Blog Post: Heather Shafer

Throughout the semester many different theories regarding photography have been brought to my attention. Most recently was in the book Image Ethics in the Digital Age. In the chapter regarding advertising photography the authors bring up a point about the encoding and decoding of photographers. While reading this I took a step back and began to look at photography in an almost negative light. I’ve lamented upon the decoding of photos. When I look at an image I know there is a large chance that I am seeing something entirely different than the person next to me. For example, I am enrolled in a Sports Business class and in class our professor displayed an image of Reggie Bush and his one handed catch in the end zone. My classmates clapped with excitement. My friend next to me explained exactly where she was when that catch was made. I, however, sunk in my seat somewhat. My best friend, whom played football for Tulsa, died two years ago. He was supposed to be coming to USC, but at last minute USC pulled out on his scholarship. He ended up contracting a staff infection at Tulsa and died within a week. At times, photographs of USC football send that chill down my spine. I sit and wonder, if he had gone to USC, would he still be alive? This is an example of the ways photos are decoded differently by individuals. We all have a specific history or past which may impact the way we interpret photographs.
The second part has to do with the encoding of photographs. When a photographer takes a picture, he is attempting to portray something specific. This can cause many problems to the credibility of a photograph. We spoke in class about one of the documentaries in which the Appalachian Indians were stating how these men would come in to film them, and that they were searching for a particular aspect of their life. They said that they would be upset if they didn’t see the people living in complete poverty, or in tears. Is this what happens with photographer? Do photographers adjust particular images so that they are able to capture a certain emotion or event in which they believe is occurring? With every photo is there something that is being “encoded?” For the most part, you would assume there is. However, when does this means of encoding crouch upon the ethics of photography. It seems now a days it should almost be necessary that every photograph come with a “disclaimer” or a short write up in which the photographer divulges his intentions for the photograph.
I apologize for the ambiguity of this post. I simply have so many thoughts running around my mind in regards to the encoding and decoding of photographs. I think of each student’s photo project. Every one of us were searching for something in particular, and so many more of us wanted to have “that moment” appear just as we were clicking our cameras. One woman in our class is doing a project on graffiti. For one of her pictures she asked a man (whom was tagging before hand) if he could continue as she snapped images of him. She was looking to encode the image of a human doing the actual work, instead of just the image of him standing by it. He had been doing it previously, however, now it was somewhat scripted. Does this take away from the legitimacy and the actuality of the image? For this instance, I do not think it is a problem. However, what about on a bigger scale? Are photographers creating lab like settings by reproducing once natural acts in order to get it on their camera, to encode what they saw onto their own photograph? And are we, the viewers, the receptors of the images being not only swayed by out act of decoding, but also by what has been encoded into the photograph?

Blog Post: Megan Baaske

At this exact moment, if you got to the New York Times homepage, you will see a picture of moon and star watermelons, accompanying a story on endangered plants. Earlier, it was an image of Obama, as he responded to questions about his ex-pastor’s speech a couple of days ago. By the time you’re reading this, the homepage has been updated countless of times; each article adorned with an accompanying photograph.

It may be self-evident to point out that we are bombarded with pictures everywhere we turn. From the moment we turn on the computer, the television, the ipod, even our cell phones, we take in images.

Because one of the goals of pluralist photography is to prompt social change (or, at the very least, raise awareness through the photographs), one must concern herself with the over-saturation of images. Do we suffer from picture fatigue?

Well, yes.

But it doesn’t necessarily follow that photographs no longer impact us. Instead, it just means that every picture will not.

Not to get too technical, but one Communication theory is called the Elaboration Likelihood Model (ELM), which is particularly useful in discussions of photo-fatigue. The theory suggests that people have two routes of processing information: the central and the peripheral. People have to process a great deal of data in a single day, not just pictures, but entire narratives, arguments, and facts. We cannot keep up with all the stuff we’re bombarded with. Consequently, we divide all that information between the two pathways. The central pathway is for information we really care about-we think about it a great deal, analyze it critically, and tend to remember it longer. The peripheral pathway is for information less relevant to our lives (however we interpret that); we tend to assign less value to this data and forget it easier.

Photographs, like political arguments or advertisements, can go through either process. Many of the pictures, like the endangered watermelons, will end up in the periphery. I will forget it soon after I finish writing this blog. But some pictures stick with us. Perhaps because they are particularly moving. Perhaps because, as Susan Sontag suggests in Photography, we are “charmed by the insignificant detail” (99). Perhaps because they make us think more deeply about their subject.

For whatever reason, these are the pictures that stand out from the rest, the ones that we process through our central pathway. We think about the argument they make, the people on display in them, and how they make us feel. Iconic images have this weight. Who cannot conjure up an image of the World Trade Center on 9/11? Who hasn’t seen the picture of the sailor kissing his girlfriend after the end of WWII? Who can’t remember the horror on the Vietnamese girl’s face after the napalm attack on her village? There are countless of images that have entered our collective psyche.

But, more often, images do not become universal like those I’ve just mentioned. Only a select few can become icons. Nevertheless, some of the photographs that I encounter may be processed centrally. I was at a photography exhibit in Amsterdam’s Foam Photography Museum, and I saw the most heart-wrenching images from an Iraqi hospital. I still remember those pictures. They were so graphic I could not stand to look at them, but the War in Iraq has never felt more real to me. For the first time, I believed I had a small idea of what it must be like in that far off country. Though most of my compatriots have never seen those images, many have seen similarly eye-opening ones of the War in Iraq or other crises throughout the world. We are all impacted by photographs in different ways, but the point is that we are all impacted. Not by every picture we see, but by the one that we pause to think about in more detail. Those are the ones that can cause true social change.