Computational imaging presents opportunities to overcome conventional imaging limits, such as a trade-off between image resolution and system z-height. Optical design and image processing are developed in parallel to optimise imaging system properties for a given application. These properties can be quantified and it is shown that the image quality of a multichanneled imaging system, relying on superresolution (SR) image reconstruction, is dependent on object depth due to interference of sampling phases. A novel multichannel imaging system that does not rely on SR reconstruction, yet achieves a reduction of system height by a factor of two, is presented. The mitigation of SR reconstruction reduces computational effort, offering an attractive option for a computational imaging device in the mobile handset market. The image reconstruction framework required for the reduced height multichanneled imager is proposed in a general form so that it is applicable to many multi-aperture geometries, making it compatible with commercial interests, i.e. it is sensible to develop something with a wide application space. A second novel imaging system is also described in this thesis: A snapshot hyperspectral imaging (HSI) camera, comprising of a square array of miniature camera modules, makes use of the multiple imaging channels to record spectrally distinct images. The generalised image processing framework is applied to the image reconstruction problem to generate the spectral data-cubes. This approach to hyperspectral imaging presents opportunities to gain performance advantages over other snapshot HSI technologies and do so at a significant reduction in cost.

This research addresses the problem of populating Building Information Model databases with information on building construction materials using a new classification method which uses multi-spectral laser scanning intensity and geometry data. Research in multi-spectral laser scanning will open up a new era in survey and mapping; the 3D surface spectral response sensitive to the transmitted wavelengths could be derived day or night in complex environments using a single sensor. At the start of this research a commercial multi-spectral sensor did not exist, but a few prototype level instruments had been developed; this work wished to get ahead of the hardware development and assess capability and develop applications from multi-spectral laser scanning. These applications could include high density topographic surveying, seamless shallow water bathymetry, environmental modelling, urban surface mapping, or vegetative classification. This was achieved by using from multiple terrestrial laser scanners, each with a different laser wavelength. The fused data provided a spectral and geometric signature of each material which was subsequently classified using a supervised neural network. The multi-spectral data was created by precise co-positioning of the scanner optical centres and sub-centimetre registration using common sphere targets. A common point cloud, with reflected laser intensity values for each laser wavelength, was created from the data. The three intensity values for each point were then used as input to the classifier; ratios of the actual intensities were used to reduce the effect of range and incidence angle differences. Analysis of five classes of data showed that they were not linearly separable; an artificial neural network classifier was the chosen classifier has been shown to separate this type of data. The classifier training dataset was manually created from a small section of the original scan; five classes of building materials were selected for training. The performance of the classification was tested against a reference point cloud of the complete scene. The classifier was able to distinguish the chosen test classes with a mean rate of 84.9% and maximum for individual classes of 100%. The classes with the highest classification rate were brick, gravel and pavement. The success rate was found to be affected by several factors, among these the most significant, inter-scan registration, limitation on available wavelengths and the number of classes of material chosen. Additionally, a method which included a measure of texture through variations in intensity was tested successfully. This research presents a new method of classifying materials using multi-spectral laser scanning, a novel method for registering dissimilar point clouds from different scanners and an insight into the part played by laser speckle interpretation of reflected intensity.

The questions that this project poses are centred on an examination of photography's relationship to modernist architectural space. Polarising the melancholic and the utopian, the definition of photography is extended to include its manifestation across a number of diverse sites and processes. What is the connection between the processes and technology of photography and its representation of modernist space? How can these relationships inform and articulate a photographic practice? This thesis comprises five key areas of investigation, with each theoretical chapter being followed by a complementary sequence of photographic images. The first section considers the process of `fragmentation' in relation to a body of photographs which I have termed `fragments'. These images reveal the aspirational or utopian content of modernist architecture as a condition of loss or melancholy. The second section develops the notion of the `fragment' in relation to `allegory', which I argue, opens photography to metaphoric interpretation thus taking on the duality of meaning. The third section uses W. G. Sebald's novel Austerlitz and Kracauer's work on history, to locate this duality within Husserl's Lebenswelt. The fourth section shifts the emphasis of inquiry towards an examination of how the utopian emerges within specific aspects of the photo-reprographic process, such as the error of misregistration in colour printing. This forms the basis for a development of the practice into the field of the photographic representation of colour. The fifth section looks at how colour has been added to the monochromatic image in a series of postcards of modernist architecture from the 1930's thus suggesting a site of utopian investment With reference to Kristeva and Benjamin I develop the notion of colour as an excess of meaning indicative of utopian aspiration. The conclusion of the project is firmly located in the practice outcome and a body of work, which I have termed `constructed images'. Representing a convergence of the five themes, these reveal the ability of photography to uniquely articulate the utopian-melancholy polarity, a transformative process, intervening into architectural space to indicate new ways of thinking about it.

The aim of the research that this thesis is based on is to explore the theoretical problems raised by the concept of photographic abstraction. These consist in the tension between the two aspects of the photographic sign, the indexical and iconic, and are examined in the context of the particular exploration of the empty space in abstract photography which I have pursued through my practice.

In the digital age, there has been a phenomenal rise in the number of photos people capture, share, and manipulate—a trend that shows no sign of slowing. Furthermore, research shows that photos—authentic and manipulated—are powerful; they can change people’s memories for distant and recent experiences, beliefs about past actions, intentions for future actions, and judgements. Yet there is currently limited research exploring the effects of digital photography on memory, cognition, and behaviour. Part One of this thesis comprises of a program of research that examines people’s ability to discriminate between authentic and manipulated images. Advances in digital technology mean that the creation of visually compelling photographic fakes is growing at an incredible speed. Despite the prevalence of manipulated photos in our everyday lives, there is a lack of research directly investigating the applied question of people’s ability to detect photo forgeries. The research in Chapter 3 addresses this question. Across two experiments, people showed an extremely limited ability to detect and locate manipulations of real-world scenes. Chapters 4 and 5 explore ways that might help people to detect image forgeries. Specifically, the research investigates the extent to which people can identify inconsistencies in shadows and reflections. The results suggest that people are reasonably insensitive to shadow and reflection information and indicate that such image properties might not help people to distinguish between authentic images and manipulated ones. Part Two of this thesis examines how the act of taking photos can affect people’s memory. Digital technology has revolutionised the ease with which people capture photos and accordingly there has been a remarkable rise in the number of photos that people take. The results of five experiments and a mini meta-analysis suggest that taking photos has only a small, or plausibly no, effect on people’s memories.

This thesis examines the relationship between photography and sociology as offering complementary ways of understanding ourselves and the world we live in. Drawing from the work of Pierre Bourdieu and Raymond Williams, I examine the idea of a ‘field’ of photography within the field of cultural production more generally. The practises of documentary photography, photojournalism and fine art photography are explored with specific reference to images of war. In this arena, the politics, aesthetics and ethics of representing the body in pain are addressed.

This research examines the natural habitat dioramas created by Major P.H.G. Powell-Cotton, in doing so it affects a remembering of a sense of place where a diorama reflects in Mieke Bal's view a three-dimensionality that draws on architectural space; it then considers the three dimensional representation of the landscape within the diorama itself; the two-dimensional illusion of a trompe l'oeil landscape painting; and the exterior space occupied by the viewer. The Powell-Cotton natural habitat dioramas exist behind large glass screens their purpose follows an aesthetic relationship with the emergence of the natural habitat diorama and the ability to transfix perception through the re-interpretation of an idyll. The potential for this practice-based research was to explore the possibility of developing an aesthetic for sculpture and architectural space. However in focussing on the Powell-Cotton dioramas the notion of aesthetic attitude would lose ground due to their idiosyncratic, artificial, and extraordinary nature, it then prepared the basis of interpretation in establishing 'theatres of landscape' as an open concept. With landscape, a sense of place anticipates various positions and numerous delays; it recollects the cognitive knowledge brought to the prospect that involves aspects in, of and about landscape. Regarding the studio-based project, the diorama was placed between the real and the unreal, challenging Bal's rationale of the cognitive relationship of a diorama to the concept of a discursive space. Where both artist and viewer 'activates' this space with their presence, they bring their own recollection of landscape and by assigning landscape with memory the potentiality is where cognition becomes accentuated. Whereas the unknown and uncharted can refute reality, memory is dependent on what is known both formally and informally, it places the natural habitat diorama in a visual system that is both constructive and destructive. Therefore the research methodology examines the historical context of the diorama through a doctoral thesis by Karen Wonders and an analysis of Louis Daguerre's diorama by Richard Altick. Following Bal's analysis of the diorama, this created a dilemma - in what ways are the perceptions of the observer determined, and how are they undermined? Jonathan Crary and Giuliana Bruno considered the diorama's position in relation to film and film archaeology, which ultimately the diorama and natural habitat diorama could not compete with. In asking what has Powell-Cotton's museum to offer in the 21st century, this thesis examines the concept of a diorama, its objectives and correspondingly its failings. As the dioramas in the Powell-Cotton Museum were undocumented, these dioramas and their written, visual and architectural relationship to Louis Daguerre offer a contribution to knowledge concurrent with the relationship of this practice based research project. Whereupon the research diary forms the basis of a contribution to new knowledge in the construction of small and large-scale dioramas, sculpture and installations. By challenging Bal's analysis this research practice would investigate natural and projected light and the visual language of transparency, translucency and opacity in the representation of landscape and landscape as motif, and progressing to the structural implications of 2D and 3D work.

This thesis presents research carried out for the visualisation of surface anatomy data stored as large range images such as those produced by stereo-photogrammetric, and other triangulation-based capture devices. As part of this research, I explored the use of points as a rendering primitive as opposed to polygons, and the use of range images as the native data representation. Using points as a display primitive as opposed to polygons required the creation of a pipeline that solved problems associated with point-based rendering. The problems inves tigated were scattered-data interpolation (a common problem with point-based rendering), multi-view rendering, multi-resolution representations, anti-aliasing, and hidden-point re- moval. In addition, an efficient real-time implementation on the GPU was carried out.

Situated at the intersection of Translation Studies, Sociolinguistics and Film Studies, this thesis provides an analysis of the subtitling into French of a corpus of films portraying speakers of African American Vernacular English (henceforth AAVE). By analysing the French subtitles, the thesis focuses on the possibility of using non-standard forms in the target language, on their potential impact on the reception of a film, and on the theoretical underpinnings of juxtaposing two linguistic varieties on screen. Chapter One examines the peculiar nature of interlingual subtitles in the polysemiotic context of films and the vulnerability of this form of translation. Chapter Two provides a description of the main linguistic and interactional features of AAVE, whilst Chapter Three analyses the way AAVE is represented in films, and studies how naturally occurring language is different from language used in films for the purpose of dialogue. Chapter Four provides an analysis of the subtitles of the films under study, and pays particular attention to how linguistic variation is conveyed – or not – in the subtitles. Chapter Five examines the use of verlan in French subtitles and its wider implications: through the juxtaposition of verlan and AAVE on screen, a cultural hybrid is created, and we investigate this hybridity in the light of Venuti’s concepts of domestication and foreignisation.

This thesis accompanies a practice as research doctoral project that investigates the perceptual mechanisms and conceptions of land as a site of constant change. It utilises photographic practice as a form of visual communication. The aim is to examine the roles of movement and memory in the perceptual experiences of the environment through a phenomenological framework that involves the consideration of the concepts of place and space from a temporal perspective. The principal theme is how the moving and changing environment can be interpreted through the stasis of photography and what this implies about the individual’s relationship to it. The research methodology is a Rhizomatic multi‐site and multi‐process approach, utilising various methods and investigating site types appropriately as an interwoven practice. This has resulted in five separate bodies of work that deal with different forms of movement. The work employs close range photogrammetry techniques liberated from the empirical traditions of archaeological photography and time‐lapse to investigate the human‐scaled aerial view and visually interpret embodiment in the environment. An exhibition, titled Continuum derived from this practice was also shown at Avenue Gallery, Northampton University, UK, from 27th October 2014 ‐ 7th November 2014. A catalogue of works, titled In Flux; Land, Photography and Temporality accompanies this thesis as a PDF on the disc provided (appendix # 1). The research concludes that a consideration of time and space as durational and flowing can be interpreted through the stasis of photography. Through this the changing nature of the environment can be investigated. This is achieved by extending the duration of photographic processes and making them evident in the resulting works. It is also enhanced through curatorial sequencing in a body of work that mimics environmental temporal experience as perceived by the mobile individual.