JKR interview in 2 weeks, send in your ?'s

[lindseyharrisst]

No: HPFGUIDX 129901

Something I really want to know is this, though it's probably too 
complicated and nerdily specific for a tv show question. 

I was wondering about the difference, in magical terms, between 
portraits that can obviously communicate and seem to have an
awareness 
and wizarding photographs, which move but do not. 
*As regards portraits, do the wizards in them have true awareness, as 
if they were somehow still alive within the portrait if they were 
dead, for example, or is it a bit like an interactive simulation? 
*If someone is alive and has a portrait somewhere, can knowledge pass 
between the two, so that if portraitdumbledore! was watching
something 
happen, realdumbledore! would know? 
*Does creating a portrait leave someting of the person behind in the 
way that becoming a ghost does? 

I starting thinking that it would be lovely to be able to continue to 
communicate with a dead person through keeping their portrait with
you 
and that led to me wondering if that would really be what you would
be 
doing, even in the wizrding world. If it is, I don't see why everyone 
doesn't have their portrait painted!

Snapesangel