Database cinema
Encyclopedia
One of the principal features defining traditional cinema is a fixed and linear narrative
structure. In Database Cinema however, the story develops by selecting scenes from a given collection. Think of a computer game in which a player performs certain acts and thereby selects scenes and creating a narrative.
New Media
objects lack this strong narrative component, they don’t have a beginning or an end but can start or stop at any point. They are collections of discrete items coming from the database
. Lev Manovich
first related the database to cinema in his effort to understand the changing technologies of filmmaking techniques in media landscapes. According to Manovich, cinema privileged narrative as the key form of cultural expression of modern age but the computer age introduced its correlate, the database: "As a cultural form, database represents the world as a list of items and it refuses to order this list. In contrast, a narrative creates a cause-and-effect trajectory of seemingly unordered items (events). Therefore, database and narrative are natural enemies. Competing for the same territory of human culture, each claims an exclusive right to make meaning out of the world."
and Dziga Vertov
as pioneers in his database cinema genre. He explains how Greenaway sees the linear pursuit as standard format of filmmaking lagging behind modern literature in experimenting with narrative. Greenaway’s system for reconciling database and narrative uses sequences of numbers. They act as a narrative shell, which makes the viewer believe he is watching a story.
Dziga Vertov can be seen as an even earlier database filmmaker. Manovich cites Vertovs Man with a Movie Camera
(Russia, 1929) as the most important example of database imagination in modern media art. The film has three levels: Cameraman filming the shots, audience watching the finished film and shots from street life in Russian cities edited in chronological order of that particular day. While the last level can be seen as text or ‘the story’, the other two can be seen as meta-texts. By the use of meaningful effects, discovering the world by this ‘kino-eye’ Vertov uses the normally static and objective database as a dynamic and subjective form.
Manovich stated that new media artists working on database concepts could learn from cinema precisely because cinema has in fact always been at the nexus of database and narrative while the movie was still in the editing room. Manovich points out especially Vertov achieved a successful merging between database and narrative into a new form .
and later worked on by Roland Barthes
) helps to define the relationship between the database-narrative opposition. In this theory the syntagm is a linear stringing together of elements while at the paradigmatic each new element is chosen from a set of other related elements. In this case, the elements in syntagm dimensions are related in praesentia: it is the flow of words we hear, or the shots we see. On a paradigmatic dimension the elements are related in absentia: they exist in our minds or stuffed away in a database. To quote Manovich: “the database of choices from which narrative is constructed (the paradigm) is implicit; while the actual narrative (the syntagm) is explicit”.
In New Media projects, this is reversed according to Manovich. The paradigmatic database is tangible, while the syntacmatic narrative is virtual.
Soft Cinema
Lev Manovich defines soft cinema as the creative possibilities at the intersection of software culture, cinema, and architecture. Its manifestations include films, dynamic visualizations, computer-driven installations, architectural designs, print catalogs, and DVDs. In parallel, the project investigates how the new representational techniques of soft(ware) cinema can be deployed to address the new dimensions of our time, such as the rise of mega-cities, the "new" Europe, and the effects of information technologies on subjectivity.
1. Following the standard convention of the human-computer interface, the display area is always divided into multiple frames.
2. Using a set of rules defined by the authors, the Soft Cinema software controls
both the layout of the screen (number and position of frames) and the sequences of media elements that appear in these frames.
3. The media elements (video clips, sound, still images, text, etc.) are selected
from a large database to construct a potentially unlimited number of different
films.
4. In Soft Cinema ‘films’ video is used as only one type of representation among
others: motion graphics, 3D animations, diagrams, etc.
Texas looks at the 'Modern experience of living between layers', that is, how time has created different 'layers' of space throughout the world we live in. The film calls on a number of databases, each structured in the same fashion. The database containing video footage (as opposed to music) holds 425 clips selected from footage that Manovich himself shot at various locations over several years. Manovich aims to capture the idea of a "Global City" throughout these shots. Each video clip in the database holds 10 parameters, including location, subject matter, average brightness, contrast, the type of space, the type of camera motion, and several more. The software uses these parameters in selecting each clip, finding clips that are all similar in some fashion to the next.
in Gateshead, UK.
Mission to Earth symbolizes the experiences of a modern immigrant as well as the experiences of those during the Cold War. It attempts to show the trauma associated with a shift in identity as one changes their life. The Soft Cinema software uses several frames at once in this piece, displaying different things in each frame to portray the split in identity that the main character, Inga, experiences. The software also changes the size and number of windows as it grabs the content from the database. Most of the video used for the database was shot in London, Berlin, Rio de Janeiro, Buenos Aires, and Sweden.
Narrative
A narrative is a constructive format that describes a sequence of non-fictional or fictional events. The word derives from the Latin verb narrare, "to recount", and is related to the adjective gnarus, "knowing" or "skilled"...
structure. In Database Cinema however, the story develops by selecting scenes from a given collection. Think of a computer game in which a player performs certain acts and thereby selects scenes and creating a narrative.
New Media
New media
New media is a broad term in media studies that emerged in the latter part of the 20th century. For example, new media holds out a possibility of on-demand access to content any time, anywhere, on any digital device, as well as interactive user feedback, creative participation and community...
objects lack this strong narrative component, they don’t have a beginning or an end but can start or stop at any point. They are collections of discrete items coming from the database
Database
A database is an organized collection of data for one or more purposes, usually in digital form. The data are typically organized to model relevant aspects of reality , in a way that supports processes requiring this information...
. Lev Manovich
Lev Manovich
Lev Manovich is an author of new media books, professor of Visual Arts, University of California, San Diego, U.S. and European Graduate School in Saas-Fee, Switzerland, where he teaches new media art and theory, software studies, and digital humanities...
first related the database to cinema in his effort to understand the changing technologies of filmmaking techniques in media landscapes. According to Manovich, cinema privileged narrative as the key form of cultural expression of modern age but the computer age introduced its correlate, the database: "As a cultural form, database represents the world as a list of items and it refuses to order this list. In contrast, a narrative creates a cause-and-effect trajectory of seemingly unordered items (events). Therefore, database and narrative are natural enemies. Competing for the same territory of human culture, each claims an exclusive right to make meaning out of the world."
Database artists
Manovich considers filmmakers Peter GreenawayPeter Greenaway
Peter Greenaway, CBE is a British film director. His films are noted for the distinct influence of Renaissance and Baroque painting, and Flemish painting in particular...
and Dziga Vertov
Dziga Vertov
David Abelevich Kaufman , better known by his pseudonym Dziga Vertov , was a Soviet pioneer documentary film, newsreel director and cinema theorist...
as pioneers in his database cinema genre. He explains how Greenaway sees the linear pursuit as standard format of filmmaking lagging behind modern literature in experimenting with narrative. Greenaway’s system for reconciling database and narrative uses sequences of numbers. They act as a narrative shell, which makes the viewer believe he is watching a story.
Dziga Vertov can be seen as an even earlier database filmmaker. Manovich cites Vertovs Man with a Movie Camera
Man with a Movie Camera
Man with a Movie Camera , sometimes called The Man with the Movie Camera, The Man with a Camera, The Man With the Kinocamera, or Living Russia is an experimental 1929 silent documentary film, with no story and no actors, by Russian director Dziga Vertov, edited by his wife Elizaveta...
(Russia, 1929) as the most important example of database imagination in modern media art. The film has three levels: Cameraman filming the shots, audience watching the finished film and shots from street life in Russian cities edited in chronological order of that particular day. While the last level can be seen as text or ‘the story’, the other two can be seen as meta-texts. By the use of meaningful effects, discovering the world by this ‘kino-eye’ Vertov uses the normally static and objective database as a dynamic and subjective form.
Manovich stated that new media artists working on database concepts could learn from cinema precisely because cinema has in fact always been at the nexus of database and narrative while the movie was still in the editing room. Manovich points out especially Vertov achieved a successful merging between database and narrative into a new form .
Implicit/explicit
The semiological theory of syntagm and paradigm (originally formulated by Ferdinand de SaussureFerdinand de Saussure
Ferdinand de Saussure was a Swiss linguist whose ideas laid a foundation for many significant developments in linguistics in the 20th century. He is widely considered one of the fathers of 20th-century linguistics...
and later worked on by Roland Barthes
Roland Barthes
Roland Gérard Barthes was a French literary theorist, philosopher, critic, and semiotician. Barthes' ideas explored a diverse range of fields and he influenced the development of schools of theory including structuralism, semiotics, existentialism, social theory, Marxism, anthropology and...
) helps to define the relationship between the database-narrative opposition. In this theory the syntagm is a linear stringing together of elements while at the paradigmatic each new element is chosen from a set of other related elements. In this case, the elements in syntagm dimensions are related in praesentia: it is the flow of words we hear, or the shots we see. On a paradigmatic dimension the elements are related in absentia: they exist in our minds or stuffed away in a database. To quote Manovich: “the database of choices from which narrative is constructed (the paradigm) is implicit; while the actual narrative (the syntagm) is explicit”.
In New Media projects, this is reversed according to Manovich. The paradigmatic database is tangible, while the syntacmatic narrative is virtual.
Soft CinemaSoft CinemaSoft Cinema is a collaborative new media art project headed by Lev Manovich. Manovich states that "soft cinema is a digital editor that provides an interface between human editors and a database of footage to 'perform' different edits of the footage...
Lev Manovich defines soft cinema as the creative possibilities at the intersection of software culture, cinema, and architecture. Its manifestations include films, dynamic visualizations, computer-driven installations, architectural designs, print catalogs, and DVDs. In parallel, the project investigates how the new representational techniques of soft(ware) cinema can be deployed to address the new dimensions of our time, such as the rise of mega-cities, the "new" Europe, and the effects of information technologies on subjectivity.Criteria
Manovich calls on 4 different criteria to define Soft Cinema in his research:1. Following the standard convention of the human-computer interface, the display area is always divided into multiple frames.
2. Using a set of rules defined by the authors, the Soft Cinema software controls
both the layout of the screen (number and position of frames) and the sequences of media elements that appear in these frames.
3. The media elements (video clips, sound, still images, text, etc.) are selected
from a large database to construct a potentially unlimited number of different
films.
4. In Soft Cinema ‘films’ video is used as only one type of representation among
others: motion graphics, 3D animations, diagrams, etc.
Texas
The original piece was created for the 2002 "Soft Cinema installation", for an exhibition titled 'Future Cinema: Cinematic Imaginary after Film.'Texas looks at the 'Modern experience of living between layers', that is, how time has created different 'layers' of space throughout the world we live in. The film calls on a number of databases, each structured in the same fashion. The database containing video footage (as opposed to music) holds 425 clips selected from footage that Manovich himself shot at various locations over several years. Manovich aims to capture the idea of a "Global City" throughout these shots. Each video clip in the database holds 10 parameters, including location, subject matter, average brightness, contrast, the type of space, the type of camera motion, and several more. The software uses these parameters in selecting each clip, finding clips that are all similar in some fashion to the next.
Mission to Earth
The original piece was commissioned in 2003 by the BALTIC Centre for Contemporary ArtBALTIC Centre for Contemporary Art
The Baltic Centre for Contemporary Art is an international centre for contemporary art located on the south bank of the River Tyne alongside the Gateshead Millennium Bridge in Gateshead, North East England, United Kingdom...
in Gateshead, UK.
Mission to Earth symbolizes the experiences of a modern immigrant as well as the experiences of those during the Cold War. It attempts to show the trauma associated with a shift in identity as one changes their life. The Soft Cinema software uses several frames at once in this piece, displaying different things in each frame to portray the split in identity that the main character, Inga, experiences. The software also changes the size and number of windows as it grabs the content from the database. Most of the video used for the database was shot in London, Berlin, Rio de Janeiro, Buenos Aires, and Sweden.