Transition of Art to Photography in Terms of Realism - Essay Example

Presently, such a world seems unimaginable thanks to photography: it comes with visual souvenirs; pictures of common and prominent people; advertising pictures that create a desire within the public while, at the same time educating them concerning all products the modern consumer culture is capable of offering; medical, diagnostic devices; incredible perceptions of exotic places, together with the outer space; world news pictures; and most significant, pictures of the events, as well as intimate moments of personal life (Keil 19).

The photography technology is partly chemical and partly optical, dating back in 1839. Shortly after its instantaneous discovery by William Henry Fox Talbot of England, together with Louis Jacques Mande Daguerre of France, photography get used in documenting foreign places of interest like India, the American West and the Holy Land. Apart from that, it got applied in portraits along with photographs of kings, statesman, as well as theater or even literary personalities. However, during the 19th century, cameras were in most cases in the hands of either professionals or entrepreneurs who were self-educated thereby trying photography as a trade.

Photography does not require professional licensing or even guild membership; therefore, in the mainstream, anyone has the capability of buying the equipment, obtaining the directions, and proceeding. This directness of the medium makes photographic practice liberated from the traditions, which had grown up throughout painting or a variety of printmaking arts (Keil 32). With the introduction of precoated dry plates in 1878, the tiresome and cluttered coating of glass plates inside the darkroom or even dark tent, for those photographers out in the field got eliminated, and with the availability of precoated photographic papers, printing of photographs turned out to be much easier, while, at the same time, more predictable.

As a result, photography could be exercised by hobbyists or amateurs, more so by lovers of the medium since the majority of the people, who had the leisure for an advanced hobby such as this one, were not only educated, but also sophisticated, and desired to come up with photographs resembling Art (Keil 47). In the past, film cameras filters got used in the modification of both the spectral content i.e. color, intensity of light, while, at the same time, generating outcomes like soft focus. However, digital cameras tend to operate differently when it comes to color; there is a possibility of performing color modification in camera with ease by setting white balance.

Therefore, for film warming, as well as cooling filters, or those filters capable of converting fluorescent light unto daylight where necessary, digital has the ability of achieving the same effects through internal operation of the digital data. There as a number of filters needed for digital including a polarizing filter, special effect filter, a UV filter, filters for infrared effects, a neutral density filter plus a given graduated neutral density filter. It is impossible to digitally simulate the results of a