POLICE PHOTOGRAPHY
TERMS and DEFINITIONS
• The word "photography" was created from the
Greek roots phōs "light" and graphé
"representation by means of lines" or
"drawing", together meaning "drawing with
light”.
• Photography is the art, application and practice
of creating durable images by recording light or
other electromagnetic radiation, either
electronically by means of an image sensor, or
chemically by means of a light-sensitive
material such as photographic film.
• Forensic- Derived from the Latin word “Forum”
which means “a market place” where people
gathered for public discussion.
-When used in conjunction with other science it
connotes a relationship to the administration of justice.
It is sometimes used interchangeably with the word
legal.
• Forensic photography - sometimes referred to
as police photography, forensic imaging or
crime scene photography. - is the art of
producing an accurate reproduction of a crime
scene or an accident using photography for the
benefit of a court or to aid in an investigation.
• Police photography- Is the application of the
principles of photography is relation to the
police work and in the administration of justice.
• Photograph - is an image created by light falling
on a light-sensitive surface usually photographic
film or electronic imager.
• Camera - is a device that records and stores
images.
INTRODUCTION
• Photography is an invaluable aid to modern
day scientific crime detection and investigation
as well as crime prevention. Perhaps it could be
stated that without photography our law
enforcement officer in the so-called modern
day scientific crime detection would still be
lagging a hundred years.
• 1839 - the birth year of photography. Its first
landmark in police history is generally confined
to its application to the problem of personal
identification. In those days the Bertillon
system of the facial features of the criminal
were measured, as well as the bone structures
of the various parts of the body. These
measurements were worked into a classification
system and the photograph of the criminal was
used to supplement the classification.
• Later, the Bertillon system was superseded by
the fingerprint system of personal
identification. Under the fingerprint system the
photograph of the subject is still placed on his
finger print chart, not to supplement the
identification system but to have available
photograph if needed for investigation
purposes.
 Bertillon system
• form of biometric identification was in
widespread use around the world. This was the
system of so-called anthropometry, invented at
the end of the 19th century by a clerk in the
Paris police prefecture, one Alphonse Bertillon.
The Bertillon system, also known as
Bertillonage, had a major impact on
criminology, especially in its native France,
around the turn of the century because
“Bertillon made it possible to visualize
criminality in a ploddingly bureaucratic yet
devastatingly effective way”.
Significance:
• The usefulness of Forensic Photography in
criminal investigation is very extensive.
• Investigators are sometimes compelled to
reconstruct or describe in court some of the
details of the crime scenes they investigated
several months ago. However, with the aid of
photographs taken from the crime scene,
investigator will not find hard time to refresh in
their minds and will be able to describe or
explain exactly the details in court.
• A good photograph of the scene is a
permanent record, which is always available,
especially in court presentation. In court
proceedings, judges, prosecutors and defense
 lawyers have generally never visited the scene
of the crime.
• A photograph of the crime scene is a factual
reproduction and accurate record of the crime
scene because it captures TIME, SPACE AND
EVENT. A photograph is capable of catching and
preserving the:
SPACE - the WHERE of the crime (Locus
Criminis)
TIME – the WHEN of the crime
EVENT – the WHAT of the crime – what is the
nature or character of the crime?
Uses of photography in police work
1. Identification files- Criminals missing persons,
lost property, licenses, anonymous letters, bad
checks, laundry marks, and civilian of personal
fingerprint IF In the case of atomic attack or a
catastrophe such as an airplane crash, the
fingerprints from a civilian file are proving
helpful in making positive identification
2. Communication and microfilm files-
Investigative report files, Accident files
transitions of photos (Wire Photo)
Photographic supplements to reports. With
modern day electro photography machines
accident reports can be made in seconds and
sold to insurance adjusters for nominal fees. An
excellent source of revenue for department is
the sale of photographs of traffic accidents to
insurance companies and lawyers.
3. Evidence- Crime scenes, traffic accidents,
homicides suicides, fires, objects of evidence,
latent fingerprint traces. Evidence can be
improved by contrast control, by magnification
and by visible radiation.
4. Offender detection – Surveillance, burglar
traps, confession, reenactment of crimes
intoxicated driver test. One of the newest
applications of police photography is to record
on motion picture film arrests in which the
suspect offers resistance. The practice has been
instituted by at least one metropolitan law
enforcement agency to counter charges of
police brutality.
5. 5. Court exhibits- Demonstration enlargements,
individual photos, projection slides, motion
pictures.
6. 6. Reproduction or Copying – Questionable
checks and documents, evidential papers,
photographs, official records and notices.
7. 7. Personnel training- Photographs and films
relating police tactics, investigation techniques,
mob control, and catastrophe situations.
8. 8. Crime and Fire prevention – Hazard lectures,
security clearance, detector devices, photos of
hazardous fire, conditions made when fire
prevention inspection are made.
9. 9. Public relations – Films pertaining to safety
programs, juvenile delinquency, traffic
education, public cooperation, and civil
defense.
PHOTOGRAPHY: ITS PRINCIPLE
• In photography, the light writes when it strikes
minute crystals of light sensitive surfaces (films
and photographic papers), a mechanical device
(camera) and chemical processing (film
development and printing). As a process,
photography is the method of using light to
produce identical image of an object that can be
preserved permanently by employing:
• a. camera: camera use to regulate, absorb
and filter light
• b. film and any sensitized material to
record light
• Photograph is a mechanical result of
photography. To produce a photograph, light is
needed aside from sensitized material (films
and photographic papers). Light radiated or
reflected by the subject must reach the
sensitized material while all other lights must be
excluded. The exclusion of all other lights is
achieved by placing the sensitized material
inside a light tight box. The light maybe visible
or invisible.
• The effect of light on the sensitized material is
not visible in the formation of images of
objects. The effect could be made visible with
 the aid of chemical processing of the exposed
sensitized material called development.
Photography is the production of visible images
by using the action of light on a sensitized
material. The word photography was derived
from two Greek terms PHOTO which means
light and GRAPHY which means to write. Thus,
literally, photography means to draw with light.
• Everyone also knows light. It excites the retina
Four primary ways of using photography in
Police Work:
1. As means of identification.
2. As a method of discovering, recording and
preserving evidence.
3. As a way to present, in the courtroom, an
impression of the pertinent elements of a
crime.
depression many experienced dream like
apparitions. In states of religious ecstasy,
visions and hallucinations occur which can be
attributed to the high sensitivity of the retina.
Many frequently perceived light impressions,
which cannot be attributed to external stimuli
of an altogether different kind, such as
pressure, impact and functional disturbances in
our body and nervous system.
of the eye. Light makes things visible. There is
no exaggeration to say that man cannot live
without light. Same things are true in
photography, because light is needed to
produce a photograph.
LIGHT AND THE EYE

4. As a training and public relations medium for

police programs.

PHOTOGRAPHIC RAYS

• What is light? Many as good while darkness the

opposite as bad have associated light. In case of
anxiety, fright, severe mental disorders and
depression many experienced dream like
apparitions. In states of religious ecstasy,
visions and hallucinations occur which can be
attributed to the high sensitivity of the retina.
Many frequently perceived light impressions,
which cannot be attributed to external stimuli
of an altogether different kind, such as
pressure, impact and functional disturbances in
our body and nervous system.

• Everyone also knows light. It excites the retina

of the eye. Light makes things visible. There is
no exaggeration to say that man cannot live
without light. Same things are true in
photography, because light is needed to
produce a photograph.

PHOTOGRAPHIC RAYS

• What is light? Many as good while darkness the

opposite as bad have associated light. In case of
anxiety, fright, severe mental disorders and
 Light rays enter the eye through the cornea, the
clear front “window” of the eye. The cornea’s
refractive power bends the light rays in such a
way that they pass freely through the pupil the
opening in the center of the iris through which
light enters the eye.
The iris works like a shutter in a camera. It has
the ability to enlarge and shrink, depending on
how much light is entering the eye.
• Light rays pass through a dense, transparent
gel-like substance, called the vitreous that fills
the globe of the eyeball and helps the eye hold
its spherical shape.
• In a normal eye, the light rays come to a sharp
focusing point on the retina. The retina
functions much like the film in a camera. It is
responsible for capturing all of the light rays,
processing them into light impulses through
millions of tiny nerve endings, then sending
these light impulses through over a million
nerve fibers to the optic nerve.
HOW LIGHT BEHAVES
• Light moves in straight lines
from its source, but it
can be bent and scattered by
objects placed in its path. We see rays of
sunlight streaming through a window on a
sunny day because some of the light is scattered
by dust particles in the air. We can only see a
ray of light when it strikes the eye directly.
• Then it forms an image of the object from which
it has come, either the light source itself, or
something from which it has been reflected,
such as a motorcar. Non-luminous objects are
one, which are only visible when they reflect
the light from a light source.
• In a totally dark room, you would not be able to
see a desk, but you would be able to see the
hands of a luminous clock. If the totally black
room had no dust particles floating around it,
you would not able to see the beam of light, but
only the light source itself and any object that
reflects the light.
SPEED OF LIGHT
Even an electric light appears to glow
immediately it is switched on, a small but
definite time lag occurs between the light
coming on and the electromagnetic radiation
entering our eyes. In a room, this time lag is too
short to be noticeable, but for distant objects
like stars, the lag is thousand of years. Even light
from the moon, which is relatively close to
earth, experiences a time lag of one second.
The speed of light, measured in a vacuum is
299, 792.5 km/sec (approximately 186,281
miles/sec / 186,000).
DIFFRACTION – light in space and not within the
gravitational field of any object travels in a
straight line. The bending of light around an
object gives rise to the phenomenon called
diffraction. This phenomenon is responsible for
the partial illumination of object parts not
directly in the path of the light.
THE LAW OF REFRACTION – when the material
in the path of the light is transparent a change
in the direction of the light occurs.
THE LAW OF REFLECTION – refers to the
rebounding or deflection of light. The angle of
reflection depends upon the angle of the light
striking the material, which is referred to as the
angle of incidence.
NATURAL LIGHT
The source of all daylight is the sun. The
combination of color and contrast ascertains
the quality of the daylight. The lighting contrast
depends upon the sunlight available in the
daylight, when clouds do not cover the sun.
Then, the contrast is high on the contrary; if
clouds cover the sun the contrast is low. In the
process of photographing and object; the
lighting contrast must be considered in the
exposure of the film. It is suggested that the
recommendations, given by the manufacturer
 of the film be observed religiously to produce
good and presentable photographs.
Daylight maybe classified according to its
intensity. They are:
a) Bright sunlight b) Hazy sunlight c) Dull
sunlight.
• These classifications are modified by the film
manufacturers like
• a) Open bright sunlight
• b) Under shade bright sunlight
• c) Hazy sunlight
• d) Cloudy bright sunlight
• e) Cloudy dull sunlight.
BRIGHT SUNLIGHT
• In bright sunlight, the subject will produced a
strong shadow, because the source of light in
not covered and the objects or subjects appear
glossy in open space due to direct sunlight and
reflected light coming from the sky which act as
a reflector.
HAZY SUNLIGHT
• In Hazy sunlight, the sun is covered by thin
cloud and the shadow appears bluish because
of the decrease of light falling on the subject in
open space. The shadow cast is transparent to
the eye and more details are visible under this
lighting condition than a bright sunlight.
DULL SUNLIGHT
• In dull sunlight, the sun is totally covered by
thick clouds. No shadow is cast to the uniform
illumination of lights all around the subjects in
open space.
ARTIFICIAL LIGHT
Almost all artificial light sources can be used in
photographing of objects, as long as the light is
capable of exposing the sensitized materials
(film). Some of the artificial lights are electronic
flash, photoflood lamp, fluorescent lamp, and
Infrared and Ultra-Violet lamp.
PRIMARY and SECONDARY COLORS
The three primary colors in light are
red, green and blue. White light can be made by
mixing red, blue and green. The process of
making colors by mixing primary colors of light
is called addition, because one color is added to
another.
Colors made by combining two primary
colors are called secondary colors. They are
yellow (red and green), cyan (blue and green)
and magenta (blue and red). When the primary
colors are mixed in different proportions any
color at all can be produced.
Painted objects do not produce their
own light, they reflect light, when objects look
red, because it is reflecting only red light to our
eyes. To do this, it absorbed the other
colors in the white light it is reflecting. It absorbed
green and blue and reflects red.
PRIMARY and SECONDARY COLORS
MEDIUMS OF LIGHT
Mediums of light maybe classified as:
TRANSPARENT OBJECTS – mediums that merely slow
down the speed of light but allow to pass freely in other
respects, transmit 90% or more of the incident light.
TRANSLUCENT OBJECTS – mediums that allow light to
pass through it in such a way that the outline of the
source of light is not clearly visible, transmit 50% or less
of the incident light.
OPAQUE OBJECTS – A medium that divert or absorb
light, but does not allow lights to pass though, they
absorb most of the light while reflecting some of it.
 The most basic of all camera, have a non-adjustable
lens. Most models have a single diaphragm setting and
only one or two shutter speeds. Most fixed focus
cameras, including many inexpensive, pocket-sized
models, use 110 or 126 size film. The negative of such
film require considerable enlargement, which may
produce a fuzzy image.

THE RAT LAW

When incident light hits a medium, three things

might happen, the light maybe: Reflected, Absorbed

Transmitted

THE PINHOLE CAMERA –

• The simplest camera is a pinhole camera, which

consists of a box with a small hole in one of its
sides. To produce a sharp image, the hole must
be very small and this restricts the amount of
light entering the camera. Quite a long time
may be necessary to let enough light through to
affect the film and this causes problems
because if the subject moves the picture will be
blurred. It is impossible to photograph anything
like a moving car or a galloping horse with a
pinhole camera.

CAMERA OBSCURA

Is a box used for

sketching large
objects? The term
means dark
chamber. The box  
contains a mirror set at 45-degree angle. Mounted in
the front end of the box is a double convex lens like that
in a photographic camera. Light from the object or
scene is transmitted through the lens. The mirror
reflects this light upward to ground glass screen on the
top of the box. There the light forms an image of the
object or scene that can be sketched easily.

FIXED FOCUS CAMERA