Google’s lens: computational photography and platform capitalism

Abstract

Computational photography is currently altering the representational and social functions of photographic imaging. A range of heavily automated computational processing techniques produce images that remediate digital photography to circumvent physical limitations associated with the size of smartphones, emulating the aesthetics associated with larger format digital cameras and professional photographic workflows and practices. These processes include automated compositing where images seen by users are constituted of up to 15 individual frames, the simulation of a shallow depth-of-field, automated facial retouching and even providing automated assistance to suggest alternative frames within the image stream to serve as the base image. This article explores these emerging techniques and accompanying claims that such processes are radically transforming photographic practice. While the extent and modes of automation and algorithmic processing depart from prior practices, contextualising them within the histories of photographic compositing and the algorithmic malleability of digital photography suggests the intensification of existing trends rather than an epistemic break. Furthermore, exploring the representational politics of automated facial retouching and the datafication of images situates these changes within the broader social context of dataveillance and platform capitalism.