The Open Frame Reader is a book published by PSBT (Public Service Broadcasting Trust(India) ). It is basically a collection of essays by people related to the documetary film making in India. It touches various aspects of documentary film making (technical and non-technical).
_______________________________________________________________
First essay I read was by Subha Das Mollic titled The third revolution. It talks about the digital shift in film making. It lists down the various factors leading to it and it´s implications.
There are numerous reasons to support videos- portability(smaller cameras), simpler digital editing(Non Linear Editing on your desktop), spontaneity(you can just keep the record button on and wait for the right moment) and above all cost. Now one thing we can never get on video is the film look and feel, second thing is resolution (in video, we have limited resolution).
Another aspect Shubha points out and I found very interesting was the high filming ratio (shot length/final length of a movie) in case of videos (due to very low cost of tapes) can actually degrade the quality of the final product. Well that depends, it may or may not. That we need to find out for ourselves.
I believe, as a general rule- If content is strong enough it can definitely overshadow the packaging. DV(Digital Video) is surely going to give young aspiring film makers to exercise their basic right to express themselves. We all should wholeheartedly welcome the third revolution.
Filed under: Books
[...] Reading more of The Open Frame Reader, I went through two more essays on digital movie making- Digital Video: A Byte For All? by Rahul Ranadive and The New ´D´ In Documentary by Trisha Das. [...]
[...] Even while watching few documentary films I assumed that this clarity of sound is there, took it for granted. Never thought about the tedious process to get that clear sound. While going through three more essays from The Open Frame Reader, which were completely dedicated to sound. It was kind of eye-opener effect. Let me take down some notes here- [...]