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The Scene in Cinema Week 2 Reflection

In class this week, we attempted a block-through of a scene. In it, a student comes into class, makes conversation with others and sits down. For me, I gained a deeper insight into focus pulling. I have used a wireless focus puller before where I could manage the focus behind a monitor away from the camera itself. In this class, we used camera tape on the focus ring of the lens and used focus markers to keep track of my focus on the subject. Focus marking can be done with stand-ins, an assistant to place a marker in a spot that can’t be seen on camera where the subject should be, and then marking the focus on the tape with a pen. This allows the focus puller to know where the focus should be without seeing the viewfinder. 

The chapter by Bunuel discusses the idea of segmentation and its close ties to cinema. He writes that a well-shot film with good camera angles can seem uncinematic because it lacked a good segmentation or decoupage. Whereas a film with ordinary photographic techniques can be a good film with great decoupage. My understanding of decoupage is the process carried out before anything is shot. It takes place during scriptwriting and especially storyboarding. Bunuel echoes this idea, saying that the “very act of setting one’s camera before an object to be filmed presupposes the existence of a decoupage” (2000, p.134). In class, we spoke about the role of the director. In this case, the director who is also in charge of turning the script into storyboard is also in charge of the decoupage of the film. This task differs with the role of the editor whose role is to coordinate shots with each other, however, the arrangement, sequencing of the film was “first projected inside the brain of the filmmaker” (2000, p.135).

The Scene in Cinema Week 1 Reflection

Coming into this studio, I look forward to furthering my cinematography knowledge. This week’s class has been a refresher on some of the basics in camera operation, the exposure triangle and cinematic properties such as depth of field. The term ‘coverage’ was not something I am personally familiar with. My initial thoughts on coverage remind me more of capturing sufficient footage, such as B-roll, for the edit. From what I took away this week, coverage meant breaking down a shot into its basic features. The idea of blocking was experimented upon in the first lesson, with the use of a floor plan, the team could accurately see the beginning and end of their movements onscreen. Prior to this class, I was told that T stops are a more accurate measurement of light entering the camera sensor, which is the reason why most Cine lenses are rated in T stops. However, I now understand that the reason why it is more accurate is that it is a measurement of the light after it passes through the glasses in a lens, although the inaccuracies are barely noticeable.

The exercise on the depth of field is a useful one in this industry. The effect of a shallow depth of field – the bokeh that is generated – is commonly associated with cinema. When clients ask me for a cinematic look on their videos, this is often what they want to achieve. The exercise we did in class showed us the extremes, by creating the most and least shallow depth of field possible. In the reading by Tom Reilly, he defines a shot as what is “photographed in between the words action and cut” (2009, p.16). The most interesting part for me was his mention that generally, 2 4/8 of a page is shot in one day. Taking into account the time it takes to set up lights and a camera, directing the actors and breaks, it does not surprise me that the average amount of script covered is 2 4/8 pages.

Entangled Media Assessment 3: Reflection

The project is in the form of an Instagram profile. From the username, the bio and the posts, we aim to explore the topic of eating disorders and its relationship to social media. We sought to examine the link between fear and food for people suffering from eating disorders, for whom the lines between the two are somewhat blurred. The page is best viewed on a mobile device in a 3×3 grid or in a linear scroll fashion.

The creation of this project was quite methodical. There was a clear division of tasks and duties for each member, the nature of posts on Instagram meant we could each create a couple and then put them together in the end. The nature of this group project meant that several ideas clash together to form a more complex issue. Much like Ingold’s idea of entanglement, my idea of superstitions and fear “[threads its] own path through the meshwork” and stumbles upon the idea of body image, resulting in “knots in a tissue of knots” (Ingold 2011). In addition, the separation of the project in several smaller pieces of media artefacts leads into Alexander’s idea on microcontent which he defines as content that is “easier to produce and consume”, can be “reused in multiple ways and places” (2011, p.30 ). Through this, there is a sense of cohesion and a product that is greater than the sum of its parts.

There were 2 major affordances with the media that could be created for this project; the limitation of the Instagram profile and of the platform. Since Instagram presents the media artefacts in a 3×3 grid initially, we had to consider the structure of each post in an interesting manner. I took inspirations from Instagram profiles that utilise grid designs such as @the_oa, @pantone, @ellesenparlens. By using the 3×3 grid, they were able to create a scrollable feed akin to a puzzle, as well using a key colour that is present in every post. Consider the grid system, we picked mostly black, white and red posts to be in a ‘+’ pattern, whilst more colourful media works are stationed in the four corners. Furthermore, certain affordances of Instagram content meant that gif formats are not accepted and thus had to be converted into a video. Also, Instagram prefers that all media are square shaped, as such the media that we created attempts to follow this rule. The plus symbol places emphasis on the centre video, encouraging the viewer to look at the centre video which serves as a warning for people suffering from eating disorders.

The Instagram layout worked out as I hoped, in the future, I would want to expand on the grid so that there are more panels vertically, enabling different types of grid designs. One of the gripes I had with the final product is a lack of customisation available from Instagram. There really were not a lot of options available for us to modify apart from the profile picture, the bio and the posts themselves. Next time, it would be beneficial to have more elements on the page be customisable in order to better represent our ideas.

During the making of this project, a query I had was the effect of the media, in general, had on body image. From my research on the effect of media exposure on body image for women, I found a few points of interest to explore next time. According to a study conducted in 2008, it is suggested that “exposure to media images that depict the thin-ideal body is indeed linked to women’s dissatisfaction with their own bodies” (Grabe, Ward & Hyde 2008). However, in a newer study, this view is contradicted. “…only peer competition… predicted negative outcomes” associated with body image (Ferguson, Munoz, Garza & Galindo 2013). The idea of peer competition and its related effects is worth investigating in future projects.

 

List of references:

Alexander, B (2011) “The Next Wave of Digital Storytelling Platforms.” The New Digital Storytelling: Creative Narratives with New Media. ABC-CLIO, LLC: 29–43.

Ferguson C, Munoz M, Garza A & Galindo M 2013, “Concurrent and Prospective Analyses of Peer, Television and Social Media Influences on Body Dissatisfaction, Eating Disorder Symptoms and Life Satisfaction in Adolescent Girls”, Journal of Youth and Adolescence, vol.43, pp.1-14.

Grabe S, Ward L. M & Hyde J. S. 2008, “The Role of the Media in Body Image Concerns Among Women: A Meta-Analysis of Experimental and Correlational Studies”, Psychological Bulletin, vol.134, no. 3, pp.460-476.


Ingold, T (2011) ‘Rethinking the animate, reanimating thought’, Being Alive: Essays on movement, knowledge and description Routlege: London, New York, pp.67-75.