Photography as Animated Art

Over the past 100 years the camera and the image have undergone huge changes, the biggest being the change over from film to digital. However bigger changes have begun to happen due to new technologies and the introduction of social networking sites and blog site such as Tumblr. The image can now be viewed by more people then ever before in one space, and now the image is becoming more clever. 

The image its self has never been a stand alone medium, but more a combination of many other arts. The Camera Obscura was originally a tool used to paint real time settings however this (on top of the chemical discovery) was the start of capturing the image. Although this might be the case we have to then look at the arts such a performance, when making an image we are conducting or capturing a performance of nature or setting one up with in a controlled space, which ever way we look at it there is a show happening in front of our lens each time. 

"Yet it is not by painting that photography touches art, but by theater"  - Barthes,R., 1982, Part One, Camera Lucida, London, Jonathan Cape, p. 31. 

The gif is a popular and now thanks to social networking sites such as Tumblr a very well known file format for images, the image simple hold data making a image act in a way a video would, the difference is that it is played over and over again in a loop. Once more this touches on the side of performance photography. 

The gif has now been used and abused, making it some what tacky and over used. In some ways the gif is past redeeming its self as as part of photography, its use for comedic and mick taking is now its soul purpose, but there is hope for image and performance to co-exist as one. 

The gif, however is now being challenged by a much more subtle performing image, with the new use of the iphone application. 

Now I hear you all scream out in despair, the iphone making images that are worth paying attention to, and I would have to agree, taking pictures on a phone is simple. 

The app its self is basic and the whole idea is as easy as taking a picture on your phone, however it bring together the subtlety of movement and image. The app allows you to take a short video but cut it down so only one part of the image moves. Thus creating a setting, a feeling of being a part of the setting, a different kind of atmosphere to that of the still image. 

So I will leave you with a few examples and let you make up your own minds, do you think there is hope for the Cinemagraph.