Graphics

Internet Image Degradation

Do things grow old in cyberspace? The answer is "yes"...

When pictures are constantly copied from website to website, and recompressed and rescaled every time, an interesting loss of quality occurs gradually over time. This page tries to simulate and display this gradual devolution. The first picture is the original.

First someone reduced to a 42 color gif.

Then someone added a bit of contrast, resized the image to 544 pixels and compressed the image at 52% jpeg quality.

Someone added a bit of sharpen because it looked blurry, resized the image to 415 pixels and compressed the image at 37% jpeg quality.

Someone else resized the image to 330 pixels and compressed the image at 45% jpeg quality.

Then someone resized the image to 309 pixels and compressed the image at 36% jpeg quality.

Someone else resized the image to 409 pixels and compressed the image at 29% jpeg quality.

Someone else added a bit of contrast, resized the image to 361 pixels and compressed the image at 41% jpeg quality.

Someone resized the image to 324 pixels and compressed the image at 16% jpeg quality.

Someone added a bit of contrast, resized the image to 449 pixels and compressed the image at 24% jpeg quality.

After that and they reduced to a 35 color gif.

After that, they added a bit of contrast, resized the image to 536 pixels and compressed the image at 31% jpeg quality.

Then someone resized the image to 302 pixels, compressed the image at 13% jpeg quality and then someone resized the image to 562 pixels and compressed the image at 28% jpeg quality.

Then someone added a bit of contrast, resized the image to 495 pixels, compressed the image at 35% jpeg quality and then they added a bit of contrast, added a bit of sharpen because it looked blurry, resized the image to 492 pixels and compressed the image at 29% jpeg quality.

After that, they added a bit of sharpen because it looked blurry, resized the image to 491 pixels, compressed the image at 28% jpeg quality and then they resized the image to 406 pixels and compressed the image at 27% jpeg quality.

Then someone resized the image to 445 pixels, compressed the image at 13% jpeg quality and then someone resized the image to 480 pixels and compressed the image at 19% jpeg quality.

Then someone reduced to a 21 color gif and then they resized the image to 306 pixels and compressed the image at 17% jpeg quality.

Someone else reduced to a 38 color gif and then they added a bit of contrast, added a bit of sharpen because it looked blurry, resized the image to 447 pixels and compressed the image at 29% jpeg quality.

Then they reduced to a 15 color gif and someone else added a bit of sharpen because it looked blurry, resized the image to 502 pixels and compressed the image at 25% jpeg quality.

Someone else resized the image to 443 pixels, compressed the image at 28% jpeg quality and someone resized the image to 380 pixels and compressed the image at 20% jpeg quality.

After that, they added a bit of contrast, resized the image to 346 pixels, compressed the image at 21% jpeg quality and someone else resized the image to 476 pixels and compressed the image at 19% jpeg quality.

Finally they resized the image to 441 pixels and compressed the image at 25% jpeg quality.

Oh my, that got pretty bad.

Website by Joachim Michaelis