Hmm 
I absolutely agree with the notion of making stuff
more available, more democratic but I *do* wonder if
there isn't a rather interesting compensatory process
going on in us, as viewers, as the technical
possibilities improve - we adjust mentally & so even
though, never mind the latest HD camera, my six year
old Canon MV 300i produces stuff that would have been
*inconceivable* twenty years ago, those with money &
the concentrated centralised resources, corporations,
professional broadcasters &c, are always on the whole
going to look better, *in purely technical terms*
because our mental bar is constantly raised by
whatever is cutting edge.
Its a bit like special effects. Of course nowadays,
when - what do you call it, where the motion is
screened at the back?- looks wonderful and clunky &
nostalgic & occasionally risible to *everyone*, I'm
also finding that I read computer generated imagery,
especially crowd scenes, with a much more cynical eye
-the patterns leap out...& if that's true now then in
20-30 years the artifice will be completely evident.
(Best 'special effect' in the world ever? - IMO the
"coming back to life" reverse-thing in 'Orphee'. It's
the poetry, not the technique)
So the point I'm making in a rather laboured way is
that a similar process is at work in  "regular" image
making...
 I think where the small independent maker of moving
image can score is in the content, in the broadest
sense ( I don't just mean what we choose to look at
but what we do with it & how). That's why some of the
most interesting work I've seen is made using mobile
phone cams or fairly basic kit, or stop motion or
appropriated footage -you get my drift- but with
lashings of the poetic imagination that an industry
which is focus grouped to death & committed to an
entirely chimerical attempt to "replicate" the look of
"reality" can't even begin to conceive of. 
best
michael

--- Rupert <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote:

> Looks amazing.  I love Canon cameras - i have an old
> Canon XL1.   
> colours, low-light and lens all amazing.  (even
> though I mostly just  
> use my nokia or my kodak for vlogging.)
> 
> Also saw this JVC on Videomaker.com's weekly vlog
> last week,  
> announced at CES - costs more but full HD and 5
> hours of hard drive  
> recording:
> 
>
http://www.jvc.com/press/index.jsp?urlid=MPPress&item=565
> 
> It seems incredible that AT LAST we can have this
> kind of image power  
> in consumer hands.  professional cameras with lesser
> quality
> cost tens or hundreds of thousands just a few years
> ago.  2 weeks  
> ago, I saw a rough cut of feature a friend of mine
> had shot on a  
> shoestring.  Visually *astonishing*, but shot on a
> £2k Sony HD in the  
> middle of nowhere in Yorkshire.  i've been waiting
> for this level of  
> quality and price to come for so long - it opens so
> many more doors.
> 
> "to me the great hope is that now... people who
> normally wouldn't be  
> making movies are going to be making them, and
> suddenly one day some  
> little fat girl in ohio is going to be the new
> mozart and make a  
> beautiful film with her father's camcorder
> and for once the so called professionalism about
> movies will be  
> smashed - forever.  and it will really become an art
> form.  that's my  
> opinion."  francis coppola, hearts of darkness,
> 1988.
> 
> "the future is now!  the future is now!  the future
> is now!"
> 
> Rupert
> 
> http://www.fatgirlinohio.org
> http://feeds.feedburner.com/fatgirlinohio
> 
> 
> 
> On 1 Feb 2007, at 23:39, WWWhatsup wrote:
> 
> [looks good, 24p too, I guess street price will be
> less]
> 
> Canon Coming Out with $1,300 HD Camera
> 
> High-definition cameras are slowly trickling down to
> the
> point where they're affordable. And Canon, which
> makes
> some of the best non-HD camcorders, now plays in
> that
> market. The new camcorder offers real benefits over
> the
> previous model. Our story has details on what it
> does and
> when it will be available.
> 
> Canon Expands HD Line-up:
> http://ct.eletters.whatsnewnow.com/rd/cts? 
> d=181-805-1-411-255402-45903-0-0-0-1
> 
>
----------------------------------------------------------
> WWWhatsup NYC
> http://pinstand.com - http://punkcast.com
>
----------------------------------------------------------
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> [Non-text portions of this message have been
> removed]
> 
> 
> 
>  
> Yahoo! Groups Links
> 
> 
> mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED]
> 
> 
> 

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