What’s wrong with simply observing the world?

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There is nothing wrong with observing the world. In this day and age, it feels sometimes as if people don’t do this enough. Many of us lead busy lives and hectic schedules, that observing the things around us can take a backseat. However, once we do make observations about our environment, I believe we, as a collective and as individuals, have a duty to do more than observe- and to instead be active participants in our realities.

As human beings, we are distinguishable from other animals by our superior mental development. Thus, we have the power to not only observe and perceive the world for what it is, but to construct our own judgements and opinions about our environment. These judgements can create divides between people, but they can also lead to powerful and passionate works of art, cinema, literature, etc. Sometimes, as unbiased and neutral as we wish to make these, our own opinions can unintentionally filter through. And at other times, we start a project with an initial political agenda. The documentary film is the perfect vessel for these agendas.

Erik Barnouw (1974, Documentary) writes, “The documentarist has a passion for what he finds in images in sounds — which always seem to him more meaningful than anything he can invent.” Documentary films have a power that other films simply cannot possess. As dramatic and intense as fictional films can be, they are still merely fiction, and leaving the cinema, the audience is well aware of this fact. However, documentary films have the task of dramatising and capturing real and true events. They not only have the ability to observe these events from an outsider perspective, but the practitioner can have more of an intimate involvement with an issue, thus allowing the audience to involve themselves too. To take the position of ‘observing’ when making a documentary, would be a missed opportunity to immerse ones self in the stories, passions, perspectives and chronicles of the communities/subjects involved.

The 1996 short film Blight (John Smith, in collaboration with Jocelyn Pook), revolved around the issue of the building of the M11 Link Road in East London. This proposal angered local residents, whom as longtime home-owners, wanted to save their homes and memories from the demolition. The documentary takes the side of these residents- ultimately viewing the M11 Link Road as a negative for the East London community. We, as an audience, hear the homeowners speak of their fond memories in their homes through voiceovers throughout the film. These are not straightforward interviews being played, however, and it does take a while for the situation to be placed into context. This audio is paired with music but also footage of the demolition, juxtaposing the two to create a somber mood in the film, which ultimately ends as quite sad once we see the demolition being completed. A.L Rees, A History of Experimental Film and Video, states the “rhythmic, emotive soundtrack is partly musical and partly a collage of the residents’ voices” and that the accompaniment of the composition “reinvent[s] a radical documentary tradition.” The audio and visual combination is powerful, and it is difficult to see how a documentary could hold the same power and passion if it were coming from a neutral position. This issue clearly had two contrasting sides with strong opposing views, and thus it was necessary to do more than just watch the chaos play out.

This shot from Blight depicts the machinery involved in the demolition as the enemy. It is evidently large and intimidating in this still, and continues to fuel the idea of the residents being the victims as their homes are demolished.

It is clear from this construction that Smith has a political stance on this issue, and is not simply constructing a film from a neutral perspective. Smith worked on the project over two years, from 1994-1996, during the demolition, gathering interviews from the local residents as well as footage of the deconstruction. Although, as the filmmaker in this scenario, Smith might be viewed as somewhat of an ‘outsider’ to the whole situation, forming an opinion and voicing the political views of the angered homeowners, proves that Smith’s documentary was more than just an observation. The overall mood of the film cements Smith as a voice for the people- an advocate that opposes the proposed M11 Link road Construction and instead fights for salvaging both the homes and the memories of the community.

“But factuality alone does not define documentary films; it’s what the filmmaker does with those factual elements, weaving them into an overall narrative that strives to be as compelling as it is truthful and is often greater than the sum of its parts” Curran Bernard, S. (2010). Documentary Storytelling.
I believe this quote sums up why an observational piece of work will never be as compelling as a documentary where the filmmaker has been actively participating in the story and background of the issue itself. Some filmmakers may have the passion and political view before they begin the project, and others may pick this up along the way. Understandably, in the example of the film Blight, Smith’s decision to give a voice to the residents makes sense in this context. Other documentary films may not have subject matters with the same level of political views as Blight does, yet I believe it is still necessary for us as practitioners to really immerse ourselves in the art we are creating, striving to create narratives that surpass factuality alone and do not passively observe the world.

Blog 3

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When visiting the location with my sisters, as expected, the animals took up a huge part of the attention paid.
As part of the project experiment style, I asked them to each pick a place to go and then pick what they wanted me to take pictures of, also prompting them to look at more than just the animals. Through this I noticed that my youngest sister, Charlotte, took interest in the animals when they were alone rather than in groups or herds. Whenever she asked me to take a picture of something it was usually a single animal, “that zebra,” or “the meerkat.” I am not sure why she was more drawn to these. Perhaps because she is younger, focusing on one is a little easier than several, doing different things. She tends to do this when reading books too- will generally point to one illustration out of the whole page and talk about that.

Contrastingly, my other sister, at eight years old, enjoys reading everything she can understand- because her literacy is improving. Thus, she paid a lot of attention to the signs, telling us what lots of them said, if there were no pictures to tell, yet also asking to take pictures of the animals, single and in groups, too. The concentration differed a lot between the two, and I think I only noticed because I know them so well.

Just with the Abbotsford Convent in task three, the Zoo proved to be a generous location to house different attention, perspectives, etc.

Blog 2

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The next location I’ve chosen for my sisters to visit with me for task four is the Werribee Zoo. Although I have been here before it hasn’t been for around 10+ years and I have little recollection of what it actually looks like.
What I enjoyed in task three’s location (Abbotsford Convent) was the way that the natural landscape worked so harmoniously with the architecture there too. I feel that zoos will try to incorporate this blending of sceneries together too, and so I think it would be a good location to choose.

When I visited the zoo alone, my attention was obviously drawn to animals there, but again, I found that the signs and buildings had an aesthetic that was really colourful and eye-catching. Understandably, it had to be this way to draw peoples attention to where they needed to go, and I think it was these colours that captivated me. I also liked the rustic and tribal feel that the location gave off- and I feel like the pictures I took from my experience encapsulated the warm and bright colours the landscape offered.

To note: I have also never been to a zoo alone, and so I think the animals were actually less of a novelty when I was by myself. Although i did go to the different to exhibits of theirs, I also paid a lot more attention to the foliage and manmade structures aswell.

Blog 1

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The first steps for my final project were to:
Choose people for my experiment and to choose a location too. I settled on choosing my two younger sisters again, and settled on Port Melbourne as the location for them to go to. I picked this randomly off of the map and was somewhat sure that they hadn’t done there before, as they had told me they hadn’t. However when we arrived, I realised they had been there before, and quite recently, so I didn’t want this to be the final location. I also found that the prospect of using a mic and having them notice sound here was pretty difficult on a windy day- not effective like I had hoped. My next task was to therefore find a new place to go, and a new medium to attempt.

Task 4 Reflection

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Task 4 Reflection

At the beginning of this studio, the task of ‘noticing’ felt like it would be simple, as noticing things is in our nature- something we do every day. I initially wasn’t sure where this topic would lead my final project to, as it felt too broad to really zone in on something specifically. However, during task one, the idea of forcing yourself to notice something you wouldn’t usually, was a lot more difficult than it seemed. Simply saying to yourself “Today I’m going to take notice of all the street signs I pass” sounds like it could work, in theory, but when put into practice, I found that as a starting point it was more difficult than I had anticipated. When something is as routine as getting to and from a familiar place, we tend to look over the simple things, such as the names of streets, roads, etc. For me, especially, I tend to generally look over such things and that was why I made it my mission, in a sense, to take note. As a beginning point, this forced me to pay attention to the things I actually pay attention to, and question, ‘Why do I notice this, rather than that?’
I think it was task two; travelling to a new place, out of my usual routine, that made really gave me the idea for task four. Because, when put into a new environment, I could not blame my noticing on any predispositions I had of the location. There was no biased for the environment that I was in. Instead, the things I noticed would say more about what I am susceptible to noticing rather than what is outwardly there.

Because of my younger sisters’ involvement in my task three, and the way that turned out, I wanted to do some research on the way that children perceive things- how this may be different to adults because they have had less time to adopt preconceived beliefs and bias opinions. Some of the research made task three a lot more understandable. I noticed through task 4 that at locations, distractions were a big issue in experiencing their environment. For example; when my sisters saw the Spirit of Tasmania ship it was difficult for them to notice much else, as they had experienced this before. However, I started to see that this wasn’t a distraction, it was just their different way of noticing, similarly to how I may be ‘distracted‘ by the sunset, etc.

I don’t think my final project reflects everything I have learnt in this studio-
I was not happy with the way I tried manipulating photos to show different perspectives. I was also unhappy with how I could not stick to my desired schedule that I had made up in class. Minor complications kept arising and I ended up putting the project off until it all became too much of a rush. However, I do think task four is an approach, nonetheless, at attempting to explore the notion of noticing and all that comes with it. I found that my most difficult task was figuring out which medium would best fit the idea I was looking at. What I explained in my proposal was how I was very interested in the readings idea of ‘nature as a backdrop for human consciousness.’ I think this tied in really well with the idea of one location and multiple perspectives. As much as an environment has its own noticeable features and things that stand out, we will all experience it differently from one another- no matter how similar we are. That was the idea I wished to explore through my work in task four.

I decided to present task four as a single blog with three separate sections to represent the three different perspectives. I found this way effective for me because the blog as a whole acts as the location whilst the three links (subjects) act as the three separate perspectives, of the same place. Evidently, my younger sisters experiences were different to the one I had at the zoo, but the changes are really subtle until looked on over and over. I think this is because the zoo does tend to draw your attention to one thing at a time, (usually animals). However, I chose images that really did demonstrate what my sisters also focused on.

Task 4 Pitch

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Part II – Project proposal (20%)

MEDIA 2 // PITCH

Originally, I was overwhelmed with ‘noticing’ as a concept to explore. It is a task that is very broad and limitless, so narrowing down to a few questions that arose from an experiment seemed quite difficult.
Initially, my aim in these experiments was to return to the location from the previous project brief, and to experiment with video as a tool, rather than still photographs. However, I had a few different questions that also stemmed from task two, which I was more passionate to find out about. The qualitative information I gathered from the several experiments is enough to hopefully build the foundation for the final project: Task four.

Questions/Queries from task two

Can I notice similar patterns through movement (video rather than still images)?

– May have to revisit original location (Abbotsford Convent) to compare the two different types of media //or collect both video and still photo from new location.

Questions/ Queries from Task two
What do I notice in another persons noticing?

Ingredients
Ø Camera to record videos and photos
Ø Pen and paper
Ø Friend/ companion to accompany (must change with every experiment)

Experiment 1

I revisited the Convent in an attempt to pick up on things that I had failed to do in my initial visit. Ultimately, this was supposed to be the point in which I took videos to which I could compare patterns in movement with the patterns projected through the still photographs. However, I was with another person than I had ventured to the location with during the previous task. I found that the media I had collected varied drastically from what I had collected the fist time- yet this hadn’t been my intention. Originally, I had only put forward the idea of changing the medium in which the subject was captured with, not necessarily the subject itself. This led me to revisit my prompt, and to draw upon another question that had arisen from brainstorming, although it had not been the one I initially aimed to explore:

How can a persons noticing / recollection be shaped by others?

Experiment 2

Thus, experiment three was more so an observing experiment rather than collecting any more media of my own. I made a note of noting down the kinds of things that my younger sisters noticed in environments and whether or not these had any patterns. However, I based this experiment on what they told me they noticed, without having to be prompted beforehand. This may sound like I did not receive enough feedback, but they were very talkative and responsive in their environments, mostly discussing what was on their mind, what they had noticed.

Experiment 3

The last experiment was a similar take on the previous one; however, I had the girls tell me what they had noticed, rather than simply recording their unprompted responses like I had previously.

What I’ve found through the several experiments is that as much as we may think otherwise, our own version of a ‘subjective’ perspective in noticing is still somewhat swayed by those around us. Environmental factors impact our reality: the way in which we view and think about what is around us.

In my final project: task four, I want to explore more thoroughly, the idea of different perspectives of the same subject. Larger scale photographs are more objective in their subject matter rather than a close up, which forces its audience to notice what exactly the picture is of. Thus, going further into this project, what I’d like to do is play upon the idea of subjective interpretation with either larger photos/videos. I was also really influenced by the reading on James Benning’s films, and one quote in particular.

“Nature is merely a backdrop for human consciousness without any materiality of its own.”

In going forward to task 4, I would like to explore landscapes as a backdrop for more than one human consciousness.

Task 3 + Pitch Reflection

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After conducting the three experiments I found that my concentration had shifted massively from one aspect of noticing to another. Originally I had wanted to delve further into the different ways of recording my noticing i.e. video, audio, pictures. I was initially interested in this because of how successful the media I collected from task two had turned out. The pictures I collected were aesthetically pleasing, projecting patterns in architecture that I did not expect to originally notice. Thus, the next task I set myself was to look for patterns in movements, which I had aimed to record as short videos. I did record a few snippets of video, however, on my second visit to the Convent, I found to become more immersed in the noticing that my younger sisters were undertaking, rather than my own. Their influence on my own noticing was more impactful than I had first imagined, and thus it posed the questions: How can another persons noticing impact my own? and How do different people notice the same subject?

These questions have given me the foundation for what I wish to explore in task four. When presenting my pitch, I was thoroughly pleased to have been given numerous ideas as part of the feedback. Some of the suggestions given as part of feedback included taking my sisters to another location and almost repeating the processes that I had undergone in the experiments of task three. In this task, however, my intention would be to focus on their noticing rather than solely my own. I really do enjoy the idea of this as a beginning to my task four as I believe children have a completely different way of both noticing and perceiving the same surroundings as us. To be able to capture their experience with a location (preferably one of a natural, organic landscape) is something I want to focus on in project four. I am unsure as of yet if my final project will be the recording of them and their noticing, or rather the environment from their perspective. However it comes to be, the feedback I received has given me that direction to focus on and has boosted my confidence in the project itself. I also think experimenting with a few different mediums is still a possibility, as the option of using audio and sound in this task was suggested. I hadn’t initially thought of how to incorporate audio into my task four, but now there is a clear path that can be taken.

I do hope for task four to explore my noticing of other people’s noticing, and hope that it can also incorporate the idea of nature as a ‘backdrop for human consciousness’.

TASK 3 EXPERIMENT 2 & 3

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After changing my direction since experiment 1, Task 2 and 3 aim to further investigate the next prompt:
How do individuals notice the same thing differently?

For this experiment I was joined by my younger sisters again, as I wanted to get a contrasting perspective on a new place to thus investigate multiple perspectives of noticing.
My first experiment was for me to record what the younger girls noticed when we simply visited a new cafe. I used the notes app on my phone to record the things they noticed, but I decided that in this experiment I would not prompt them to tell me but instead wait for it to happen. The results were as follows:

Charlotte (5 years old)
– Points out the painting of the bird on the wall, and tells me about the finger painting she made at creche.
– Comments on the lilac colour of her milkshake
– Notices that two of her chips are almost exactly the same size

Emily (8 years old)
– Also comments on the painting of the bird on the wall
– Notices that we both have our hair in a ponytail
– Says that the cafe is quieter than the last time we went out for lunch
– Comments on me writing notes on my phone
– Notices her milkshake is filled higher than Charlottes
– The lights are like the lights she has in her room

In comparing this experiment with the second, I found there to be a significant distance. Instead of keeping note of little things they noticed in a new environment, I instead asked them afterwards if they noticed anything about the said place (which happened to be a friends place.) When prompted about what they noticed, the answers were a lot more artificial and I felt as though when they were put on the spot, they made an effort to come up with answers that sometimes didn’t even correlate with the place, fabricating things to meet my criteria. I think it’s a difficult task to record what others notice without it becoming artificial, however with younger children it seems to be somewhat easier as they ten to vocalise the things they notice. I think moving onto task four I would like to take the more natural approach in recording what exactly others notice rather than force them to think of something after they’ve already gone through the experience. Recording them in an environment via video may be the best way to collect such perspectives.

TASK 3 EXPERIMENT 1

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REQUIREMENTS
– PEN & PAPER
– CAMERA TO VIDEO AND RECORD
– NOTEPAD

METHOD
– TAKE 4-5 SECOND VIDEOS OF BOTH ARCHITECTURE AND SCENERY
– RECORD W/ NOTES ANY PATTERNS NTOTED OR SIMILARITIES (WHILST AT SAID LOCATION)
– ONCE AWAY FROM THE LOCATION, LOOK OVER MEDIA COLLECTED FOR ANY OTHER PATTERNS THAT WERE NOT ORIGINALLY NOTICED

PROMPT
Can the same patterns and textures be noticed through a different medium?

REFLECTION-
This experiment was originally all about changing the form of media I had originally used in task two (which was simply taking photos at Abbotsford Convent.) I had wanted to take videos in this experiment but found that the company that I was with, my two younger sisters, had altered my noticing altogether and drawn me away from the things I would usually pick up on. This idea interested me. We are very much impacted and swayed by those around us, without even being conscious of it sometimes. I also realised that the experience at the Convent for me was completely different to what it would have been for the five and eight year olds. This prompted my new questions that I wished to explore in the next two experiments. How can a persons noticing / recollection be shaped by others?
and
How do individuals notice differently?

MEDIA-
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