Databending
A glitch-art method of corrupting an image by editing its raw file data in unrelated software, such as an audio editor. It grew from circuit-bending culture and flourished in online art communities through the 2000s.
Spot it
- 01Horizontal tearing bands
- 02Garbled color shifts
- 03Repeated displaced stripes
Why it happens
Treating image bytes as audio or text and applying edits like echo or find-and-replace scrambles the encoded data, so the decoded picture shows shifted rows and wrong colors.
Recreate it in Pixio
Image edit prompt“Apply a databending glitch to this image as if its raw file bytes were corrupted in an audio editor: horizontal bands of displaced rows, sections repeating like echoes, sudden magenta and green color shifts, torn scanline stripes and a few blocky static patches. Leave most of the image readable. Keep the original subject and composition.”
Open PixioUpload your image and pick an image-edit model.