Los is a one and a half hour experimental film documenting the city of Los Angeles by filmmaker James Benning. It contains 35 static shots, each a different location in LA, that all have a uniform duration of 2.5 minutes. This is an example in using the cuts for your editing process. The cuts are all time based, which removes subjective input from the filmmaker in an aim to eliminate any bias the filmmaker might have about what to include in the shot and when to cut etc.
In terms of exploring noticing and non-fiction filmmaking through this medium, it is an attempt to explore what the camera notices rather than what we notice. Benning himself also outlines the importance of movement in this type of filmmaking. With zero camera movement any minute piece of movement within the frame is noticed by the audience “because the camera doesn’t, because it has a fixed gaze.” (Panse 2009). The shots being completely devoid of deliberate focus or movement hones the audience’s attention completely to anything that changes within the frame.
This is something that definitely directly applies to my project. I want to ensure that there is very little movement within the frame, and zero movement from the camera. By doing this, I am trying to ensure that the shifting lights are the sole object that the audience focuses its attention towards. I want the light sources to jump around the screen and continually disrupt the audience’s attention and draw them to those specific spots in the frame. This will help to explore how the light source changes the environment as well, because with the lack of other agents or movement in the frame, the light sources will be the only changing variables.
Reference
James Benning. (2001). Los. 26 October 2001. Available from: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NZGxdGRJ3rg.