Fire and Knowledge

The perennial act of cutting-edge enterprise in reporting is to shove a camera or a microphone into the face of a grieving woman. But what is the qualitative difference between the man who cold-heartedly shoots another and the photographer who cold-heartedly photographs the corpse or grieving widow? Are they not simply two parts of the same epidemic failure of imagination, which is to say a failure of compassion and of community life?

Such exposures do not make us free, and the do not increase our knowledge. They only compound human cruelty by a self-induced numbness to the suffering of others and to our common suffering.

–Wendell Berry, Life is a Miracle: An Essay Against Modern Superstition (2000), p. 87

The difference between the two ways of seeing is the difference between walking with and without a camera. When I walk with a camera I walk from shot to shot, reading the light on a calibrated meter. When I walk without a camera, my own shutter opens, and the moment’s light prints on my own silver gut. When I see this second way I am above all an unscrupulous observer.

–Annie Dillard, Pilgrim at Tinker Creek (1974), p. 31

The complexity of new manufacturing processes, the new vagueness that can be designed into vivid images, the new uncertainty of relation between the image and the thing imaged (Is it an actual photograph?)—all these make the simple question, “Is it true?” as obsolete as the horse and buggy.

–Daniel Boorstin, The Image: A Guide to Pseudo-Events in America (1961), p. 214

We [travel] more and more, not to see at all, but only to take pictures.

–Daniel Boorstin, The Image: A Guide to Pseudo-Events in America (1961), p. 117

We tend to lose respect for things we can manipulate. And when we can so readily manipulate images—even images of presidents or loved ones—we contribute to the decline of respect for what the image represents.

—Christine Rosen, “The Image Culture“

I know I already plugged the latest edition of The New Atlantis, but I just finished reading Christine Rosen’s essay “The Image Culture” and I must say it is excellent, as usual. So print the PDF and spend half an hour reading and thinking about our image culture. It will more than repay the time you put in.

Colorization Using Optimization

This is incredible. A few color markings on a b&w image or video and you get a result in full color. Photographers will love this.

Black-bodied Canon Digital Rebel (EOS 300D)

Canon has announced that it will release a black version of the affordable Digital Rebel for a limited period of time in the US. The black 6.3 megapixel SLR will cost $999 and will come with the digitally enhanced EF-S 18-55mm zoom lens. It is hoped that the black digital version will increase sales even further with its ‘professional and fresh new look’.