Like last week, I had to go out and find this Instagram videographer. Once again, back to the listicles. This practitioner was number 4 on a list of ‘5 Video Artists to Follow on Instagram’.

The video I have chosen to analyse is this:

Source

Why did I choose this video? It had a simple aesthetic and theme, however the production looked intricate, almost magical. I found its message, ‘let your light shine’, sweet and uplifting.

Who is the practitioner (what is their name?) and when were they practicing?

This Instagram animator and illustrator is named Rachel Ryle and she has been active since 2014. The video can be found at the link above.

With the photo or video you are examining, when was it produced (date)?

Rachel Ryle posted this video to her Instagram account @rachelryle on the 15th of June 2016, but due to the time and work required for a stop motion video, production probably began days or weeks prior to publication. (That alliteration!)

How was the photo or video authored?

Rachel Ryle created this stop motion video by drawing on physical paper and capturing it frame by frame from a top-down angle. She has used cutouts of illustrations like the projector and projector screen to make her illustrations move across the white background and she has also utilised small lights to illuminate the light bulb and projector.

The video has been captured in the square format popularised by Instagram and in the top left corner is her website URL, presumably added in during post-production.

The caption of this video is emotional and personal, speaking of the Orlando shootings that occured around the time of posting and also of Ryle’s own fear of her first Father’s Day without her father.

What I find most interesting about the authoring of this video is that really, it’s just a bunch of photos, but put one after another, they create a time sequence, a video. It’s photos becoming video. Additionally, it uses stop motion, a very old method of animation, yet it was published on Instagram, the epitome of modern online video.

How was the photo or video published?

This video was published on Rachel Ryle’s Instagram (@rachelryle) on the 15th of June 2016. It was also posted to Rachel Ryle’s YouTube account on the same day, with the title ‘Let It Shine! – Stop Motion Animation by Rachel Ryle’. Additionally, the YouTube video was embed in a post on Rachel Ryle’s website. As she also has a Facebook and Twitter account, I presume she posted the video (or links to other publications of the video) on those platforms too.

In this article about Rachel Ryle on Tech.Co, I discovered that she has a background in marketing and partnering with brands, one that she combined with her art and Instagram’s then-new video affordances to create beautiful and viral online videos. As the ‘internet continues to move in a more commercial direction’ (Berry 2018, p.9), it was this background that allowed Ryle to be an Instagram illustrator and animator full-time.

How was the photo or video distributed?

Because of the variety of platforms Ryle posted her video on, it would’ve reached a wide audience almost instantaneously. As I mentioned in last week’s post, thanks to smartphones, people can literally hold a copy of this video the second it is published. Online media makes publishing and distributing almost one and the same.

Often ‘we take for granted the delivery of different media forms streaming seamlessly across the web, just as much as we take for granted the seemingly unlimited storage aspects for photo and video’ (Berry 2018, p.8). Over two years after publication, I easily found Ryle’s video, on Instagram, YouTube, and her website. With the affordances of the internet, not only can people access content immediately after it is published, they can also continue to access it for years to come.

 

For my final thought: In this week’s reading, Berry (2018) writes that ‘videoblogs depend entirely on physical technology both during production, distribution and consumption’ (Berry 2018, p.19). And that’s the case for this video too. This video was produced frame by frame, with drawings done on old school pen and paper. Though the video file itself may be intangible, just a bunch of numbers, those numbers have to be stored on a hard drive. I have no idea how hard drives work. Maybe Rachel Ryle has no idea how hard drives work either. But regardless, we depend on its ‘materiality, and it’s [sic] stability, for [our] work’ (Berry 2018, p.19). Not only is the video stored on physical devices, it is also distributed and consumed on them.

I think it’s remarkably interesting that despite the growing intangibility of our data, stored in a cloud, our relationships, suspended in text bubbles, and our identities, defined by pages on various websites, we keep returning to the physical plane, the space where our bodies exist and play and interact.

It’s so very human and I think it’s lovely.

____________

References:

Berry, T 2018, ‘Situating Videoblogging’, Videoblogging Before YouTube, Institute of Network Cultures.

To be honest, I had to go out and find this photographer. As you know, I barely use my Instagram, so I had to ask Google for lists of ’15 inspiring photographers to follow on Instagram’.

I stopped at the first photographer on the list. When the article noted that ‘he describes himself as a storyteller first and a photographer second’ I was intrigued.

The photo I have chosen to analyse is this:

Source

Simone Bramante has so many stunning photos I had trouble deciding but I eventually settled on this for its warm simple colours and the way the girl’s skirt flows out behind her.

Who is the practitioner (what is their name?) and when were they practising?

The photographer I have chosen is Simone Bramante, an Italian Instagram photographer with the username @brahmino. He has been a photographer for over 15 years and is currently practising on Instagram.

This photo itself has no title but it is a part of a collection or ‘story’ of photos titled White Labyrinth. 

With the photo or video you are examining, when was it produced (date)?

The photo was uploaded to Instagram on the 27th of March 2017. It can be found at the link above.

How was the photo or video authored?

With the iPhone’s increasingly improving cameras and the virality of Instagram, the entry barriers of authoring, publishing and distributing photos are much lower than they were than in the legacy photography age.

Simone Bramante was invited by Carpisa, a bag company, to travel to Matera, Italy for 48 hours.

The photo was presumably taken with an iPhone, maybe with the additional of clamps and a tripod. The girl posing in the photo is a local photographer named Enza.

Unlike film photography, where the amount of photos you could take was limited by the film, digital photography allows you to take as many photos as your phone and cloud storage allows. This photo may have been just one of dozens, perhaps even a burst, from which he selected this one photo, where her skirt fluttered at just the right height.

One interesting element afforded by Instagram and the ease of photo-sharing is the commercial aspect. ‘Photographs attract eyeballs and, where there are eyeballs there lies the possibility to make money’ (Palmer 2014, p.249). Bramante, a photographer, an artist, was hired by Carpisa, a company, to promote their name. Yet, there are no bags in this photo. This isn’t like the product placement in films. The decision behind this promotion is not as straightforward. Bramante was hired to advertise the location of Matera, Italy and by extension, advertise the idea of travelling, and by linking Carpisa in his caption, hopefully infect his 900k+ followers with the travel bug, influence them to travel to exotic places like Matera, and buy some Carpisa bags to help them out.

What a strange world we live in.

How was the photo or video published?

This photo was published to Instagram on the 27th of March 2017. The photo is also geotagged at Matera, Italy. As Palmer (2014) writes, ‘geo-location metadata is commercially valuable’. People searching for Matera, Italy, maybe as a potential holiday destination, might have seen this photo and tagged potential holiday buddies.

In his caption, he added the name of the photo collection, White Labyrinth, as well as a simple, very human musing, the kind that could be found on anyone’s daily Instagram. This is advertising even more ingrained than sponsored posts that work their way seamlessly into feeds. This is advertising within a regular Instagram account, one that earned your follows and likes honestly, through their content.

Perhaps this is why people tend to react negatively to independent creators accepting sponsorships. There is an intimacy in knowing that there is a single or small team of people behind that one account. It is furthered by the casualness and widespread of iPhone photography. It creates a commonality between creator and consumer. It makes them feel like one and the same. There’s a humanness, and perhaps many feel this humanness, this small scale, is disrupted when a creator takes on sponsorship. They’re no longer a human, they are the extension of a company’s values and desires.

How was the photo or video distributed?

Because of Instagram, the publication and distribution of this photo would’ve been instantaneous. People carry their smartphones with them all the time, meaning they would technically be able to hold a copy of this photo in their hands the second it was uploaded.

Smartphones afford a tactility to online photography that is perhaps lost in viewing the photo on a laptop. Palmer (2014) describes the iPhone as ‘a miniature photo album that can be passed around the dinner table with friends’ (Palmer 2014, p.248). ‘The mobile phone,’ he writes, ‘…introduces a previously missing visual intimacy to screen culture’ (Palmer 2014, p.248). In that tactility, in the fact it fits into the palm of the hand (much like a Polaroid or printed 4×6 photo) there is that intimacy, but also a callback to an older medium, much like I discussed last week. We didn’t need to make touch screens. We didn’t need to turn our digital photos back into physical. But we did because of that nostalgia factor.

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References

Palmer, D 2014, “Mobile Media Photography”, The Routledge Companion to Mobile Media, pp.245-255.

Image source

I’ve only seen The Sound of Music once, however, it popped into my mind when discussing how the quirks of old video formats can become evident in new media despite the fact that the origin of these quirks no longer exists.

Let me explain through example.

 

Who is the practitioner (what is their name?) and when were they practicing? What is the title of the photo or video you have chosen to analyse? (can you provide a link?)

The Sound of Music was directed and produced by Robert Wise, who practiced between 1934 and 2000. This film was based off the stage musical by Richard Rodgers and Oscar Hammerstein II. Though I can’t link the entire film, I can link a trailer.

 

With the photo or video you are examining, when was it produced (date)?

The film was produced in 1965, based off the musical from 1959.

 

How was the photo or video authored?

From a technical standpoint, The Sound of Music was filmed in 70mm and it used DeLuxe Color processing and six-track sound recording.

But that’s not what I’m interested in.

The Sound of Music was based off a musical. Musicals are generally longer than films and hence they have intermissions, because you can’t exactly pause a live performance.

Yet, even when the film was on VHS and DVD, when the power to pause is at our fingertips, intermissions are still included, even though they are no longer required. Preservation of the original at the expense of practicality.

This can be seen everywhere, not just in The Sound of Music. Vintage photo filters, grain on YouTube videos, retro graphics on video games–everywhere, we see digital effects that imitate old physical quirks, or even limitations.

 

How was the photo or video published?

The film was premiered on the 2nd of March, 1965 at the Rivoli Theater in New York City.

 

How was the photo or video distributed?

At release (2nd of March 1965), the only way to see this film was to go to its opening premiere in NYC. Seats were presumably limited and entry exclusive. On 10th of March 1965, it premiered in Los Angeles, again presumably with a similar set up. After that however, it opened at 131 cinemas across the US, then, a few months later, in 261 theaters overseas.

The process of watching this film used to require you to completely transport your physical body to another space, purchase and present a physical ticket and sit in a designated space just to see this film.

Eventually, you could buy it on VHS and take it home.

Then with VHS, you could watch it in the comfort of your own home and in your own time, but you still needed to slot the bulky rectangle tape into the bulkier machine and make sure you rewind it after watching otherwise you won’t be able to watch it straight away next time. Several physical objects and movements are involved. DVD was more or less the same just slimmer, no rewinding required.

But now, in 2018, you can simply stream it or download it online. You don’t have to haul your couch potato body off the couch to put in a disc or tape, all you need is a finger to click the mouse or touch pad.

Now as announced in a YouTube video on the Rodgers and Hammerstein channel, The Sound of Music began touring in 70mm on the 18th of May 2018.

This Saturday, in opposition to single click required to watch films now, you can haul your body over the St Kilda’s Astor Theatre, buy a ticket (physical or digital) and watch The Sound of Music in a cinema.

It’s funny how history comes back around.

After looking at the black and white photos of Henri Cartier-Bresson, I was inspired to revisit one of my favourite photos I studied in high school.

Image source

 

Who is the practitioner (what is their name?) and when were they practicing?

This photo was taken by Jerry Uelsmann, an American photographer who used photomontage and darkroom effects to create surrealistic images, like the one above. He practiced from the mid-20th century and still currently practices photography today.

 

What is the title of the photo or video you have chosen to analyse (can you provide a link?)

This photo is untitled, perhaps intentionally, to allow the audience freedom of interpretation. It can be found online here.

 

With the photo or video you are examining when was it produced (date)?

It was produced in 1976.

 

How was the photo or video authored? 

Uelsmann, practising before the era of Photoshop, used composite photography techniques, like multiple negatives and enlargers in a darkroom, to create this surreal image. Here, he combines photos of a study, a sky and a person.

Where Henri Cartier-Bresson took his photos decisively in the present, waiting for that one perfect moment, Uelsmann used a process he called ‘post-visualisation’, composing and creating the perfect image after all its pieces have been photographed, not photographing with an image already in mind.

If we look at photography as the ‘active practice of cutting through the flow of mediation’ (Zylinska 2016, p.13), Uelsmann is making several cuts, then combining them into one new image, ‘stabilising [the] data as images and objects’ (Zylinska 2016, p.13).

 

How was the photo or video published? 

It is difficult to find information on where the photo was originally published, but now, it has been published to both Jerry Uelsmann’s official website and the websites of various art museums like The Metropolitan Museum of Art and Telluride Gallery of Fine Art. This photo was produced in 1976 before the rise of the Internet and back then, it would’ve most likely been presented in one of Uelsmann’s books, or in a gallery as a print, much like a painting.

These days, the fact that the photo is so easily to discover on the Internet, just a Google search away, is a double-edged sword. On one hand, it allows people from a non-photography background, like me, to stumble upon this image and delight in its beauty. On the other, it reduces its uniqueness and allows for replicas and imitations to be made, and even allows for people to illegally profit off his work.

 

How was the photo or video distributed? 

Currently, this photo is distributed to viewers via the Internet via the avenues I listed in the above question. Printed copies can be bought online from places like artnet for prices up to $3000 (currency unknown).

_________________

References

Zylinska, J 2016, ‘Photomediations: An Introduction by Joanna Zylinska’, Photomediations: A Reader, Open Humanities Press, http://www.openhumanitiespress.org/books/ titles/photomediations/.