Assignment 2: REVIEW | Grace Kirkby

By Grace Kirkby (S3663473)

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Practice Analysis Week 5: Analogue Photography – Henri Cartier-Bresson

Practice Analysis Week 6: Analogue Video – Nam June Paik

Practice Analysis Week 7: Networked Photography – Hannes Becker

Practice Analysis Week 8: Networked Video – Foster Huntington

1. Provide a definition for ‘analogue photography’.

Analogue photography (AP) is the process of capturing light on the physical, light sensitive surface of film, in order to record an image. The process of AP involves processing and printing before the image can be seen, distributed and published.

2. Provide a definition for ‘analogue video’.

Analogue video (AV) is an electronic medium dependant on the recording and translation of electronic signals produced when light hits a light-sensitive surface. This signal is interpreted and broadcast by TV monitors, visually and audibly at the same time (Spielmann, 2007). AV is reliant on hardware such as aerials, cables and television monitors.

3. Provide a definition for ‘networked photography’.

Networked photography (NP) is a form of photography taken on, or uploaded to, a digital device which can then be shared between platforms, users and social networks as data.

4. Provide a definition for ‘networked video’.

A networked video (NV) is a video which has been taken on, or uploaded onto, a digital device which then travels as data between devices, platforms and users.

5. Provide definitions for the terms ‘authoring’, ‘publishing’ and ‘distributing’.

AUTHORING:
Authoring is the process of creating media or content. In a media context, authoring media can include taking, editing and combining photographs, videos, audio or texts to create works. The way media is authored is dependant on the devices used to record the media, and the technology used to prepare it.

PUBLISHING:
Publishing is the process of preparing media in a format or medium that can reach and be interpreted by an audience.

DISTRIBUTING:
Distributing is the process of spreading media content to a larger audience through platforms. This may include (but is not limited to) the Internet and Intranets, social networking and messaging sites, magazines, books and websites.

6. What differences and similarities did you discover between the way analogue and networked photos are authored, published and distributed?

Authoring:

As I noted in week 5, AP and NP is vastly different in the devices used to author and capture images. Smartphones are not only capable of taking, editing and storing photos, but of uploading these to the internet (Palmer, 2014, p. 245). AP was seen as a ‘carrier of facts’ (Wells, 2015, p. 16), because it was used to record a point in time and not usually edited. However, NP can be easily and widely manipulated through networks such as Instagram, in a way that is faster and more accessible than altering AP (Kuc & Zylinska, 2016). As I discussed in week 7, one of Instagram’s main purposes is to edit photos to make them more aesthetically pleasing or different (Palmer, 2014, p. 248). Although, the limited manipulation abilities of Instagram, and the demand for high quality authoring is causing many Instagram users to digitally author and manipulate their photography elsewhere.

Publishing:

One integral difference between AP and NP is the role of the author, because today users are not just photographers, but publishers too. Instagram’s second major purpose is to provide a platform to simplify the publication and distribution of images (Palmer, 2014, p. 248). One similarity in publication is that most AP was displayed on gallery walls (Wells, 2015, p. 16), which is also true for NP, except those ‘walls’ are the tiled format of Instagram, allowing photographers to create their own virtual galleries. This dematerialisation of media from its physical form into data (Lister et al, 2009, p.18) enables users to author, publish and distribute digital media at any time through their own virtual galleries of networked media.

Distributing:

The distribution of AP relied on the burgeoning of print media (Wells, 2015, p.22) in the same way that NP is central in the proliferation of online and social media. Today, the publishing of NP and is almost indistinguishable from distribution by virtue of platforms like Instagram. The ‘virtual galleries’ of Instagram, which I mentioned earlier, enable users to distribute NP to Instagram users and followers through hashtags and geolocation. This juxtaposes the long and hierarchical distribution of AP, which occurred in photography magazines such as Time and Life (Wells, 2015, p. 22). Furthermore, the emergence of smartphones has allowed NP to be uploaded directly to networks, enabling fast and accessible publication and distribution, which is noted as being one of the elements that made the iPhone a revolutionary tool in photography (Halpern & Humphreys, 2014, p.7).

7. What differences and similarities did you discover between the way analogue and networked videos are authored, published and distributed?

Authoring:

As I discovered in week 6, the rise in smartphones has increased the accessibility and ease of of authoring NV (Goggin, 2014, p. 149). AV is highly reliant on physical objects (Lister et al, 2009), such as cables, aerials and power supply. On the other hand, NV is only reliant on a data and the Internet. Thus, NV exists in an almost permanent state of flux, whereas AV tends to be fixed, because it relies on physical objects (Lister et al, 2009, p.19). This means when one is authoring an AV they are reliant on the transcription from one physical form to another, whereas NV is reliant on the transcription of input into numbers (Lister et al, 2009, p.19). Ultimately, this makes it much easier for individuals to author NV through platforms such as Instagram, because there is no reliance on physical processes, equipment or editing suites.

Publishing:

Smartphones have also simplified the publishing process and merged it very closely with distribution. AV was an expensive medium and was restricted to publishing important occurrences in life and society. As I discovered in week 8, the digitisation of NV means people are no longer restricted by publication cost and can easily and relatively cheaply publish more intimate and mundane occurrences to networks, and even generate revenue. The publication of NV can be done by anyone at any time simply by uploading their video to a network, in stark contrast to AV which could only be published if it was seen as profitable by television and film corporations.

Distributing:

Perhaps the biggest difference between AV and NV lies in distribution. Networked video is distributed across a much larger range of channels, platforms and devices (Goggin, 2014, p.153). As I discovered in my week 8 blog post, Foster Huntington’s video was published on Instagram but distributed on YouTube, Vimeo and Facebook. This is in contrast to an AV on television which is traditionally only published on one channel. By distributing NV on many platforms it can also be accessed by consumers on a much larger range of devices, in different locations and situations (Goggin, 2014, p.153). The diversity of platforms and devices means that NV content is more flexible and can be altered to match the constraints of different platforms.

REFERENCES:

Goggin, G 2014, ‘Mobile Video: Spreading Stories with Mobile Media’, in G Goggin & L Hjorth (eds.),The Routledge Companion to Mobile Media, Routledge, New York, pp. 146-156.

Halpern, M & Humphrey, L 2014, ‘Iphoneography as an emergent art world’, New Media and Society, vol. 18, no. 1, pp. 62-81.

Kuc, K & Zylinska, J 2016, ‘Photomediations: An Introduction’, in K Kuc & J Zylinska (eds.), Photomediations: A Reader, Open Humanities Press, London, pp.7-16.

Lister, M, Dovey, J, Giddings, S, Grant, I & Kelly, K 2009, New Media: A Critical Introduction, Routledge, New York.

Palmer, D 2014 ‘Mobile Media Photography’, in The Routledge Companion to Mobile Media, (eds) Goggin G., Hjorth L., Routledge, New York pp. 249–55.

Spielmann, Y 2007, Video: The Reflexive Medium, MIT Press, Cambridge, Massachusetts, pp. 1-6.

Wells L 2015, Photography: A Critical Introduction, 5th ed., Routledge, New York, pp. 9-27.