[-empyre-] Re: some questions about vogs

["Nemo Nox" <lists@nemonox.com>]

Jean-Luc Godard is often quoted as saying that "a story
should have a beginning, a middle, and an end, but not
necessarily in that order". I'll adapt this concept to
email and reply in a reconstructed order, so I don't get
lost among my own thoughts. :-)

Adrian Miles wrote:
>why do you wonder if it could be hitchcock with a pc
>and a modem?

I very much prefer movies as a narrative form than as
a wildly experimental medium. I mentioned Hitchcock,
but it could have been Wilder, Mankiewicz, Almodóvar,
Kasdan or many others. But never Godard or Von Trier.
Just my personal taste.

>if there was a 'simple to use' vog tool, would you
>want one? :-)

Certainly. :-)

>ok, i think of hypertext links as like performative
>speech acts (they're promises). i think of hypertext
>links as being the *same as* film edits. film edits
>are also promises. as performative speech acts they
>have force (they're like order words) and so inside
>their promise that they make sense there is also this
>excess of force that means they will make sense.

There is a big (and in this case very significative)
difference between edits and links. Edits are always
internal. They take you somewhere else inside the movie
(which means the author retains control of the whole).
But links may take you somewhere else outside the site
(which means the author loses control of the whole).
To make edits and links relate more closely you would
need edits that can take you to a different movie. I
guess that would be very interesting. :-)

>this force leaks out each side of the edit/link which
>is why the meaning of the before and after can change,
>without changing what the before and after is. ie the
>kuleshov effect. same content different meanings yet
>the thing (the image in that case) that effects the
>meaning (the edit) in no way changes the image itself.
>same thing happens in link node hypertext particularly
>where complex structures are invovled.

But the Kuleshov effect was meant to be created on
purpose. The link analogy you suggest can create
unwanted results (because the links can send the
audience to places out of the author's control).

>i've just finished writing the first part of a tutorial
>about how to use quicktime pro to build a movie collage
>(looking for somewhere to publish it right now).

Please let me know when it is available, I would
like to read it.

>using only quicktime pro (US$30) i have non new media
>students making collaged vogs in one class. it is easier
>than html. (seriously).

You can blog for free (Blogger, for example) and
without any html knowledge. But there is more. When
I mentioned a learning curve I was also thinking
about the language itself. Most people are ready to
start writing a weblog (even badly) because it is
exactly that: writing. But to work with images a
different language is needed and the visual grammar
is not as intuitive to the masses as writing. Not
many untrained people can create a meaningful visual
narrative.

>not sure about mx but earlier versions of flash only
>let you embed video in flash and then do tricks around
>the video (outside of the video). from my point of view
>that makes flash a pretty tv set in relation to video.
>click, video plays, do something else, video does
>something else. but i'm not clicking in or on the video.

When I asked why QuickTime instead of Flash I was
thinking in terms of visual narrative but not
necessarily video. Flash is much more suited for
animation. What would you think of an animated
Flash vog?

Nemo Nox
http://www.ploft.com/index.shtml