[HN Gopher] Photography's new bag of tricks (1984)
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       Photography's new bag of tricks (1984)
        
       Author : achairapart
       Score  : 9 points
       Date   : 2023-06-02 20:58 UTC (2 hours ago)
        
 (HTM) web link (www.nytimes.com)
 (TXT) w3m dump (www.nytimes.com)
        
       | verisimi wrote:
       | > The National Aeronautics and Space Administration regularly
       | employs similar techniques to clarify images transmitted from
       | outer space. The computer can sharpen fuzzy pictures or add color
       | to satellite pictures of land masses so that it is easier to
       | decipher the details.
       | 
       | lololol
       | 
       | > It is no accident that unfamiliar environments such as outer
       | space or the inside of a computer, with its high-tech components,
       | have been favored for the computer-generated segments of movies.
       | 
       | > In search of aids to more realistic simulation, researchers
       | comb the various branches of mathematics, and even art. For
       | instance, Geoffrey G. Gardner of Grumman Aerospace in Bethpage,
       | N.Y., has been analyzing Impressionist painting techniques in
       | order to understand how it was possible to use such large brush
       | strokes and still represent the essence of a scene without
       | reproducing unnecessary detail. Gardner would like to apply such
       | a technique to the computer.
       | 
       | > Though no researcher has yet synthesized an image of a human
       | being that anyone would mistake for a photograph of a person -
       | real or fictional - scientists at the University of Pennsylvania
       | Computer Graphics Research Facility have created a humanlike
       | figure that moves on a video screen through zero gravity like an
       | astronaut. This figure will be used for tests within a simulated
       | space shuttle, such as checking on the size of passageways and
       | the accessibility of instrument panels.
       | 
       | hehe
       | 
       | > Recently, Whitney says, his production company used the data
       | from a NASA photograph to simulate the surface of Jupiter for the
       | soon-to-be- released movie ''2010,'' a sequel to the film
       | ''2001.''
       | 
       | > "If we really want to, we can convince folks that it's real" ..
       | What interests Smith is "going to be to find out how far you can
       | go away from reality and still have people follow you."
       | 
       | quite far indeed!
        
       | psychomugs wrote:
       | Now more than ever, it would behoove photo-makers and -viewers -
       | i.e. everyone - to read Sontag's "In Plato's Cave" as a reminder
       | that there is nary a thing as a real photograph.
       | 
       | https://openlab.citytech.cuny.edu/chengphotoarth1100f2019/fi...
        
         | klysm wrote:
         | Is the photograph the thing that isn't real?
        
       | yieldcrv wrote:
       | > Whitney feels that researchers are overcoming the computational
       | obstacles and that computers, despite their considerable expense,
       | have already been proved cost-effective. With a computer, one
       | will need a much smaller movie staff. Lighting crews, carpenters
       | and cameramen are expendable. One can film in any weather and
       | dispense with travel to exotic sites.
       | 
       | thanks for posting this! in reality over the last 40 years,
       | movies got bigger and employed far more people
        
         | nomel wrote:
         | > With a computer, one will need a much smaller movie staff.
         | 
         | Part of the problem is that their estimate for the number of
         | computers was off by many orders of magnitude. In a decade or
         | two, with all of the generative tools, they might be much more
         | wrong on the compute side of things, but more right on the
         | direct-staffing side.
        
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       (page generated 2023-06-02 23:01 UTC)