Scanner-Cam

Retro-Scanner-Cam-App based on JavaScript und p5.js

Inspired by Stefan Mildenbergers “Smart Scab Lab: Thoughts on moving Images”

Olaf Val, 2018

www.olafval.de/scanner-cam

Prior to the usual use of digital cameras, flatbed scanners were widely used to scan analog photos to be processed on a computer. Image scanners uses a line sensor that has been mechanically moved across the photo to capture it digitally. The Scanner Cam reverts to this process, which makes the snapshot of a photo in which time seems to stand frozen as the result of a time-based process. The app simulates the scanner process to produce interesting image artifacts. The pixels of the camera sensor will not read out as usually all at once, but by the Scanner Cam deliberately slowly row by row. The instantaneous and often playful handling of the mobile phone camera is therefore being promoted by a design possibility. At the same time, the supposedly sober and pragmatic data acquisition device of the scanner is subsequently credited with cultural relevance.