Photographic truth and evidence

Abstract

The application of visual material is becoming increasingly more prominent when presenting forensic evidence in contemporary courts. This paper examines how photographic evidence is used as a means of presenting facts relating to evidence and whether the concept of photographic truth actually exists and advances knowledge. This paper suggests that the obligatory telling of truth when presenting evidence should also extend into the showing of the truth when visual narratives become dominant within forensic evidence. It further challenges the notion that photographs, due to the mechanistic nature of the camera, produce naturally objective and independent evidence that reinforces the search for the truth. Faithful contextualisation of photographic evidence is essential when the reliability of this form of evidence is deliberated.

Keywords:

• photography
• photographic evidence
• truth
• visual communication
• forensic science
• jurisprudence
• intertextuality