Douglass & Harnden, "Point of View"

Douglass and Harnden discuss the differences between first and third person storytelling in film. On point they make is that third person is generally seen as more credible by the audience than first. In academic papers, I was taught (over and over again) in high school to never use first person in our papers. Any use of I, me, mine, etc. called for an immediate 10 point deduction. At first I found this difficult and didn't understand why it mattered. However, I quickly realized that my opinion on such large issues rarely constituted anything in scholarly works--at least when I used first person. Despite what tense you use on paper, it is your opinion whether or not you clearly state that, and only your credibility is questioned.

The issue of first person credibility also appears in film, but the idea of opinions in storytelling does not. In movies, if you are treated as an outside viewer (third person), then  you trust what's happening but feel removed from the decisions of the characters. In first person, audiences still feel like they have no control (and they don't).

However, first person point of view is very popular in horror films, especially as the predator. Seeing the victim from the predator's eyes helps build suspense, while also letting the viewer know that something is about to happen. Although, there are some shows that I've watched where the camera angle is from that of the attacker, but something happens to thwart their attempt and the camera goes back to third person point of view while the attacker retreats, but is never shown. This tactic builds suspense in both the present, but also the future since you know the attacker will be back to finish the job at a later point.

What do you find to be the most effective point of view for cameras in movies? Do you like first person camera angles, or does it frustrate you since you have no control over the characters actions?

Osgood & Hinshaw, "The Aesthetics of Editing"

More than You Could Imagine

It's interesting that our reading today discusses editing and starts with a quote that attempts to describe the challenge of proper editing. The reading also shares how the crude videotape editing in the 1960s required editors to get creative with how they manipulated footage; one in particular was for the show Laugh-In, in which the editors had to splice tape using a razor blade under a microscope. This made me think of a Buzzfeed post (embarrassing, but what's new?) I was reading yesterday about how incredibly complicated it was to create the stop-motion picture film, Nightmare Before Christmas. 

This one piece took 24 frames!

For me, before I started editing my video, the craziest fact was that one minute of the movie required an entire week of filming. That is so much time and work for a minute that probably feels like a few seconds to the viewer. However, once I truly understood what a frame was and how difficult it is to edit, the most astonishing fact was that each second of the movie had 24 frames, resulting in 110,000 frames for the whole film. Just the idea of that is beyond daunting, and I can only imagine the patience and incredible skill needed to create such a coherent movie from such a monstrous editing process. If this movie were to be made with today's technology, do you think the editing would be just as tedious?

Time Constraints

Television programs and commercials have designated time slots, leaving the film and content to become very manipulated by the editors. Since I have enough trouble trying to make page requirements on my papers, I completely understand the struggle of time constraints in video editing. I haven't filmed enough scenes for my video project for me to start worrying about meeting the time requirements just yet, but I'm sure that I will struggle deciding which frames to cut or keep. In fact, when I was working on my slideshow, I photographed and edited many more pictures than necessary and faced serious internal conflict when deciding which pictures wouldn't make it to my slideshow. It's even more difficult for TV shows with consecutive story lines to show scenes and how they relate in less than 27 minutes. For commercials, it's 30 seconds that they have to tell a story in, which can be very challenging. Do you think you could create a meaningful story in that amount of time?