Hello there,
I’m new both to the forum and to the Dark Heresy RPG: I already knew and loved the setting so when a couple of months ago one of my fellow players showed our group his copy of the DH rulebook and I took a look at it, I was very glad to switch to DH and even offered to GM it.

For the last weeks my group and I have been playing a couple of the pre-made adventures (Illumination and Shattered Hope) in order to familiarize ourselves wih the game’s mechanics: now it’s time we start our own campaign. I have plentiful of ideas, though here and there the feasibility of some of them slips me: my biggest concern now is about photography in the Imperium.
Is it allowed or reached by the Imperium? Could the pictures be the same as our own, printed on paper?

I think the level of technology required is met by the Imperium: after all they have holograms and even Servo-Skull-embedded videocams. I think photocameras should be easier to produce than videocameras.
And I can hardly think of photography being deemed heretical.

I need the players to find a picture that links the bad guy they’ve just defeated to another NPC they’ve already met: which altenatives do you suggest should photography be unlikely in the Imperium?

Thank you for any help!

Berengario said:

Well considering a video camera is just a photo camera that takes upwards of 30 frames per second and strings them together, usulaly with an audio file to run concurrently, yeah I'd say photo cameras are easier. =P

Seriously though, I'm sure still photos are a technology the Imperium has access to. They probably even have the ability to take 3-dimensional "photographs" that are essentially a still frame from a holographic recorder. I'm equally certain such things would not be considered heretical.

I would imagine it would be far more common to have pictures displayed on a screen instead of printed on paper (does anyone in the 40k universe still use paper?) but if you wanted to have the PCs find a printed photo, it would probably only be that much more noteworthy for the fact that it had been printed out. Alternatively you could let your players find the picture in digital format while searching through an old computer drive they found at the crime scene, or whatever.

Bottom line it is entirely doable as a plot hook. You could also let them find a short fragment of video or holo that shows the two NPCs talking (with or without audio). If you prefer a still photo, that's fine, too.

Howdy!

Yes, the Imperium has photography. There's a recent Gaunt's Ghosts story by Dan Abnett which I seem to recall describes a photographer. A lot of Imperial photography seems (for some unknown reason) to be black and white. I'm thinking of the photo portraiture imagery in Tactica Imperialis, a 40k background book published in 2007.

I'd speculate that this may be a stylistic choice by the Imperium's inhabitants. Imperial citizens largely fear progress and respect antiquity. Painted portraits are usually in colour, photographs less so. (Of course, the real reason for this is that pictures of 19th century men in uniform with cybernetics photoshopped on look cooler in black and white, but the in-setting explanation is more fun! )

EDIT: stylistically, I'd add that I see 40k newsreels as being in black and white, too. I don't know why this should be, but it feels right, in the same way that 40k computer tech should have display screens with only 8 colours and all text in glowing green. The Imperium has technology of sufficient sophistication to produce colour photos, video footage, broadband streamed videofeed cctv etc etc, but this technology is not widespread, and on many hive worlds will be fairly restricted.

Lightbringer said:

As a, not based on any fluff, guess. It may be that because digital photography would be prohibitive that most camera's would use chemical films. The chemicals itself are quite complicated solutions and it might be that with different wave lengths of light on different planets and different atmospheric make ups that you would need a different film for each planet pretty much.

Got nothing to back that up BTW but it sounds plausible.

In my games, I normally allow the pc to use "pict capturing devices" (PDC; or Camera) which make electronic pictures. Those are normally carried around on a data plate... but can be printed on paper.

Thank you all for your replies and the welcome!

I'll treasure your comments and use them as "auctoritates", should my players turn up their noses when finding photographs and videos: one of them is reading the Gaunt's Ghosts novels, so at least he should be prepared!

Steve-O said:

The video is a good idea: I'll keep it for the continuation of the adventure.

A bit off topic - My problem (at the moment) with anything digital in game is where I can push the limit up to: I can't figure what is good and what isn't.
I mean, I think a DOS-like pc is fine as far as it works as a word processor or a pocket calculator but I'm uncertain when a computing device turns heretical, although I can suppose it has to involve A.I.: when the device becomes self-aware it becomes an enemy to the Imperium; even a step earlier it is still an instrument of the Emperor's will.
How close am I to the mark?

The setting is slightly inconsistent when it comes to computers. Dataslates (basically ipads) are relatively common, apparently, but are really used just for ...er...data. Heavy numbercrunching tasks are done by "datalooms," which are basically supercomputers. These are rare, however, and only tend to be owned by the sector-level authorities.

There isn't really much inbetween these two extremes. "Cogitators" are the closest to modern personal computers, but these are mostly used for arcane administratum tithing purposes as opposed to anything fun.

There aren't many internet-style databases outside organisations like the Inquisition, though the Mechanicus is supposed to possess a version that is far more sophisticated than early 21st century versions.

There are also a variety of computer "machine spirits" implanted within vehicles and heavy equipment, and some of these are very sophisticated: the one in the Land Raider is almost an AI.

99% of humanity don't have access to computers on a regular basis, I'd say. Of the remainder, most are using ancient, malfunctioning devices that they don't understand for arcane tax-collecting purposes.

It's also worth considering that computers are rare, humans are common. So "wordprocessing" would be done by a scribe. Searching a database would be done by wandering through a library holding a candle. Using a speedsheet would probably get you burned at the stake...

Steve-O said:

Of course they use paper! Look at all of the books, scolls, and auto-quill servo-skulls in the imagry. I think photos are entirely appropriate.

There's also a short story concerning 'photographs' in the Eisenhorn omnibus. I don't have a copy on me unfortunately, I gave that book away to a friend to get him interested in 40K (and he really liked it too), but what I remember is that the man basically travelled Gudrun, peddling high quality "hololithic" prints to people.

Which is what I'd imagine photography of any quality to be like. Something holographic and fancy, as opposed to just a simple piece of paper with a picture, which is probably really **** common.

I'd imagine that among the middle classes digital photography wouldn't be uncommon either, due to the existence of dataslates and other simple electronic media.

Blood Pact said:

I dunno... obviously it depends upon the tech level of the world in question, but I always get the impression that sepia-tinted black and white photography is more common then digital. I can't see Imperial families cheerfully uploading family snaps to visagecodex.com on their dataslates: more likely they're sitting shivering in bombshelters as war rages outside, clutching poor quality black and white snaps of loved ones either dead or fighting in the Guard...

I'd go for a weird mix of styles - a camera where the subjects have to stand still for half an hour, but that produces a 3d hologram. In black and white. Probably outputs on to a glass plate as well.

Blood Pact said:

I don't know. I find that using the formula of they have technology x therefore they should have technology y and use it to end z troublesome for the Imperium. These are people who don't really fallow the same kind of logic we do. After all, they are capable of building gigantic space cathedrals capable traveling to hell and back (literally) in order to transverse the galaxy and what do they use this technology for -traveling hundreds of light-years just so they could shoot down to a strange planet's surface to sword-fight with aliens. They're an odd lot.

When it comes to the technology of the Imperium and how they chose to use it, when it starts making too much sense, then you've done something wrong.

I also feel as Lightbringer dose that photographs should be black and white affairs, news reals should be gray scaled scratched and jumpy affairs with voice-in-a-can sound quality, and cogitator screens (when they exist) would almost always be 8 colour or less affairs with harsh green text. The reasoning is the same here as it is for why Dog-Latin is used for High Gothic. All technology in the Imperium is old, ancient even. Even if it's a fresh bit of kit recently assembled, it is based off of plans that have been in use for thousands of years. Everything is old, antiquated, and to us, black and white photographs, old news reals, and 2 bit monitors all fit that description. Therefor, describing most all technology or it's end results in such fashion makes it feel properly old to us. Mix in odd bits of supper high tech wizardry and bizarre and almost mystical names in with this and you have the right feel of 40k technology -it's capable of preforming some amazing things, is comprised of some high tech components, but it's freaking old and poorly understood to the point of being mystified by the masses.

Paper is also used heavily in the Imperium and seems to be far more common then digital anything. Most librariums are stuffed to the gills with all forms of scrolls, tomes, and stacks of paper, some of which is produced on alien (though still very imperial) planets from plants never dreamed of by us displaying odd properties themselves. Hell, they even produce psycho-reactive parchment and, apparently, a lot of folks in the Imperium like to wear the printed word or tie it to a stick and use it as a weapon (remember, when it comes to the logical use of something, these people are a step apart from us ;-) ).

Photography may or may not be prevalent on any given world despite any video technology said world might have. There doesn't need to be any logical reason why. If a world has vedeo they might use printed photographs, or they might have forgotten you can do that, or they might believe that doing such captures the subjects soul and any caught doing such should be burned and seared by a sanctified laser!

By the book, a camera would simply be a Pict Recorder (DH pg 151). From there, let your imagination soar and make sure to make anything revolving around it antiquated and surreal all at the same time. Heck, you can't go wrong describing the photographs as infinitely detailed (you could actually Zoom and Enhance infinitely if you ran it through one of the most rare types of cogitator that could preform that mystical and oft lauded right of Zoom and Enhance!) life-like black and white auto-gravings (because that sounds cooler then photograph or pict which tends to refer to video) of the figures with a moving background, all motion just blurs that keep repeating across the surface of the yellowed chrono-parchment that the auto-graving was etched into.

Graver said:

I like it, especially ", When it comes to technology of the Imperium and how they chose to use it, when it starts making too much sense, then you're doing something wrong."

Berengario said:

Place the limit wherever it suits your campaign the most. The Imperium contains planets that don't have anything above stone-age tech, planets with very high technology, and everything in between.

Don't forget the remembrancers.