Smartphone photography and its socio-economic life in China: An ethnographic analysis

Abstract

The smartphone is perhaps one of the few items that can define our time in terms of its ubiquity and mobility. The photographic feature of various types of smartphones has also drawn the attention of consumers and manufacturers in recent years, with the consecutive upgrades of built-in cameras, photo-editing and sharing apps. From the taking, retouching, to publishing a photograph, smartphone photography, coupled with social media, has become important in understanding the relationships between digital image and sociality, aesthetics and identity. This article examines several new developments such as the rise of ‘professional amateurs’ and the selfie within the Chinese context. It then attempts to develop theories of smartphone photography that incorporate these developments. Using ethnographic analysis and interviews, this article aims to theorize smartphone photography as a series of practices that reveal local and individual specifications that traverse technicity, sociality and aesthetics. It shows how this has had a significant impact on Chinese people’s economic and social life.

Analysis of smiling photograph; Operation US–Bangla Air Crash

“…People capture casual smile images from their mobile phones and cameras and store them on their phones and share them on their social media accounts. 8,9 Due to digital advancement, high-resolution images are not too difficult to acquire, 10 and can be utilised as antemortem data during human identification. This low-cost, quick and easy technique can be valuable during a disaster.…”

Loving the enemy app: Resistance versus professionalism in ‘post-TikTok’ India

“…Such phenomenon indicates the blurring boundary between amateur-professionals and professionalisation of digital content creators. The growing smartphone use, which created a booming 'digital-visual economy', also contributed to the professionalisation of amateur smartphone photographers and the transformation of a 'hobby'/'serious leisure' to 'hobby business' (Yang, 2021). With skillful netizens routinely recruited by Chinese tech-firms for their understanding of consumers' photographic preferences, there emerged 'professional amateurs' (Yang, 2021).…”

“…Such professionalism also united TikTok with other platforms in the post-ban digital space, despite differences. 6 Past research of user-generated online videos (Ding, Yang, Li, & Zhang, 2021) and smartphone users (Yang, 2021) in China indicate the porous boundary between ‘amateurs’ and ‘professionals’ and the transformation of ‘hobby’/‘serious leisure’ into ‘hobby business’. This paper further confirms this trend as India’s post-TikTok digital short video content production assumed the semblance of large-scale movie production with elaborate outdoor shooting, grooming/make-up, professional camera and ‘good quality content’.…”

Reclaiming the Periphery in the Age of Social Media: Power and Narrative of Rural China in My People, My Homeland (2020) and Coffee or Tea? (2020)

“…Although both are still subject to platform algorithms, the energy, the liveliness and diversity that these videos deliver about rural China are undeniable (especially the former type) and even regarded as “weapons of the underclass” for their function in enhancing rural visibility (Liu & Wang, 2020, p. 52). This smartphone enabled digital-visual economy forms an interactive triangular of technicity, sociality, and aesthetics (Yang, 2021). While making My Homeland , the production team launched a campaign of “Great Changes in Every Countryside Household” ( shangxiang jubian, qianjia wanhu ) on Douyin and called for submissions of videos on this topic.…”