In class we talked about how media changes our concept of reality. We are looking at reality as something we can edit and we speak about in “media terms” such as freezing, fast forward, rewinding etc. We saw some examples of pictures inspired by Harry Potter and Star Wars, where people acted in real life as the heroes of these stories.
This reminded me of a type of tourist photo people take where the reality is somehow unreal and looks manipulated. You know, the ones where you lean against the tower of Pisa as if holding it up. One especially good example are the photos taken at Salar de Uyuni, a salt flat in Bolivia. The large area, the blue skies and the incredible flatness of the place makes it a perfect spot to take unrealistic photos that seem to be from a movie. Or what do you think of these: http://mashable.com/2013/10/22/salar-de-uyuni-instagram/
I think that these photos are a good example of how people want to play with the reality, challenge the limits of what is considered possible and impossible in the real world compared to media. Also they make ordinary tourist photos much more fun and extraordinary – and who wouldn’t want at least occasionally reality and their life to be more fun and extraordinary?
Why I Heart My Media 