Vol. I No. 7

What I have always noticed with digital photographs is that objects in the photo seem to stand out unnaturally from the background. An image of a person, for example, will seem unnaturally 'de-contextualized' as if that image might have been merely inserted into the composition.

The reader, as I do, may notice that digitalized video, as on TV, has a kind of a cartoon-ish quality, in which the sharp, definitive elements of the image are emphasized at the expense of subtle elements of color tone and shading.

With all the hype surrounding digital TV and 'High Definition,' there is a tendency to give credence to the claim that this new video technology produces a better image.

Do you feel the way in which the digital image is portrayed almost painfully with a sort of minimal quality in which all the sharp lines define the images? And of course there is a conscious or semi-conscious tendency to tailor the content - the programming itself - to the characteristics of the medium. If I am reading it correctly, the most recent TV dramas and action shows are seeking to be very stylized, with characterizations that, instead of being complex or subtle, involve what appears to be a lot of angular, grim posing and posturing. I see this as the complement of a digital/hi-def medium that, rather than being superior to traditional analog TV, is ironically very much worse and which is well-adapted to a cartoon-ish minimalistic storyline of obvious, simple gestures and sharply drawn, one-dimensional thespian 'statements.'

The case is similar in regard to digital audio. Every instrument seems to clamor, in its turn, for prominence. Each of these instruments sounds out-of-context, as if it could have been recorded anywhere and inserted into the mix. The compositions we hear in this medium have no regard for rhythmic continuity. Because the medium does not reproduce it, the musicians disregard it. Music in the digital age is about posing and stylized image-making, not about the cultivation of rich emotions and spontaneous expressions.