dvmanifesto

Postmoderism

2008-09-16T12:49:00.001-05:00

In regards to the death of David Foster Wallace. How the technical and the superimposed can lead to insight and connection with the human system, our authentic selves.

clipped from www.guardian.co.uk

Every heartless tic of facetious ironised postmodernism is redeployed to capture the heartfelt loss and confusion of human beings.

Make Professional Video

2008-08-08T09:10:00.001-05:00

clipped from news.cnet.com

"What we've found is that advertisers and agencies are only interested in professional media, so professional content providers are having a good time finding extremely high demand because they have a lack of video views," he said.

Rebellion makes gains

2008-01-28T17:14:00.001-05:00

clipped from www.psychologytoday.com

Even prodigies who avoid burnout and resist social pressures are unlikely to make a big splash as an adult. The problem, notes giftedness researcher Ellen Winner, is that to make a major contribution in the arts, and even the sciences "you need a rebellious spirit and the type of mind that can see new things

TV and the arts

2008-01-27T15:52:00.001-05:00

The Web can be the new TV promise!

clipped from www.artsjournal.com

Today I want to make an argument about the rise of arts culture. In the 1950s, at the dawn of TV, the medium's pioneers believed that television would be the great democratizer - exposing culture to the masses. The best of the world's culture could be brought into the living rooms of America. The early shows were full of high-art culture - symphony orchestras, plays, high-minded debates.

Thinking outside the box

2008-01-02T21:28:00.000-05:00

From Today's NYT:
"When everybody knows that something is so, it means that nobody knows nothin’,” said Andrew S. Grove, Intel co-founder. In other words, it becomes nearly impossible to look beyond what you know and think outside the box you’ve built around yourself.

"This so-called curse of knowledge, a phrase used in a 1989 paper in The Journal of Political Economy, means that once you’ve become an expert in a particular subject, it’s hard to imagine not knowing what you do. Your conversations with others in the field are peppered with catch phrases and jargon that are foreign to the uninitiated. When it’s time to accomplish a task — open a store, build a house, buy new cash registers, sell insurance — those in the know get it done the way it has always been done, stifling innovation as they barrel along the well-worn path...

"To innovate you have to bring together people with a variety of skills.

"When experts have to slow down and go back to basics to bring an outsider up to speed it forces them to look at their world differently and, as a result, they come up with new solutions to old problems."

This is why we need to think differently about television. This is why old media is threatened.

sticking to breaking rules

2007-11-11T21:01:00.001-05:00

clipped from www.nytimes.com

In doing different road movies, I also came to realize that a good screenplay grants you more freedom to improvise than a weak one. It’s like jazz: the better the melody, the easier it is to wander away from it, because it will also be easier to return to it later.

I don't really want my MTV

2007-09-05T09:02:00.001-05:00

clipped from blog.fastcompany.com

The older and more established the network gets, the more mainstream and commercial, the more out of tune and irrelevant. MTV has relinquished its title as our youth culture's spokesperson. But unlike the modern wonders of Web 2.0 -- YouTube and MySpace -- MTV has a more emblematic personality -- a greater connection with its dwindling audience. Just like radio survived the giant threat of TV through innovation, for MTV the Web is the ideal podium to regain its pop culture cool and its influence in the media landscape. But does the user-generation need a spokesperson when they can speak for themselves or do they want myMTV?

Why creativity is ROI

2007-09-04T15:59:00.001-05:00

clipped from www.dispatch.com

"Millionaires think long-term. The middle class thinks short-term," wrote Keith Cameron Smith in
The Top 10 Distinctions between Millionaires and the Middle Class, released on
the Internet in August. "Millionaires talk about ideas. The middle class talks about things and
other people."

open TV as cultural change

2007-07-23T10:47:00.001-05:00

From the New Yorker

clipped from www.newyorker.com

Not just television, but also private radio stations and newspapers have flourished in Pakistan over the past few years. The result is an unprecedented openness. . . . Young people are speaking and dressing differently. Views both critical and supportive of the government are voiced with breathtaking frankness in an atmosphere remarkably lacking in censorship. Public space, the common area for culture and expression that had been so circumscribed in my childhood, has now been vastly expanded

why old dogs need to learn

2007-06-27T16:02:00.001-05:00

clipped from www.hollywoodreporter.com

Consolidation in the old media world destroys value," said Laura Martin, founder and CEO of Media Metrics LLC. "They are buying stuff (and audiences) because they don't know what else to do."

She argued that online and digital deals with a monetization rather than a traffic focus are key, citing Google as a firm that has made smart acquisition decisions, while signaling that media giants are often otherwise inclined.

Martin also said that the young technology entrepreneurs that make a difference in today's world want cool and hip work environments. "That's not the big media companies," she said.

CSPAN Copyright policy

2007-05-29T10:31:00.001-05:00

clipped from www.c-span.org

C-SPAN holds the exclusive copyright in the video of all the public affairs programming it produces.
Although C-SPAN is the only news media organization that regularly televises the legislative proceedings of the U.S. House and U.S. Senate, it does not hold a copyright in that video coverage. That government-produced video is in the public domain which means that it belongs to the American people and may be used without restrictions of any kind.
As part of its mission to make the activities of the federal government more broadly available, C-SPAN has established a copyright policy that allows the public to use C-SPAN's video coverage of federal government events for their own purposes. Those who want to use C-SPAN copyrighted video will be able to do so without concern about further copyright restrictions as long as they adhere to the following policy:

Share and share alike

2007-05-14T11:10:00.001-05:00

Very interesting to note that the paid model will not work in the future according to this research. This seems to again, go against current wisdom. This also will perhaps allow greater production by the public. Perhaps the model will be ad $ going to popular AND niche-rich productions.

clipped from playlistmag.com

The iTunes Store’s salad days as an outlet for paid video downloads are short, according to a new report from Forrester Research. The company claims that paid video downloads will peak this year, to be replaced by advertising-based systems instead.

Networks explain why Prime Time TV viewing is off

2007-04-25T15:00:00.001-05:00

This is from today's USA Today. Old media is scrambling for why viewing is off, other excuses included the fact that daylight savings occurred earlier and therefore people were outside longer (?). It might be also that alt media on the web is replacing the commercial ladened shows are getting usurped by dvrs and downloads.

clipped from www.usatoday.com

We can't really examine things in the same mind-set that we did a year ago," ABC research chief Larry Hyams says.

Trouble is, advertisers so far are refusing to pay for all those procrastinating viewers, arguing that many skip commercials. So Nielsen is testing ways to measure audiences for commercials, not just programs.

Still other observers worry the shortfall may mark a tipping point as networks lose share to the Internet, cable and other media. "When you put it all together, it snowballs," says Starcom Media's Sam Armando. Yet hope springs eternal as the finale-filled May sweeps begins: "In another month we can have turned the corner."

From Andy Kessler's Blog in the NYTimes

2007-04-10T08:36:00.001-05:00

clipped from kessler.blogs.nytimes.com

Don’t get me wrong. The Internet will soon deliver all our video clips — sitcoms, sports, the whole shebang. But whoever creates and controls this content is who will make the big returns from it. Google is tops at search. It’s not yet obvious it will be tops in video. The game of lifting video clips made by others is almost over. If Google wants to stay in the game, it will need to ramp up its spending on video big time.

From David Denby in the New Yorker

2007-03-23T11:59:00.001-05:00

clipped from www.newyorker.com

Storytellers, relying on sequence and causality, make sense out of nonsense; they impose order, economy, and moral consequence on the helter-skelter wash of experience. The notion that one event causes another, and that the entire chain is a unified whole, with a complex, may be ambivalent, but, in any case, coherent meaning, not only brings us to a point of resolution; it allows us to navigate through our lives.

neuromarketing

2007-02-12T06:45:00.000-05:00

Whaddyaknow! Marketers are using neuroscience to sell. I think storytelling (myth, fable, fantasy) and the connecting of neurons are as powerful as the science.

about story from KQED

2007-01-16T21:32:00.000-05:00

From the KQED Digital Storytelling Initiative:

"The restorying process can be used as an agent for personal change and the transformation of a negative experience into a positive one. As a therapeutic application, storytelling is a technique that encourages people to analyze events and relationships clearly and put them into perspective. This process grants permission for a negative or stressful situation to be developed into a positive or resurrective narrative. The concept is simple: you can't change what happened, but you can change where you stand in relation to that story. That is, you don't need to stand in the victim's place. If you retell the story, you become the author. Through that reauthoring process, the story gets rewritten according to your version of it."

New Yorker Article on State of Cinema

2007-01-07T13:55:00.000-05:00

Great piece in the NYer regarding cinema by David Denby, one of my favorite film critics. I do dislike 99 percent of Hollywood productions BUT I LOVE THE BIG SCREEN. It is different than the tiny web screen. I watch most of my media now in little, tiny 320x240 screens on my computer. I am as enthralled and bored as I am with big pictures. There is real psychology to where and how you watch. But if you become engaged in a story, no matter how big of a screen you are watching, that shows the real power.

Interviewing Problems and Solutions

2006-12-31T13:37:00.000-05:00

In this month's GQ, correspondent Chris Heath gives us a delightful insight on what to do when an interview goes bad. He didn't intend for this to happen, but in his interview with De Niro he had to show us behind the scenes to explain the dearth of material.

The article really goes to show how important the relationship is between the interviewee and the interviewer. Sometimes even the best can be foiled by reluctant interviewees. Heath has guts though and presses on!

Link

Sarnoff Quote from 1950

2006-12-17T18:28:00.000-05:00

“When Television has fulfilled its destiny, humanity’s sense of physical limitation will be swept away, and boundaries of sight and hearing will be the limits of the earth itself. With this may come a new horizon, a new philosophy, a new sense of freedom and greatest of all, perhaps a finer and broader understanding between all the people in the world.”

David Sarnoff
Chairman of the Board
RCA
1950

A.O. Scott in the NYTimes 11/22/06

2006-11-22T07:30:00.001-05:00

"In narrative art, nothing is more artificial than an ending — life, after all, does go on — and Mr. Altman’s endings often serve two purposes. They bring the artifice to a dazzling pitch of virtuosity while exposing it as a glorious sham. They revel in plenitude, in throngs and spectacles, but there is a throb of emptiness, of incompletion, in the midst of the frenzy."

Aging Thoughts

2006-11-20T07:04:00.000-05:00

From AOL Headline about lack of programming for the 40 plus age set:

"One statistic he's sure to cite: The survey found 51 percent of the postwar generation describe themselves as "open to new ideas." Meanwhile, only 12 percent of young adults think the older folks feel that way.

Why does that matter? Jones said the average media buyer or planner is under 30. Many are undoubtedly hired for their know-how in appealing to a specific generation, and it isn't the baby boomers.

"There is this huge perception versus reality situation in the marketplace," he said.

Jones is pushing the idea of a "middlescence," about 40-to-59-year-olds who don't feel young anymore but don't feel old, and have plenty of discretionary income."

I still wonder why the under 40 set is bought at $300 a minute while the older set is bought at $100. Age is so "long tail" there is more money to spend and more money to spend for a longer time.

In the world of television I would be concentrating much more on the 40 plus demographic especially as the under 40 flocks to the internet. That is not to say that the over 40 is not capable, perhaps the over 40 just doesn't spend its time investing in mindless entertainment.

This study shows what it the ongoing paradigm in TV advertising: statistics and perception really don't add up.

Lobes

2006-11-18T16:32:00.001-05:00

"Movies can't work with the frontal lobe," says Mr. Kidd. "We can't tell the audience what to feel. We can only figure out what we want them to take away from a scene, and then use the camera to suggest where the undercurrent is going."

--NYTimes 10/25/02, Dylan Kidd

Kiki Smith in NYTimes

2006-11-06T07:12:00.000-05:00

“Also, the hardest thing is to get past your taste — past your own formulaic way of doing things. Otherwise you’re stopped by what you know, which is limited. Chance is what a lot of artists use. In my case, I’ll arrange ways for things to be unpredictable. That’s what’s nice about working on prints. You’re working with other people so you have to let go of some of your own ideas. Almost everything I do involves collaboration.”

Kiki Smith

Critical Thinking Matters

2006-11-06T06:56:00.001-05:00

"I am inclined to believe that the logic of images is the prime mover of constructive imagination."

Théodule-Armand Ribot
French Psychologist

Quote from Suzan-Lori Parks in the NYer

2006-10-30T07:52:00.000-05:00

"When you wake up and look at your lover or husband, or whatever, that's a way of honoring your commitment. But then you get out of bed and say another kind of prayer when you sit down at your desk. 'Yes! I'm a writer.' When you make that commitment all sorts of things move toward you."

From the Blog of Brown Trout

2006-10-25T06:14:00.000-05:00

Same thing with writing. Storytelling, behind sex and food, is the third most direct way of communicating with fellow hominids. Music, dance, visual arts all follow after. When you read something that's written well, or when you hear a story told, you are living inside the author's brain. You are swimming with their soul. You are experiencing what it is to be human and alive. And let me say that I'm not talking about Tom Clancy here, or anything that is written with any consideration for a market.

Ken Burns in NYTimes

2006-10-23T06:41:00.000-05:00

“The essential DNA of all my films issues from still photography,” Mr. Burns said. But Mr. Liebling’s influence on his work, he said, reached much deeper, to a personal and ultimately philosophical level that has guided many of his choices of subject and approach.
“It was this broadly humanistic mantra that he instilled in us,” he said, adding: “Jerry turned me and made me look inward, and it was not always a comfortable thing. I changed as a result of it. It was like molting.” He also taught, Mr. Burns said, that “all meaning accrues in duration — sometimes you have to just slow down and look.”

Kundera wrote a book about slowing down: "Slowness."

What Art Video is not

2006-07-12T19:28:00.000-05:00

I have come to realize that so many people title video that fits nowhere else as "art video." OK, maybe so, but it usually fits in the sub category of "BAD art video."

Fair use and Copyright

2006-06-06T17:47:00.000-05:00

The thing is about copyright is that I follow the laws as best I can but watch so many break the laws. I feel like I am missing out. I can't help but to think that all of the videos posted that use copyrighted music and materials will one day pay for their misuse. I also feel that the users who break the laws and post copyrighted material are potentially ruining the free web for the rest of us.

Don't get me wrong. The laws are ridiculous. The Constitution wanted to give protection to original work and thinkers, but it is written in such a way that eventually these products will return to the public to build upon (really, are there original ideas or just mash ups of other ideas). Congress continues to extend what constitutes public domain every few years. I don't know the truth of this, but I have heard that copyright control has been extended everything Disney's Mickey Mouse comes up to be entered into the public domain. Whatever, copyright seems to protect greed more often then fair use. BUT, I do believe in the concept. Our execution of the law has much to be desired.

Courts have begun to sue copyright breakers by fining per dub of copyright infringement. I suppose this could extend to per download. With fines, set in law at a minimum of $750 per infraction, this soon amounts to a lot of money.

The Center for Social Media has published a short document on what is their idea of fair use and appropriate use. This is not legal advice in as much as it is a guideline to help keep one from furthering the scrap in greedy pockets.

It is upon us to police ourselves and push our creativity to avoid breaking copyright laws. In the best case it helps other artists like ourselves. In the worst case it prevents the greedy from getting richer.

What are first videos

2006-05-09T19:40:00.000-05:00

It is interesting to note (in my experience at least) that what eventually appears in most new video student work is:
1. Shots of driving
2. Shots of an eye
3. Shots of the videographers feet walking.

Deeper Meaning Usefulness

2006-03-27T07:37:00.000-05:00

Knowledge is the recitation of fact.
If you know something you do not necessarily understand it.

Understanding is the application of these facts.
If you understand something it is not necessarily meaningful.

Meaning is the value to you or others.
If you know meaning you know something.

If videos are not meaningful I am usually quite bored.

From 8 1/2

2006-03-26T10:42:00.000-05:00

Is this what the web has helped to perpetuate?...
Guido's quote from Fellini's 8 1/2:

"I really have nothing to say...
...but I want to say it just the same."

But to counter this is another quote made by the critic in the movie, I believe it is quoted from Stendhal (Beyle)...

"The self-centered [person] who cherishes themself alone will end up strangling in their own emotions."

My DV Manifesto

2006-02-25T07:48:00.000-05:00

Digital video is democratic.
DV is not controlled by expensive equipment or programming schedules. It is free for anyone with access to a computer and a camera.

DV is beautiful.
DV is DV, not film, not Beta, let DV be bold and beautiful DV.

Access is everywhere.
DV has no barriers for distribution.

Digital video is individual.
You don’t need a large crew for your art. DV allows for the practice of solitary pursuits in a community of support.

Creation is definition.
DV aesthetic is being defined and altered as the technology changes and the medium percolates to culture. The making of DV defines DV.

Digital video is new.
The TV/film aesthetic, control, distribution, creation, and use should not apply. There are new frames, and new rules.

What will happen?

2006-01-20T07:40:00.000-05:00

I just wrote a post in my web site: dvplace.com where I pine that I do not particularly like the production aspect of video. I like the edit where it is dark and lonely and it is just you and the story a cuddled up next to the glow of the computer screen.

However, I do like the production when I come home and feel that it went really well. However however, many of these times when I get to edit that particular footage it is not as good as I thought. Sometimes the opposite is true--when I get home and think the day was a disaster and then I see some really nice stuff.

I must say that both scenarios happen usually when I am shooting with a team without a monitor which I now refuse to do.

Anyway, the most detailed producer, armed with an armful of storyboards and shot lists can screw things up if they do not make themselves aware of the organics of the moment. Great things happen before or after "roll tape!" and off screen.

In documentaries it is even more so. Each of us will concentrate on the one or two needed things we need and then many cases lose really nice presents of happenstance. We return home happy that we "nailed our shot" only to find that later, in the edit, the "shot" really wasn't all that important to nail, and we missed the good parts. You change story slightly, add VOs, add emotional music and problem fixed. But the problem is not fixed for us. We watch and remember and we know what was covered up. It should make us more aware.

Thinking with Eyes

2006-01-10T06:48:00.000-05:00

My father-in-law, who is a contractor, has been helping to renovate our bathroom, told me this in regards to the design:

...think with your eyes, not your brain.

This is so perfectly suited for so many things. Rules, theory, plans help to lay a foundation but can obscure our way. When something "looks" wrong, despite being proven by theory or rule, it probably is wrong. If it looks wrong it needs to be fixed even if it only makes our eyes feel better.

Waiting

2006-01-07T15:01:00.000-05:00

Who here really really really is annoyed with waiting for the home menu of DVDs to appear? Hello! We all are!

Even when the opening are really well done, like the open for Momento. Wow! What an opening but there are times when we want to get to the #@!! movie.

Though, it is nice to see creativity inserted in routine tasks. The movie maker (well, the DVD maker at least) forcing us to enter their mind space.

Are we to expand our minds with direct trajectories? Would we take the side paths if given an option? Usually no, and I am speaking for me.

As much as we want to bend the medium into something new, we walk in the same ways. When our paths are obstructed our usual reaction is anger or frustration.

watching

2006-01-04T07:47:00.000-05:00

Just read that people don't like watching talking heads...or rather when watching talking heads people soon get bored...most will start to ignore after 22 seconds. Actually I have read that people get "fatigued" with an image on screen after 7 seconds.

Warhol did a series of short films that were just shots of people's faces. I think they lasted around 3 minutes each (which is the time contained in a 100 foot 16mm film roll). These are facinating and lovely "portraits."

I don't really adhere to the quick change image rule and I think we are making people less likely to really look based on constant image change. HOWEVER the 22 seconds should be a rule to those who think that just by virtue of the camera turned on them, they are facinating. It is a subtle line between what is interesting and what is cause for wandering eyes. Sometimes this is purely based on the viewer. Sometimes it is just us.

elusive narrative

2006-01-03T08:01:00.000-05:00

In the NYer.."great storytelling is an alchemy of voice, tone, and point of view"...Laura Miller writing about Philip Pullman.

This is indeed for story. In video it is also place, time, and character, though these could be broken up into the former.

Expression as need

2006-01-02T09:39:00.000-05:00

This was in the NYTimes last week:

Dr. Dan Siegel, a child psychiatrist at the University of California, Los Angeles, was one of several speakers to emphasize how psychotherapy changes the wiring of the brain. For example, he said, brain imaging findings suggest that secure social interactions foster the integration of disparate parts of the brain.

"When I'm telling you my feelings, discussing memories, in this close relationship, I'm achieving better neurological integration," Dr. Siegel said. "I'm repairing the connections in the brain."

The thing as relevant

2006-01-02T09:34:00.000-05:00

Connecting to or from a thing is what makes the thing something. Each connection can be random. The relevancy of this connection is what matters to the receiver. Sometimes something won’t be relevant until later. It is up to us to determine how it will be used. The subconscious may or may no take over the rest.

An idea can be shared only if the idea is “gotten.”