On Wed, Feb 10, 2010 at 8:16 PM, Adrian Miles <[email protected]> wrote: > if you follow that logic to its logical conclusion then why be online > at all and instead be in a cinema, or project via some hi-rez system > against a wall in an installation?
Because online is the distribution medium of choice and the only place to find an audience! But hey, because I film at 1280x720 I *could* do that if I wanted to, because I'm smart enough to film my content at the best quality I'm capable of. (Technically I can do 1920x1280, but I drew the line smaller for practical and optical reasons). I therefore have the option to project in a cinema as well as produce a 160x120 ultra small podcast, or anything in between if I so chose. I've got this amazing thing called choice! It's a real shame those who film in 320x240 don't have the same choice... > it is a wrong argument as it is like saying because I'm a painter and > I can have a 4 metre square canvas anyone who chooses to paint > miniatures, or even small canvases, isn't really doing painting. (Or > if I write a novella instead of a novel I'm not really a writer, etc.) I am NOT saying those who film and upload is 320x240 or smaller are not videoblogging or not creating useful content. They certainly are. I'm just saying that such a limited resolution is really doing their efforts a disservice if creating higher resolution content isn't much more difficult. And lets be honest, it's not. > There are deliberate creative, aesthetic, technical, theoretical, > practical reasons for choosing scale in these ways so that choosing to > be small is recognised not as a default condition of all that the > technology allows but a deliberate creative decision. Like choosing to > write a haiku when I could also have written a short story. Or a novel. > > It also ignores the entire role of constraint to creative practice > and art (there is no art without constraint, pixel dimensions does not > have to be a constraint, but it does not follow from this that you > must therefore only go for the highest current available pixel > dimensions). Sure, but that whole argument is such a big red herring and so entirely beside the point it's not funny! Almost every video blogger *wants* the best possibly quality video they can get, they aren't keeping it small for some artistic reason. They keep it small because they are (or think they are) constrained by some technical limitation. If you have the capability to do greater than 320x240 and you are deliberately sticking to 320x240 for some reason then I stand by my assertion that you are doing your efforts a big disservice. Seriously 640x480 is so trivially easy on almost any bit of hardware, it is no harder than 320x240. 320x240 is just not worth it unless you are producing a specific podcast or similar where bandwidth is critical. I produce a 480x272 podcast version of my show for just such reasons, but I'm not silly enough to film at that resolution or only make my product available only at that resolution. > For example things like Daniel Liss' "seven maps" or Will Luers' "217 > Views of the Tokaido Line" work because of constraint - of rules and > of composition. Particularly with Will's project the scale is > essential precisely because it is not big, it is about Japan, the > small, the miniature, the everyday (think Pillow Book of Sei Shonagon > or of course what Will's work directly refers to). Finally in my own > work I take a different view as I think of the computer and the > network as the medium for the work, in which case it lives in a > complex ecoystem and visual field with other windows, other > applications, other attentions. So my video should not take over your > screen in the same way that I despise any app on my computer that > assumes it has the right to all of my screen, all of my attention, > etc. I don't think of the computer and the network as just a clever > delivery device to get my video onto other screens at full resolution > but as something small that sits there in amongst your email, photos, > and the 12 apps you're currently running and flipping between. Once again, entirely beside the point. You can film and upload in any resolution you want, the viewer is perfectly capable of displaying the resultant image in any size and form they chose. Deliberately limiting your source material because you have some preconceived notion about how it should be viewed, is in my view a silly thing to do. But hey, if you want to go all arty-farty and shoot small, be my guest, just don't argue that's even close to what most video bloggers want, you'd be way off the mark. > All power to full screen video, but please don't make an argument that > this is the only way to approach video online. I'm not. I'm simply saying that any videoblogger should be making use of the best possible resolution they can easily do. I'm not necessarily talking about HD here, as there is still has quite a few technical issues for the average users as has been discussed on here many times. But lets be honest, 5 or even 10 year old gear is easily capable of 640x480, as is any $50 second hand DV camcorder of any age. Heck, I can remember easily editing a 2 hour 720x576 DVD movie on an 800MHz Pentium 3 with 768MB of memory and crappy integrated Intel graphics card. If anyone's camera is only capable of good results at 320x240 then I'd highly recommend you spend a few bucks and upgrade! Don't necessarily jump into HD, but film and upload in the best size and quality you can do. Otherwise you might regret it a few years down the track. But hey, that's just my personal view, if doing all your work in 320x240 makes you happy, then more power to you. Dave.
