User:Clàudia/methods-Glitch

Glitch

The answer of the questions: WHAT, HOW and WHY of one of my projects: Glitched images.

Glitched images are digital pictures whose code has been hacked. The outcome is a digital image that resembles the original but reveals its technological nature through its visual distortion. It looks broken and faulty, being no longer a loyal copy of the palpable world. Now, you can envisage the digital.

The method I use to glitch, uses an image and the Mac Terminal. To start, the image code is accessed through the Terminal, using the command line. Once the code of the image is revealed, it can be changed at one's own will: deleting parts of the code, writing messages, copying and pasting it several times, etc. Next, when the hack has been done, the file can be saved and viewed as a normal image.

When I started glitching, the only aim was to experiment. I had felt very attracted to the aesthetic of those images and wanted to learn how to make them. However, when I started making my own glitches, and reflecting on them, other points of interest were unveiled. The randomness and surprise factor was very interesting. You never know how an image is going to look like until you accomplish the glitch. And the surprise comes when, even though it is a random output, it can be very beautiful, symmetrical, or perfectly asymmetrical. It makes me wonder how a fault in the code can make such a beautiful outcome. Another fact that draws my attention is that the medium becomes obvious. The digital medium can be envisioned, and also its vulnerability, how easily everything can be fucked. Another point of interest is the feeling of entering into another dimension: the picture is not the portrait of the so-called real world anymore, it shows something that you can't touch but that is everywhere, and that, under my point of view, has became a world as real as the physical one.