Lab

Forensic physics, the chemistry of analogue media, optics and microscopy — where science meets criminalistics. The “Laboratory” section returns to materials: silver halide, glass plates, magnetic emulsion, paper. We argue that fixed media — the kind you can hold in your hand — remain the last bastion of evidentiary truth in a world where every digital pixel is a candidate for tampering. The section publishes laboratory walkthroughs (how a forensic optical setup is assembled), interviews with materials scientists, comparative studies of digital and analogue capture under controlled conditions, and slow essays on the philosophy of the laboratory itself. Audience: forensic engineers, security architects, photographers, and the editorially curious. Content type: 3–5 features per year, with diagrams, microscopy stills, and bench-top photographs from European laboratories — Bern, Vienna, Munich, Zurich.

In this issue: “The Architecture of Grain” — silver halide against the digital pixel as the last bastion of forensic truth.