Photographic film itself was optimized for pale skin tones.
So, why has it taken so long to correctly record non-white faces in photographs?
This bias was also institutionalized in the lab, where the film got developed and printed.
martin-dm / Getty Images
Kodak finally followed, but not because it wanted to capture dark skin better.
Film also has another purely technical limitation.
It can capture only a limited dynamic range.
Rosa Menkman / flickr
The photographer would have to make a choice.
But with digital, things changed.
“Film presents a completely different issue because you don’t get the room to edit in post.
Rosa Menkman / flickr
In fact, the main danger with a digital camera is ‘blowing out’ the highlights.
Once a white tone is overexposed, it has gone forever.
But camera sensors dont create photos.
Instead, they record data, which algorithms must interpret to make images.
Adobes new presets then take these images and tweak them.
There is also a Light Skin pack.
But the problems have not been solved.
They’ve just moved.
This technologyworks well to distinguish white men, but fails on black men.
The common thread is that seemingly neutral technologies contain the biases of those that create them.
And this will persist until the people designing our technology are the same as the people using it.
