In this chapter I felt that Soutter was trying to cram too much into it. She starts with talking about when digital first appeared an how everyone thought this would men a change in the way we evaluate photography and the issues of photographic truth. She starts by claiming:

When digital photography was first introduced there was a kind of hysteria on the part of some writers and audiences, a panic that the new technology would undermine the truth value of the photographic image. Some argued that images made up of infinitely manipulable code wold no longer carry reliable traces of the visible world. Of course this anxiety rested on a misunderstanding of traditional photographs. (P93)

There s a large element of truth in this statement, that when a photograph is manipulated digitally it I just really following the techniques which have existed in darkroom practices for decades. This position is further supported when she goes onto claim:

Rather than altering the meaning of the images, digital technology merely represents an advance in their manufacture. (P94)

It strikes me that this is similar to when photography was first invented. To begin with we had the daguerreotype, the paper negative, the tintype, glass negatives and so on. Then later came dodging, burning, cyanotype, lith printing and the list goes on. The point she is making is that at the beginning of photography there was an entire range of techniques to manipulate the image and that with the invention of digital photography, it bought about an evolution of these techniques.

Then with the rest of the chapter, it’s a catalogue of different artists using digital photography in various ways. She discuses Gursky producing huge and abstract photographs and how this would not be possible without digital photography. She also talks about Crewdson and his technique of setting everything up like a film set and taking a lot of photographs from the same viewpoint and then producing what is essentially a composite image.

The point she is making is that modern photographers are finding new ways to manipulate the image. She is confirming that some photographers are comfortable with this manipulation and that there is nothing new about image manipulation.

I must admit that I find her approach to the issue of digital photography refreshing and forward looking. She is advocating support for “a new dawn” and instead of looking fearfully into what could happen next, she concentrated on the diversity and creativity possible with digital imaging.