[Frameworks] Film and Digital for beginners

[Jonathan Walley]

Hello everyone,

This question isn't about experimental cinema specifically, but it's
certainly an important question for our world, and I think experimental
filmmakers (and scholars, critics, etc.) are among those best equipped to
answer it. So here goes. There is some preamble meant to set the stage, but
you can skim it and skip down to the question if you want.

Each semester I teach an introductory cinema studies course called "Film
Aesthetics and Analysis." The main goal of the course is to teach students
how to analyze film aesthetics (in case the title of the class didn't make
this obvious), and it is aimed at the general campus community, not just
Cinema majors. Indeed, the majority of students in the class are non-majors
who have never studied film before.

Early in the course I talk about filmmaking on a very material level - call
it the "nuts and bolts" of filmmaking, a subject I return to periodically
across the semester (e.g. how cameras work, the process of editing,
projection, etc.). I have always privileged film - that is, analogue,
photochemical, mechanical, "celluloid" film - but to keep up with the times
I have been trying to talk more about digital cinema technology, with a
view to contrasting the two media. Though I'm a luddite when it comes to
film, I'm not necessarily interested in converting my students to that
mindset, nor to favoring one medium over another. I simply want my students
to understand the ramifications of shooting, editing, projecting, and
viewing films on different media.

SO NOW, THE QUESTION: what would you say are some of the most important,
and most fundamental, differences between making and/or seeing "films" in
these two media, in terms that intro-level undergrads can understand and
appreciate. For example:

-true black is not possible in digital projection the same way it is in
film projection (something I can actually demonstrate in class).
-differences in resolution.
-different "lifespans" of film and digital.

And so on and so forth. Though I do talk about things outside the realm of
film aesthetics specifically (such as the cost of digital conversion,
preservation issues, etc.), my main interest is in showing my students the
concrete, appreciable consequences that attend the decision to do something
in film or in digital. And to be able to demonstrate them in class with
specific examples - using the 16mm and digital projectors I have in the
classroom - would be nice, so suggestions of such specific examples would
be appreciated.

Thanks in advance for any ideas.
Best,
Jonathan

Jonathan Walley
Dept. of Cinema
Denison University
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