into consciousness. One has time to look at the photograph (an essential difference to film); this time one needs to find one's way in a strange or even familiar space, to recognise things again, or even just to detect the changes. The duration of the observation is subject to one's own will and so one selects what one likes to perceive. The photograph is recorded, burnt onto an analogue image carrier and can be viewed at any time in any place. The "event", the section of reality has become irrevocable.
The murder of the Jews in the Third Reich: how credible would the transmission of the crimes be without the photographs, which, as evidence and documents, remove all doubt about what happened. Before the photographic process, history was always something third-hand, an interpretable view of things. But photography is like a camera obscura of history without explaining it. Newspapers and magazines disseminate this history, even if the points of view are contradictory, because photos are placed in different contexts depending on the text or caption. The photograph in the newspaper is then also compared with the visually real experience of reality: Lady Di is wearing a beautiful dress, and that hat, you have to have it, even if only as a cheap imitation. The public participates in the life of this woman. But the greatest fulfilment is to see her in the real world and to realise with excitement that she looks just like in the photos (16).
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15 Freund, G.: Photographie und Gesellschaft, - Reinbeck bei Hamburg 1979, p. 119
16 British Prince and Princess visit Cologne, in: Kölner Stadt-Anzeiger 4 Nov. 1987
The loss of the authenticity of the image through digital image recording using the example of daily news coverage
A picture of Lady Di appears in the daily newspaper. She is a visual event, prepared by the multitude of pictures and supporting texts in the print media (who should be interested in a person who only appears through texts nowadays, unless it is a secret agent or the similar). Her fans know everything about Lady Di, especially how she dresses, how she looks, how she looks with Prince Charles, with her children, subjects or even her flat. Her function is to appear, to give an image, to prove something, to substantiate (perhaps her good fortune: that others hope to get something from or learn from, or even just to be there as an example: "Here, I'm doing so well."). But why is the photo enough to make you believe it? You just have to see it, this woman's smile, to have no doubt about her happiness (even if it is just this one moment). The photograph proves it - the smile.
The same city, the same woman, in the same newspaper, but digitally recorded. Both the digital image and the photograph will be indistinguishable when printed; but they are not the same images! The photograph is burnt in, even on the negative you can see that smile. The digital image, however, does not show itself, it is stored in yes/no information and has yet to be assembled, has yet to transform itself in order to be seen.
Up until the moment the subject, in this case Lady Di, is photographed, the two processes are no different. After the negative is exposed, the photographer has hardly any possibility to influence, to add a change to the event. For the photographer, the process of capturing the image has largely ended with the exposure of the negative; but for the digital image, the image-making process only begins here. The event, the arrival of Lady Di, becomes the raw material. The future "photographer", equipped with a video system, telephone and computer, is now in a position to "improve" the event, or the section of reality captured for the time being, according to his or her own ideas. The possibilities for variation are endless; perhaps just a change of light (sunshine instead of grey light), or tidying up the picture by removing disturbing elements, such as the cathedral servant standing obtrusively between Prince Charles and the "photographer". These are still quiet, unobtrusive edits to the image; go ahead: a turn of Lady Di's head - and the too-serious face is transformed into a smiling one and Prince Charles, who was looking to the side, now turns his head affectionately.
What photographer waits for that special moment when he can produce it himself?
The "new photographer" does not manipulate, he designs, constructs and produces. He may no longer need to go to the scene of the event, but "picks up" the "telephone" and lets himself be connected to an electronic picture archive. There he finds Lady Di, Prince Charles, the cathedral, and enough audience to manufacture his event completely synthetically. The production of a supposed reality is perfect again. Actually, Lady Di no longer needs to appear at the scene of the event.
The digital image appears in the newspaper, whether it is left as it is, slightly altered or completely synthetic remains unimportant. The published end product does not seem to differ much from a conventional photograph, but one thing is lost: the certainty that this is how it was and nothing else. The historical documentary value of the image is lost. The image no longer refers to objects of a depicted section of reality, but becomes an object itself.
It is inconceivable that, as in the 1940s, the American actor James Stewart appeals for donations in a US newsreel with a pile of photos as a document of a misery to be proven. It is inconceivable that photos still have any evidential value. The authenticity of the image and the photo are lost.
© Bernd Arnold, Cologne, 1987/88
Translated with www.DeepL.com/Translator
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17 Schmid J.: Es kommt der elektronische Fotograf, in: European Photography 22, Göttingen April/May/June 1985, p.5 ff.
18 In particular, adding the constant competitive pressure that a photographer is exposed to
Bibliography
Anders, Günter: Die Antiquiertheit des Menschen, Volume 2, On the Destruction of Life in the Age of the Industrial Revolution, Munich 1987.
Barthes, Roland: Die helle Kammer, Remarks on Photography, Frankfurt 1985
Baus, Hermann und Clärchen: ...zum Augenblicke sagen, verweile doch! , Theatre work for Cologne, Cologne 1985
Freund, Gisele: Photographie und Gesellschaft, Reinbeck/Hamburg, 1979
Deken Joseph: Computerbilder, Kreativität und Technik, Basel-Boston-Stuttgart, 1984
Gidal, Tim H.: Bibliothek der Photographie, Deutschland – Beginn des modernen Photojournalismus, Lucerne-Frankfurt/Main, 1982
Lohman, Dr. Joachim: Gegenwart und Zukunft der Forschung in der Fotografie, in: ProfiFoto March/April, 1986
Kölner Stadt-Anzeiger: Flags and cheers for Lady Di, British prince and princess visited Cologne, Cologne, 4 Nov. 1987
Kotzloff, Max: om Licht verbrannt, Einige lose Gedanken über Fotografie und Erinnerungy, in: European Photography 19, Göttingen, July/August/September 1984
Peters, Ursula: Stilgeschichte der Fotografie in Deutschland 1839-1900, Cologne, 1979
Scheurer, Hans J.: Zur Kultur und Mediengeschichte der Fotografie: Die Industrialisierung des Blicks, Cologne, 1987
Schmid, Joachim: Es kommt der elektronische Fotograf, in: European Photography 22, Göttingen, April/May/June 1985
Sontag, Susan: Über Fotografie, Frankfurt/Main, 1980
Visual: Baden-Baden 1/88
Click on the photographs and the dichograph to purchase available rights of use or for image descriptions
32 years later
2019 - about 32 years later - it becomes apparent that in the course of digitalization and the future dominance of the digital natives in the coming decades, the change in consciousness with which photographs and images are received will continue to progress. The fundamental change in photojournalism is not yet complete, but is in the midst of radical change.
Photography approaches "painting" on different levels. The "time machine" into the past, which was made possible by the invention of analogue photography, is gradually broken down into its individual parts by each new digital extension and disappears in a fog of infinite possibilities. What remains of this "window of time" are artefacts or photographs in physical form. Prints, magazines and illustrated books are the future testimonies of a past that can be read with the words "this is how it was".
>> Take a look at the new work This is how I saw it from the year 2021/2022 (only German language).
Here I have taken up the old study work again, photographed and dichographed the German Bundestag election campaign in 2021. This was accompanied by an essay describing the changes that have taken place over the last 30 years in the work of a photojournalist and developing thoughts on how new technologies affect the perception of photography and thus also influence social and political life.