Digital vs Film

 Affordances and Constraints in analogue and digital moving image production.

What are the experimental limitations caused by the relative immateriality of digital image making?  What are the creative affordances of film stock?  Is there an ideal meeting point between these two technologies, that optimises innovation in production and presentation?

By looking at the history of artesanal filmmaking and the impact of the digital revolution on this non-commercial artistic activity, I intend to interrogate both mediums and produce a series of films that illustrate the affordances and constraints of each that manifest themselves in the filmmaking process.

Moving image artefacts will be made in both mediums, and a comparative commentary will be written that describes processes and critiques results.  Reference will be made to current theories of medium specificity and the cinema apparatus.  

A compromise will be sought between the extremes of structural materialist forms and experimental narrative.  Alternative forms of presentation will be embraced to highlight the importance of scale and location on audience reception.

To what extent does a particular technology dictate how it is used, and what is produced by it?  What can be learnt by examining the historic uses of an obsolete technology?  Can this inform the uses of a current technology?  

What are the parallels to be found outside of the cinematic realm?  Look at the history of cars/typewriters/paper and writing/weapons?  What are the arguments about technological determinism?

Enough threads to weave a face mask?

Pulling together ideas into some kind of coherence is time-consuming.  Writing is part of that process, so as part of the discipline of research I think it is time to make a short note of the reading and ideas I am formulating.

Some important texts have come to light that have helped point the way in a bracken-laiden corner of the field of avant garde film.  Definitions are vitally important if the writer wants to ensure that the reader is on the same conceptual page and not just the word/pdf one.  What are we actually talking about?

'Film' is a metonym for all the associated practices involved in making, producing, distributing, showing and receiving a work of moving images with sound.  It is an outdated and confusing term, as 'film' in the original sense of the word, is rarely used as a medium for audio-visual works.  What is actually used is digital video.  Video uses electronics, not chemicals, to create audio-visuals.  The distinction is an important one, because there seems to be a confusion that has promulgated a lot of discussion, debate and academic writing.  

As a maker, I have no time for arguments over the authenticity of the medium used in making.  What counts is what you can do with it.  Film and video are just different.  No one is better or worse in terms of indexicality.  In fact, as an artist, indexicality is not of particular interest to me.  Film provides a material substrate that you can work on in the manner of for example distressing the canvas or sticking things to it.  Remarkable results have been achieved (see the usual suspects - Brackage et al).  

In 2020, using film is not widely available as an option to the average journeyman filmmaker.  It may continue in certain backwaters like mid-Wales or Cornwall (see 'Bait'), making the most of the bourgeois trend for artisanal making, but it is like fitting the metal rim to a wooden cart wheel compared to the Quick-Fit of digital video.  If you want to get 'From A to B (and back again)' forget the cartwheel.  That belongs in the craft park as a Sunday afternoon family outing curiosity.

The previous metaphor is apt, as the artisanal movement is associated with slowing down.  I am certainly for less haste, but I think speed is of the essence as 2020 comes to a close.  The Eco-catastrophe is upon us.  DV is misused everywhere, but is the go-to medium for the Eco-Artist.  It requires electricity to make works, but avoids plastic and chemicals, and is available to most people in the developed world.

Is this a face mask which I see before me?