Image Trace of Adobe Illustrator

Image Trace is a feature in Adobe Illustrator for converting bitmap images into vectors. This feature analyzes pixel data to approximate outlines with Bézier curves.¹

While Image Trace always aims for accurate reproduction by design, predicting its exact outcome is impossible. The traced image is transformed based on various parameters, and fine details are invariably exaggerated or omitted. While this result is repeatable numerically, it remains uncontrollable. As long as the complexity of the computational process exceeds human intuition, the irregular outcomes of approximation in the digital environment will always remain unpredictable. And the gap between the traced image and the original, which inevitably accompanies the process, connects to the new potential of digital images—the potential of the Potential Image.

Hito Steyerl's Strike (2010) demonstrates digital randomness through a simple gesture. A 20-second video of a hammer striking an LCD monitor screen hung on the gallery wall suggests the surface and fragmentation of digital images. Alongside his artistic tendency to explore images and politics, this work primarily connects to discourse concerning power and resistance in contemporary society, revealed through digital materiality. Yet, even before its political context, the formal implication embedded in the work is quite intense. Is the inherent nature of digital images truly predictable? In an era of algorithms that (seem to) eliminate chance, how can we encounter the uncertain?

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Work using this method:

1. Random Silhouette