Where I’m From from Emma Moser on Vimeo.
Fernando Canet describes that often in contemporary cinema, it is the “(creators) intention to capture reality as honestly as possible, that representation can never be an exact reproduction of reality, as the nature of representation in itself prevents this.” (Canet 2013) I explored this thought through my piece, as I explored the reality of my day-to-day life, however shifting away from literal representation through the use of audio and visual techniques and highlighting a more personal perception of how I experience living at home. This is described by John Grierson as “the creative treatment of actuality.” (Canet 2013)
The theme of my audio-visual work was a combination of both the lumière film and sound piece made previously. It is an exploration of my home being the place where I both work and relax, however these two states often blur together as I procrastinate and experience distraction. I wanted to represent these stages in the setting of the house I’ve lived in for as long as I could remember, through the motif of and old jewellery box, which has a constant presence throughout the one minute.
As Matthew Mullane claims, “By encouraging an active listening relationship with one’s space, effective sound-based artwork enlivens the seemingly prosaic, underlining the inherent aesthetic potential of common experiences.” (Mullane 2010) My aim was to highlight the “aesthetic potential” in both the sounds and sights we see every day in our own homes, which have become overlooked due to familiarity, and presenting them in a new way. This was done through editing sounds through reverb, reversing and stretching, and visually by setting context and then re-capturing an everyday object through experimentation with framing and light. I edited the visual first, using the sound editing to further convey how I perceive my own home.
Using match cuts and subtle continuation shots I conveyed a pattern I notice in my own home, there’s a certain sensation of repetition and connectedness I feel in my day-to-day life. Through sound editing, I included diegetic sounds in the shots of me working and moved toward a more non-diegetic edit as the film progressed to a more dream-like state, this was in order to represent the shift from focus to distraction. This shift was also conveyed through the complete drop of sound after a progressive build-up of noise, this is a dramatic and effective method of implying a change of mood, tricking the ear from receiving a lot of information to hardly any at all.
References
Canet, F 2013 Acta University Sapientiae, Film and Media Studies, 7, The New Realistic Trend in Contemporary World Cinema: Ramin Bahrani’s Chop Shop as a Case Study p. 154
Mullane, M 2010 Journal of Aesthetics and Culture, The aesthetic ear: sound art, Jacques Rancière and the politics of listening p.1
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