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 41 color gif.

Someone added a bit of contrast, resized the image to 347 pixels and compressed the image at 54% jpeg quality.

Someone else added a bit of contrast, resized the image to 302 pixels and compressed the image at 65% jpeg quality.

After that, they resized the image to 572 pixels and compressed the image at 62% jpeg quality.

Someone else resized the image to 456 pixels and compressed the image at 66% jpeg quality.

Then they reduced to a 48 color gif.

Someone added a bit of contrast, resized the image to 511 pixels and compressed the image at 22% jpeg quality.

Someone added a bit of contrast, resized the image to 379 pixels and compressed the image at 22% jpeg quality.

Then someone resized the image to 435 pixels and compressed the image at 18% jpeg quality.

Then someone resized the image to 400 pixels and compressed the image at 24% jpeg quality.

Then someone added a bit of sharpen because it looked blurry, resized the image to 433 pixels and compressed the image at 30% jpeg quality.

After that, they reduced to a 31 color gif and after that, they added a bit of contrast, resized the image to 332 pixels and compressed the image at 34% jpeg quality.

After that, they resized the image to 405 pixels and compressed the image at 20% jpeg quality and someone reduced to a 29 color gif.

Then they resized the image to 453 pixels, compressed the image at 30% jpeg quality and after that and they reduced to a 24 color gif.

Then someone added a bit of contrast, resized the image to 408 pixels, compressed the image at 35% jpeg quality and then they resized the image to 505 pixels and compressed the image at 21% jpeg quality.

Then someone resized the image to 338 pixels, compressed the image at 16% jpeg quality and then someone resized the image to 420 pixels and compressed the image at 18% jpeg quality.

After that, they reduced to a 46 color gif and after that, they resized the image to 301 pixels and compressed the image at 22% jpeg quality.

Someone else reduced to a 26 color gif and then someone resized the image to 557 pixels and compressed the image at 10% jpeg quality.

Someone added a bit of contrast, resized the image to 485 pixels, compressed the image at 32% jpeg quality and then they added a bit of contrast, added a bit of sharpen because it looked blurry, resized the image to 452 pixels and compressed the image at 15% jpeg quality.

Someone else resized the image to 308 pixels, compressed the image at 34% jpeg quality and someone else resized the image to 531 pixels and compressed the image at 32% jpeg quality.

Finally they resized the image to 398 pixels and compressed the image at 26% jpeg quality.

Oh my, that got pretty bad.

Website by Joachim Michaelis