Yes, an image is not in any single point, in space and/or time, but in the space (and time) between such points. Between the pixels. Between the frames. Between the grain. The random arrangement of the film grain means there is exceedingly more diversity in the potential image. From one grain to another is a change in value and it is this change we see. Not the grain (or the pixels themselves) but the differences between such. We can see this in a binary image.
This image is composed entirely of pixels that are either black or white. No grey pixels here. But subconsciously (if not consciously) we can see the grey tones.
Counter-intuitively we can get an idea of this subconscious image if we blur the dots. Below all I've done is apply an 8X gaussian blur to the above. This is effectively looking into a subconscious aspect of the above - bringing into "focus" (so to speak) what our subconscious mind is otherwise able to appreciate (to see) as occupying the above. We can see grey tones in the above image because they are, in some sense, there. Our eyes roam across the dots, criss-crossing them from different angles and reconstructing something beyond what is otherwise momentarily apparent (as dots). We begin to appreciate instead, a face. With grey tones. Of course all of this happens very fast. But the face that emerges (what we end up seeing) is the image proper. What we see is therefore not an image
of a face. It is the face itself which is the image proper. A face image. The dots are not an image. In this sense an image can be understood as much more related to reality than are the dots. Image and reality can be understood, in the limit, as the same thing. The dots are something else. A kind of intermediary. Not yet an image. Not yet a reality. In this sense we can say the image is not an illusion as such, as if the dots were reality. On the contrary, it is the image which is a reality (and reality an image) - not the dots.
In any case what this suggests is that what we see subconsciously, or perhaps super-consciously (!) are not the dots (pixels/grain etc) as such (unless we're specifically concentrating on such of course). It is the image (a face) we see (or feel, or comprehend) and in terms of technical considerations (the domain of dots) this image/reality occupies the space
between the dots/pixels/grain. And in the case of video or film, the space (or rather time) between the frames as well - where there is otherwise, on close analytic inspection, nothing there but the apparent absence of any face (of any reality). This is the basis for a realist conception of film (and digital for that matter). It is not in some division between image and reality (leading to an anti-image conception of the real) - but the opposite - of an equivalence between the two. Image and reality become the same thing. A reality that subsists between the dots. Entirely visible. Is defined by it's visibility. Is that which is unable to be invisible (although often hidden). Goddard might argue (or have argued) otherwise: the image as some sort of illusion.
But this is the freaky thing. We can see what is not, on the face of it technically, there. Are we like seers or spirual mediums? Visionaries? Able to see the absent? Yes. In short, precisely so. But such discoveries allow us to understand how we might technically manipulate the intermediaries (the dots, the pixels, the grain, the frames) in order to better bring into "focus" (so to speak) what otherwise strikes us as absent (not really there). Reality we can otherwise theorise is simply not in the moment. It is not locally situated. At any given moment is an intermediary. Dots etc. Reality occupies a different dimension - action at a distance (in time sand space). It refuses to be contained (or erased) in confined spaces. It is always outside the box. It is that which impresses itself from outside, of time and space, into such. Occupying the space/time between the pixels. Between the grain. The image proper. Reality proper. A kind of spooky thing. An apparition. A ghost. A reality. Or a ghostly reality. It insists or insinuates itself. Refuses to be absent. But equally refuses to be entirely present. As such there is no such thing as the perfect crime. Colombo is an angel as Wim Wenders reminds us. He can, and we can, (with the power of angels) see clearly Hitchcock's rope.
But back to a more 'technical' understanding: the spatial randomness of film grain allows the image (reality) more scope (or more freedom) in how it expresses itself (between the grains), than that which digital pixels allow. There is simply more potential. We can reconstruct a far more complex ghost through such. We can feel the image more intimately - in our very being. It is a far more haunting image. Far more powerful.
Carl
