SMU Experimental Camera 2019

I agree with Dorsky as he was saying that film is so much more than just entertaining people for hours. I never had really thought about film in that sort of way, but I like the way he stated that it has qualities to make people happy or sad or just entertain them for more than just the length of the movie. Due to the films we watch impacting us more than thought about, we can come to a conclusion about how by watching films we learn more and more about ourselves. The emotions we feel are very real and I think Dorsky's whole reading was very interesting to learn about. 

Dorsky, in his writing entitled "Devotional Cinema," meditates on the magical quality that film has in furthering our own emotional development. He states that film has the ability to transport us and through this, learn more about ourselves and our existence, thus giving film as a medium its "devotional" aspect. In effect, Dorsky holds the medium in such high esteem for its ability to enlighten us about our own existence. When Dorsky wrote about his experience after watching Rossellini's film A Voyage to Italy, it reminded me of a similar experience that I had following seeing a James Turrell piece . I went into the exhibition space alone, but after experiencing the color field art piece, I made friends with another girl that had also been in the space with me. The piece was a vessel for us experiencing a range of emotions, from anxiety and fear to peace and contemplation; the shared experience making us more "open," as Dorsky put it, to interact wi

Dorsky draws on elements of human perspective, vision, emotional response and the artistic merit of various cinematography to illustrate the sensations of a 'devotional' cinematic experience. Certain films can evoke the feelings of their own world, a full universal order, emotions and sensations trapped on the ramifications of the screen. It seems thats the type of visual experience Dorsky would describe as devotional. Certainly those films engross, and offer a perspective of the world thats similar to our own interpretation of the world. However, these are not the only types of valuable, and emotionally impactful films. Dorsky describes how documentaries can have a disconnect between the visual style and the narration. If the footage was captured as field recordings, it's nearly impossible to correlate the necessary audio backing to the footage shown. These type of films can still offer valuable insight into our perspective, construct a world, and absorb with their own exi

After reading the article on Devotional Cinema, I can say that I like a lot of what the author says about how cinema seems to have a life of its own and an inherent power to bring health and sickness to those who watch it. One point that I would like to add on to what Dorsky said is that I dont necesarilly think that cinema itself has the power to bbring such emotions to us, but in fact it is our willingness to be manipulated into showing and feelings these emotions that gives us the superstition that cinema has such a power. One quote that I really like from the excerpt is "We are part of our experience and yet we can see through it. We can see through it, yet we are not free from it. We are both appreciators and victims of material existence." When Dorsky talks about how our every reaction, emotion and movement is not actually our own, I felt that it is both a realistic theory yet also a questionable one too. With different kinds of upbringing different people will believ

As I read into this interesting article, it became more and more clear what Dorsky was trying to convince the reader to believe. From my understanding, Dorsky was attempting to convince the reader that film was more than simply entertainment for a few hours. Dorsky was trying to convince readers that film had visceral qualities, even to the point of healing and causing illness. I had never thought of film the way Dorsky described it. However, after reading the points he was making, I related with some of them. Most relatable to myself was the feeling after the film was over the everyone in the theater gets. I have left films where everyone was silent walking in and talking to each other walking out. I have also seen films that left people silent and sad as they were walking out, including myself. I have seen films where that feeling of sadness lasted for days, as I was unable to shake the memories from the film I had just seen. Though this is a feeling that I am sure many people have

In my opinion Andre's book about the Ontology of the Photographic Image preaches a very touchy side of photography that is constantly berated to the new by the old. I agree that the ancient use and value of photography was to extend life onwards into immortality. To be able to capture the best of oneself and provide evidence of the existence. Afterwards he goes on to explain how nowadays photography has become a channel for those of us from the masses to live through a portal in the surreal. To be able to find a place where we can escape reality and enjoy our own fantasies without repercussions. I have always considered the use of photoshop a bit more of a cheating way than purely using Lightroom. Don't get me wrong though, I understand that there are fantastic artists who put Photoshop to legendary use and create shockingly realistic images, yet these people understand and claim that their "paintings" or work stems from the use of existing images across the interne

After reading the insert from Bazin and listening in on the discussion from class, I have certainly formed an opinion on Bazin's words about photography. To my understanding, Bazin was trying to convey two simple messages, that photography is beautiful and that photography is psychologically sound. Bazin stated that photography can surpass art in creative power, which I very much agree with. I do believe that it is more difficult to take a beautiful image than paint a beautiful painting. In order for one to capture a beautiful photograph, one must first find a beautiful subject, which could very based on individual's opinion on beauty. Bazin also stated that photography is more psychology sound than a painting. This statement confused me at first, but after I was given the example of using a picture of a subject with a murder weapon versus a drawing of a subject with a murder weapon, it made much more sense to me. I also agree with Bazin, in saying that more people trust the el

In the beginning of this reading, Andre Bazin shows how ancient Egyptians use to practice embalming, which is keeping bodies for decaying after mummifying them. The author compares the practice to the inception of plastic art. I think there is a need for a person or community to practice whatever satisfies their desire. There is also the basic psychological need of a person to outplay time and by preserving the body, this desire is achieved. Their aim was beating death, however that was impossible in real life but could be done by painting images of the dead as a way of preserving their existence. An example of this is Louis XIV, who was depicted to have survived via painting. Therefore, I have the opinion that photography is a conflicting relationship with arts that represent obsession with reality. The invention of the camera in the fifteenth century was believed to be the creation of photography that would make things appear in reality. I think this made the spiritual expressi

Bazin’s “The Ontology of the Photographic Image” furthers the claim that photography “saved” the plastic arts when it was invented, as photography freed the visual arts from its aspiration towards realism. Bazin states that photography and cinema satisfy our obsession with realism and argues that photography is formed without the creative intervention of man. However, Susan Sontag states in her essay “On Photography” that “to photograph is to exclude,” implying that the mere act of photographing a scene rejects its objectivity as it excludes other information through the cropping of a scene. Bazin then tries to make the argument that photography represents an objective “proof,” even if drawings or other artworks offer more information than the photograph itself. Bazin’s argument about the objectivity of photography would be hard to uphold in our digital contemporary society. With countless apps and software able to distort the truth in images, photography no longer holds the complete