Main idea: Filtering is more than just enhancing a photo, it is a process that all social media sites and individuals use in their daily lives.
Key Terms:
Filter: A process of removing unwanted content. Also used in photography terms, is a process of enhancing a photograph.
Attenuates: reduce the force, effect, or value of
Vignette Effect: a small illustration or portrait photograph that fades into its background without a definite border.
Terministic Screens: Terms in our language through which our understanding of the world is filtered
Normative Discursive Strategies: Either implicitly or explicitly structure our agencies
Defamiliarize: render unfamiliar or strange (used especially in the context of art and literature).
Aestheticization: concerned with beauty or the appreciation of beauty.
Summary: According to the author of “Seeing Ourselves Through Technology” in the second chapter, the author states that in our daily lives we are constantly using filters. Filters have both physical and electronic uses. These types of filters are labeled into three different groups, technological, visual, and cultural. Technological filters are filters that remove unwanted or unnecessary content. An example of this would be a pre-formatted baby journal, where you put in your baby’s milestones into a computer system and it makes a journal for you. While this is easy and convenient to use, it constrains one’s ability to be original and creative. Visual filters are filters that are tangible and can visibly be seen. Instagram uses visual filters to enable its users to enhance their photos. This filter has an effect on how we view ourselves as individuals. If one does not like a photo of themselves they can simply just add a filter that brightens the skin or flushes out blemishes. The final filters are cultural filters. These are the “unspoken rules” of social media. In other words, they’re the guidelines for what we should and should not post. Filters are becoming a major part of our lives. The more we use filters, the more we defamiliarize with reality.
Commentary: The author provides very good details on how filters run our lives on a daily basis. There is more to the filter than just a goofy looking photo of your face on the internet. The interesting thing about this book is how the author displays factual information in a very artistic way. However I do still like to see statistical evidence with numbers. The author depicts how people view themselves through the social media lens. She uses terms such as defamiliarization to describe how we have distorted our view on reality. She also describes how filters are limiting our creativity. Most photographers today just use instagram filters instead of putting forth the effort and using photoshop. This is due partly for convenience, but also because most smart phones can do exactly what professional grade cameras can do. The art of photography is dying slowly because of this. The author doesn’t explain those points which could have benefited her in the persuasive aspect.
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