week 6 reading

the essay film rests between fiction and non fiction cinema

an essay is neither fiction nor fact

indeterminate, open and indefinable

reflectivity and subjectivity

unlike the documentary film which prevents fact and information, essay film produces complex thought (at times not grounded in reality, can be contradictory, fantastic)

transgressive

meeting point between intellect and emotion

film essays originated from documentary and documentary forms (cinema verite for one)

Phillip Lopate : we must distinguish from a reflective self conscious style and a truly essayistic one > an essay film must have words (either text spoken subtitled or intertitled) which represents a single voice, text must represent and attempt to work out some reasoned line of discourse on a problem, text must impart more than information, readers must be included in a conversation, follow a mental process of contradiction and digression

Timothy Corrigan: usually a short documentary subject, lack of dominant narrative organisation, interaction of a personal voice or vision, interaction of subjective perspective

Michael Renov : descriptive and reflexive modalities are coupled, subjectivity and reflexivity are the staples of the essay film

 

film tv1 analysis/reflection 3

3. Why do we shoot to edit?

Having the editing process in mind when approaching your shoot is helpful as you are able to avoid problems that might occur during the editing process, such as missing shots or cuts that don’t correlate. If you approach your shoot with the concept of many smaller shots that will be edited together then post-production is usually more successful and you don’t spend unnecessary time filming long takes. If you ensure that you have enough coverage of a scene then you also avoid missing crucial footage.

Dually, this allows for more creative license in the edit suite and you are afforded more options in shaping the flow of your film. If you shoot the same scene from multiple angles and shot sizes with editing in mind, the editing process is allowed its creative or experimental potential. You are able to pick and choose until you find the perfect combination of shots and angles.

 

week 5 reading

this weeks readings give us an idea of what can be defined as a narrative and similarly what cannot be defined as a narrative, as adrian wrote in the post about the readings it’s interesting to note where the type of interactive documentaries we are making in this course sit. it also made me think about documentaries in general and crossed over to work we are doing in another subject about how much of a ‘documentary’ is fictional, constructed (or purposefully ‘narrative’ driven, which makes the authenticity questionable). if you make an interactive documentary, for example, about a character or subject that is: in the current world, situated in time, with intelligent mental life, affected by causality and has clear goals or desires that propel the story forward, does this not completely satisfy ryan’s criteria for what can be classed as a narrative? it is possible for documentary to be narrative, therefore it is also possible for interactive documentaries to be narrative if they meet some of the criteria. I wonder, however, if an interactive documentary may still be classed as an interactive documentary if it is strongly narrative based, or if it becomes classified as something else… the question I pose is do interactive narratives have a specific criteria that they must meet to become an ‘interactive’ documentary (like there is criteria in this weeks readings as to what is a narrative and what isn’t a narrative) as opposed to falling into becoming just a narrative, a website, a database or a documentary?

here’s some notes on ryan:

Marie-laure Ryan: Avators of Story

“narratives” are now defined in a multitude of different ways and most definitions traditionally relate to textual actualisation of a story

because transmedial narratives cannot be defined verbally this poses a problem

ryan has proposed the conditions of ‘narrative’ into these dimensions-

1. spatial dimension (story must be about a world populated by individuated existents)
2. temporal dimension (story must be situated in time and undergo significant transformations, transformations must be caused by non habitual physical events)
3. mental dimension (participants in events must be intelligent agents with mental life who react emotionally to the states of the world they inhabit, some events must be actions by these agents/characters and motivated by identifiable goals)
4. formal and pragmatic dimension (evidence of causality, events asserted as ‘fact’, story must have meaning)

ryan concludes that definition of what or what isn’t a narrative is ultimately in the hands of the reader and that the reader embeds their own meaning (or lack of meaning) into a text

 

film tv 1 reflection 2

1. Clown Train utilises many different types of sound to create the soundscape that informs the genre of the film and the general mood. The use of silence between atmos sounds creates tension and draws the audience in – this is done in many horror or thriller films, where sometimes the complete absence of sound is more tense than the moments where there are sound. The eeriness of the train and the isolation the protagonist is supposed to feel is alluded to through synth drones, high-pitched drones and other features in the soundtrack. These drones and high-pitched notes reach a crescendo at points of ultimate tension (for example, before the Clown gives the punchline of the last joke). The foley of the train noises is altered through post production to enhance the reverb and create an eerie, echoey feel so we are at once given a sense of place and context as well as creating a mood. The same is done with the foley of the fluorescent lights flickering – they become exaggerated and enhance the sense of desolation and tension. These are all typical of a horror or thriller genre and the audience immediately connects with a genre and an expectation for the film.  Another genre film which uses sound to inform the space it is in is the horror/thriller film The Ring, particularly in this scene where the girl comes out of the television. There is a distinction between the two ‘spaces’ depicted on screen – in the room of the character who is about to be attacked, the eerie drone as well as television static (which would not be that audible in real life) give a sense of unease and the room itself is made to sound cavernous and therefore isolated. This is done through the resonance of the telephone as it rings, the amount of noise made when the character throws down the television remote and the echoes of his footsteps. In contrast, the scene with Naomi Watts that it is intercut with has a very different soundscape and sounds just like any other normal room. There is not a lot of echoing or reverb and her lines sound dull or natural. Like in Clown Train, the atmos track and eerie sounding music comes to a crescendo when the big moment of tension is about to occur.

 

2. In the week 3 reading “Creating the Sound Design” there was much exploration into what makes a good sound designer. The reading defined the difference between ‘listening’ and ‘hearing’ which is something I never considered before – the point that was offered is that if you’re not truly focusing on listening then sound merely becomes a part of the environment or background noise. If you’re listening to your iPod on the tram but aren’t focusing on it intently then the music that is coming through your headphones isn’t truly registering with you. There is a difference between listening to a record in a quiet room whilst doing nothing else but engulfing yourself in the sound than listening to music or sounds purely as background noise. This point was so important because a good sound designer is perceptive of this and understands how to properly listen – isolating particular sounds, taking stock of all of the sounds that surround them in an environment, ‘selecting’ what the are hearing and having the ability to separate these sounds. If you are unable to properly listen then you are unable to create an authentic and believable soundscape with layers, distance and dynamics like in a real environment.

The reading also touched on the fact that sound designers very often have distinct styles, motifs and techniques that may be resonant through their different work. I thought this was interesting and I wondered how sound designers can maintain their distinctive style when crossing genres or briefs – for example, how can a sound designer create the soundscape for a romantic comedy and then a horror whilst still maintaining their distinctive style, artistic license and individual flair? If you look at the work of directors such as Tim Burton or Baz Luhrman it is easy to recognise the distinct style that carries through all of their films in how they appear visually or the ‘vibe’ they create. It never occurred to me that this might be the same with sound designers and the reading points out that there are many ways in which sound designers make choices which are completely up to their own creative license (for example, some sound designers choose to have quieter background noise so they can bring this to a crescendo in a moment of tension).

3.

4. Aside from some unrealistic plot components, Rolling was a light-hearted and enjoyable short film. The first thing I noticed about the film (which is a device that always captures my interest) was the fact that the reveal or big ‘plot event’ is at the beginning of the film – you are shown the protagonist’s house full of toilet paper and made to wonder what were the events that led up to it. Generally, films that implement this device are successful in engaging the audience’s interest and attention from the onset. The casting of the male character was well done and the direction for his timing and delivery of lines helped the character to come across as authentically awkward (and somewhat hilarious). The dialogue written into the script for his character was believable and the way he delivered the lines didn’t seem acted or contrived. On the other hand, the script for the female character was lacking some authenticity or believability, coupled with the delivery of some of her lines (particularly when she says something to the effect of “did you want me?”). Immediately I was made to be aware I was watching an actress delivering lines, pulling me out of being engrossed or lost in the story. I liked that the plot was fairly simplistic and light-hearted, although the resolve seemed very far fetched (would the girl really turn up to this stranger’s house with the remaining toilet paper and then invite herself in) and at the same time fairly predictable for a romantic-comedy style of film. The production design for both scenes were authentic though this is perhaps because the locations were well chosen, rather than having a lot of thought put into specific design components.

 

week 4 readings

As I have already read (and written) the chapters from Bordwell and Thompson that were listed for this weeks readings I went through and skim read my notes and found the most relevant ones to this course. I’ve written so much on narrative form and structure in the past that I really don’t see any benefit from rehashing that all over again, so instead I decided to focus on the chapters about documentary. The notes I’d written on documentary as a form in itself helps to understand the fundamentals of documentary making before we can then go and challenge this form in making interactive documentaries and other forms which we are engaging with for integrated media.

While documentary typically presents factual information about its subject matter, there are techniques used in documentary making which are ‘staged’. While most events filmed are candid and the opinions presented are verbatim, there is a school within documentary who ‘re-enact’ or recreate events for artistic or visual enhancement. The process of editing a documentary, or choosing which parts of captured footage are presented also, in a way, detracts from this ‘truthfulness’ of the information presented. It is impossible to be entirely objective when capturing a documentary, as obviously the information presented must go through a culling process, and the filmmaker chooses only the material which will further the point they are trying to make. When capturing ‘real life’ such as a person carrying out daily activities, there is some debate as to whether this is real or constructed, as the presence of a camera and a director means that to some degree this ‘daily activity’ has already become altered – if a film maker asks the subject to go about their daily routine, this is still constructed as the subject becomes aware that this is being documented. Observational documentary is different as the film maker does not become involved in the action or instigate action happening, they have no control over the events being presented and merely observe from afar; often the subject does not know that they are being filmed. However, in the editing process some ‘truth’ in observational documentary also becomes subjective. There are many different techniques within documentary which inform genres of documentary – interview style, compilation of archival sources, direct-cinema and nature documentary. A documentary may be organised as a narrative to captivate its audience, using categorical form to form patterns within the information presented and employing formal patterning. Rhetorical form is used when a filmmaker desires to form an argument, and the information is categorised similar to an essay, where the information forms a logical flow in terms of an argument.

constrained task 3

the question was posed to us about editing and speed, specifically do fast cuts mean fast action and slow cuts mean slow (and visa versa). it was interesting to note when I was doing this exercise that the opposite actually occurred – using fast cuts for something fast (ie. the cars on the freeway) made them appear slower than they were due to the jolted nature of where they appear on the screen. this was unexpected for me and the traffic didn’t appear nearly as “fast” as it did using only my eyes. on the other hand, using the same cuts for the washing going slowly around the machine made it almost appear faster… so the principle of fast cutting – fast movement works for slower objects, but not in the case of objects that are already moving fast. generally in films, fast cutting denotes a lot of action, or things moving in a faster pace. I have pointed out with my videos and this task that maybe this is not the case when you are already filming something that is moving fast…