ABSTRACT
This chapter focuses on the media impact of photographs, visual media can comprise any form of physical media, such as fine art, drawings, graphic illustrations, sculptures, visual icons and so forth. Photography, since its early years in the mid-19th century, has played an increasingly important role in mass media, especially in journalism and documentary storytelling. Photography is an essential component of 21st-century mass media. Photography can also alter reality and present a dreamlike, irrational vision, far removed from the documentary representation of people, places and events. The move to digital photography and the rise of social media has changed the way photographs are not only taken, but also how they are stored, curated, circulated, and shared. Manufacturing realities via photography is not just a characteristic of modern culture. Photography affords us controlled slices of reality rather than—as many people assume—unbiased representations of reality.
