The Photogrammetric Image and Black-Boxed Mutative Automation Considered through Philip K. Dick’s The Preserving Machine

The multi-media research collective, The Preserving Machine, was initiated through collaborative discussion in response to Philip K. Dick’s 1953 short story of the same name. This article considers Dick’s story in light of current forms of image-making apparatus, specifically in relation to photogrammetry. Dick’s protagonist, Doc. Labyrinth’s design and ambitions of The Preserving Machine to safeguard cultural heritage in the light of ecological catastrophe resonates with the application of 3D imaging technologies in cultural heritage industries. However, his positionality is problematic as it both highlights the nature of preservation as being potentially extractive and does not account for the agency of the machine in the process. The text foregrounds the ways in which current computational forms of photogrammetry are conceived in the humanities, with reference to the language of post-cinema, gaming and, most importantly, photography. The argument is structured to mirror the digital production pipeline of photogrammetric processes to highlight the problematic industry rhetoric claiming objectivity, accuracy and automation. This methodology thus deals with issues surrounding the choice and capture of data input, consideration of the black-boxed processing and mutative automation and expectations surrounding reproducibility. The authors propose that current forms of conceptualising photogrammetry are insufficient to account for these hybridised digital image forms solely through the language of index, likeness and simulacrum associated with photographic theoretical dialogue. Instead, these 3D images need to be considered relationally to wider assemblages of meanings that are less readily understood through singular, coherent theoretical readings.