How I Stopped Worrying and Learned to Love the Blog

My interaction with video games has been ambivalent, mostly due to the stigma that I associate it with. However, I fundamentally enjoy the experience of playing a role, however predetermined, in an engaging narrative. Two games come to mind: Half Life and World of Warcraft. Half Life for me was the experience I’ve always expected from cinema, but rarely gotten. There is something tyrannical about the big screen that turns me off. The immersive quality of cinema is a double edged sword, in that it can make one blissfully lost in the story, or else made to feel like an outsider. When I lose interest in a film I have few choices:

• zone out and watch the movie
• try to patiently wait for the end
• leave the theatre

For a variety of reasons, I have a hard time with “suspension of disbelief”. I am tempted to chalk it up to short attention span, but I’m skeptical of such dismissal.

The Lumiere Manifesto expounds on a vision of online media that emphasizes authenticity of experience, for creator and consumer alike. Its tenets are based on the characteristics of early film, e.g. brevity and lack of editing. For the authors, these qualities enhance the integrity of the experience, and stand in stark contrast to most contemporary video, especially broadcast and cinema.

In an effort to promote their ideals, the authors “curate” an online video gallery whose content must meet prescribed guidelines that approximate the limitations of early film:

• 60 seconds max.
• Fixed camera
• No audio
• No zoom
• No edit
• No effects

Having read the manifesto and viewed some of the submissions, I recognize the power of the restrictions they’ve devised to facilitate aesthetically and conceptually appealing pieces. However, I find a contradiction in terms in ruling out both editing and audio. Sound recording is usually enabled by default in contemporary video recording devices, so I suspect that for at least some of the submissions, audio was edited out. Clearly this is a trangression of the manifesto’s ideals. Even in cases in which audio was never present, the creator must have taken extra measures to disable audio recording. I see this is a form of on camera editing, and an impediment to spontanaiety.

Deciding to record something is choosing not to record something else, and is thus already an editorial decision. Post-production editing is merely an extension of that process. Editing allows the artist to distill content to correspond with his or her experience of the moment. The exponents of Lumiere Video ignore the merit of artistic vision on the grounds that it limits the free choice of the viewer. I argue that the medium, by virtue of its bandwidth limitations, requires editorial vision to restore its degraded content. Our level of trust dictates whether or not we value the artist/editors vision. Sometimes the creators don’t merit our trust, but when they do, the experience is more worthwhile than watching purportedly “raw” footage.

Incidentally, the my vlog debut comes close to the requirements of Lumiere video.

Voice can be a window or a closed door.

One of the advantages of video is the enhanced bandwidth for communication. My vlog debut does not dissappoint in that respect. I think my body language speaks to my discomfort with more poignancy than volumes of editorialized text. Despite my uneasiness, I feel the exercise was a success in its authenticity.

First blog post, and it feels a little exhibitionist so far. Maybe I just need something interesting to say. Then instead of self-consciously rambling, I can pontificate, oblivious to the transparency of my conceited rhetoric. Forgive the angst, but it’s a bit of an existential quandary, not knowing if anyone will actually read this, let alone care.

In any event, this blog is my venture into read/write web, and I invite you to share in my journey as I try to reconcile my online identity while discussing art, media, and technology.