Comment by fluoridation
5 days ago
Well, "what a digital image is" is a sequence of numbers. There's no single correct way to interpret the numbers, it depends on what you want to accomplish. If your digital image is a representation of, say, the dead components in an array of sensors, the signal processing theoretic interpretation of samples may not be useful as far as figuring out which sensors you should replace.
> There's no single correct way to interpret the numbers
They are just bits in a computer. But there is a correct way of to interpret them in a particular context. For example 32 bits can be meaningless - or it can have an interpretation as a twos complement integer which is well defined.
If you are looking to understand how an operating system will display images, or how graphics drivers work, or how photoshop will edit them, or what digital cameras produce, then it’s the point sample definition.
Cameras don't take point samples. That's an approximation, just as inaccurate as a rectangle approximation.
And for pixel art, the intent is usually far from points on a smooth color territory.
Multiple interpretations matter within different contexts inside the computer context.
> Cameras don't take point samples. That's an approximation
They use a physical process to attempt to determine light at a single point. That’s their model they try to approximate.
> And for pixel art, the intent is usually far from points on a smooth color territory.
And notice that to display pixel art you need to tell it to interpret the image data differently.
Also it has a vastly different appearance on a CRT where it was designed which is less like a rectangle.
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