by CARIDAD BOTELLA LORENZO

Mobile news

n December the 2^nd 2011, newspaper The Guardian announced the theatrical release in Los Angeles of Olive by director Hooman Khalili, the “first feature film shot entirely on a smartphone” (a Nokia N8)[1]. Less than a year ago, the same newspaper announced the first short film shot entirely with the new iPhone 4, Paranmanjan by Korean director Park Chan-wooks which was released 27^th January in South Korean cinemas[2]. However, mobile movie-making[3], -this is the practice of shooting a movie with a mobile phone device-, is not a 2011 phenomenon but a film practice that was born in 2005, when the first built in cameras were incorporated to cell phones.

The first films shot with mobile phones appeared between 2005-2006. One of them is feature film SMS Sugar Man (2005-2006) by South African director Aryan Kaganof. This film is regarded as a revolutionary alternative way of making films with the limitations imposed by the mobile phone.

 17_CBL_001 - SMS Sugar Man (A.Kaganof - 2005/6)

Another pioneering film considered amongst the first ones would be New Love Meetings (2006) by Marcello Mencarini and Barbara Seghezzi.

The reception of these novelties highlight the use of the new technology and its limitations becoming assets; The Guardian reports about New Love Meetings on 14^th of June 2006: “The limitations of filming with a mobile phone – having to film at close range, weak sound capture and the slightly shaky picture – turned out to be advantages for them, leading people to open up a little more easily.”[4] Even though both films are very different, -the first one being a narrative ode to “film noire” and the second one a documentary film, an ode to Pier Paolo Pasolini’s 1965 Love Meetings,- they made film’s attention shift towards the issue of how reality, the world out there, is filtered through a cell phone’s camera. Not only because of the low-resolution imagery but because a cell phone is such a domestic object everybody carries it in his or her pocket: fiction or reality both films feel very close to us, spectators. A lot has happened since then; 2011 seems to signal the jump from cell phone to Smartphone…possibly the next experimental film will be shot with an iPad. The terms keep evolving together with technology but the one common aspect of these gadgets is that they are mobile devices offering the user the possibility of making photos and videos. They “insert” a lens in everybody’s hand: capturing reality at any moment and place of the day has never been so accessible. The possibilities this offers has not gone unnoticed, from common users to professionals: during the past years, films made with mobile phones have received the attention of not only the press but also film and media scholars. In order to better understand them, there is a tendency to root such practice within certain film traditions; moreover, scholars have attempted to define the aesthetic and stylistic characteristics of cell phone made films, resulting in the creation of categories and definition of possible tendencies.

17_CBL_002 - New Love Meetings (M.Mencarini and B.Seghezzi - 2006)

The mobile, portable aspect of the filming device is of utter importance when it comes to understanding cell phone made films. Regardless of the device filmmakers use, be this a cell phone, iPhone or smartphone (something that becomes highlighted by the press as the attractive piece of news) their mobile characteristic is what catches the attention of writers such as French scholar Roger Odin, one of the first ones to attempt to categorize cell phone made films. Odin brings forward a distinction made between cinema uno[5], the photographic cinema of the “trace”, “made to be seen in a room by a spectator invited to adopt a specific discipline of the eye” and cinema due or digital cinema which is consumed in many different kinds of “dispositiefs”, “which are often inscribed within the communication of the multimedia, of the game (…) or of the physical effect (…) rather than with that of the narrative”. (Odin 2009) Within cinema due the camera phone stands out as a different element: the camera as a prosthetic eye in the hand, as an extension of the body that makes mobile made films different, as the camera slowly integrates in the human body. (Odin 2009) This distinction deserves a special consideration since cinema due is too vast, Odin comes up with a subcategory: p-cinema: “is the part of cinema due which is made with a mobile phone.”[6] Odin’s category is to be based on the prosthetic aspect of the mobile phone, which translates into a shooting style.  And so with Odin a new category is born which opens the doors to new interpretations and analyses of an emerging cinema practice. Odin and others[7] have had the courage of sharing their thoughts and theories on a new subject; today, seven years after the first cell phone shot films, it is time to make a retrospective exercise. This paper will revise the evolution of aesthetic characteristics and typologies of mobile made films that have been suggested by several authors offering a short history of this recent phenomenon. Every attempt to explain the style and aesthetics of cell phone made films is an attempt to define a recent way of approaching reality; moreover it might define the characteristics of a possible new language. My objective is to place these considerations into perspective in order to offer some suggestions for future ones.

Before I continue and for the purpose of this article, I wish to clarify that the term “mobile” can be understood in two different ways; first as a type of device, the mobile phone, -also called cell phone,-  shares today stardom with the newer smartphones: hand held devices that not only allow us to make a phone call but that have become close to portable computers with Internet connection. The second use resides in the context of the mobility the term implies, as the devices are mobile in the sense that we take them with us everywhere, all the time. In terms of mobile movie-making, the technical characteristics of the device and its mobility generate a wide spectrum of filming possibilities, for example (as I will explain here below) the amount of pixels and portably of the device amount to certain aesthetic characteristics. This double understanding of the term points towards a holistic idea of mobility: the aesthetics of mobile movie-making are “mobile” not only due to the mobility of the devices but also due to their changing characteristics and constant state of evolution.

Mobile aesthetics

The way we perceive reality through a cell phone, built in camera has changed through time: pixelated images due to the camera’s low resolution, -so iconic in the beginning,- have become a conscious choice and high definition (HD) is now the new standard.  The first films made with camera phones in 2005-2006 had no other choice but to take advantage of the camera’s shortcomings: low resolution and the consequent pixelation of the image gave impulse to a low-res aesthetic. Far from being rejected, this effect is embraced by makers and considered as an asset to the end result. But low-res was soon superseded by better quality cameras; for films made in the last years (2010 on) low resolution is an option as, for instance, the mobile device iPhone4 records in HD where there is hardly any trace of the pixel. This phenomenon raises important questions about the quality of the image as a characteristic of cell phone made films. Is the pixelated image an aesthetic quality essential for the identity of cell phone made films? Is there such thing as mobile aesthetics beyond the celebrated shortcomings? Is the tool itself a unique asset when it comes to capturing reality, regardless of the amount of pixels? In their short life-spam, what seems to be true is that the very concept of cell phone film aesthetics is quite “mobile” itself as devices keep developing and changing very rapidly.

Media artists and scholars Camille Baker, Max Schleser and Kasia Molga support the idea of image pixelation as a defining characteristic in mobile aesthetics but they also consider other aspects that derive from the accessible character of the cell phone. In their common article Aesthetics of mobile media art they argue for the “existence of aesthetics unique to the mobile media” looking at the “mobile media specific qualities of immediacy and intimacy” (Baker et al. 2009: 101) Counter to the HD phenomenon, they consider mobile phones to have brought new standards when it comes to aesthetics. Moreover, considering filmmaking, German director and film scholar Max Schleser, co-author of the above mentioned article, has introduced a new category derived form the use of cell phones: the ‘mobile-mentary’. Schleser writes: “The category can be defined through the characteristics of an original aesthetic signified by pixelated video images. Thus, it is the mobile phone’s limitations that are the defining pattern for the establishment of this new format.” (Baker et al. 2009: 102) His statement seems to define a timely image previous to the improvement of the cameras.

The image quality issue, as Italian scholar Alessandro Amaducci points out, has had a fluctuating course throughout the history of cinema. The same fluctuation is present now a days when it comes to camera phones. Considering the past, the shortcomings of amateur technology which translate into a specific image quality, have been embraced by filmmakers such as Jonas Mekas or Stan Brakhage. Low quality image is considered a way of artistic expression; for instance, Mekas supports the “grammatical anarchy” of the “audiovisual avant-garde to defend the means that the market does not consider professional. In the 60s the Super8 or 16mm, abandoned formats of the mainstream production, become the new weapons of the artists who want to create moving images.”(Amaducci 2009: 143) Today, video artists such as Amsterdam based artist Raul Marroquin, exploit and defend the effect of low-resolution aesthetics, making the evident trace of the pixel the protagonist of the image[8]. Te thick quality of the pixels becomes an aesthetic filter through which reality is perceived. However, low resolution is not exclusive of video art and avant-garde cinema. Image quality is often distorted to achieve a desired effect such as, for example, that of a surveillance camera (Look who’s watching, 2007, Westley Emerson)[9] or POV effect made with a DV camera (Cloverfield, 2008, Matt Reeves entirely shot with this effect). We could say that, when a new technological tool comes out, like the DV camera or the mobile phone, the quality of the image is given as not optimal but with time the tool develops and strives towards professionalism, which is in this case as close to 35 mm or HD as possible. Low resolution defines the aesthetics of the beginning period of cell phone made films; once there are better options, low-res becomes an aesthetic choice[10].
As Amaducci writes:

Based on this, it seems as if the aesthetic line between experimental and mainstream film is blurring. Moreover, the quality improvement of built in cameras and generalization of HD video brings mobile made films closer to mainstream aesthetics. Thus, recalling the category of p-cinema (coined by Roger Odin) which refers to the portable, prosthetic character of the camera, can we say at this point that all the films shot with camera phones share aesthetic characteristics? Perhaps it is necessary to look beyond the question of the image quality to find unique traits of cell phone made films. Max Schelser refers to the new mobile aesthetics as “Keitai” aesthetics. In Japanese Kaitai means “hand-carry, small and portable, carrying something, form – shape or mobile phone”. (Baker et al. 2009: 102) Given this definition of Keitai, the concept of aesthetics derived from it goes beyond image quality into more philosophical aspects of the mobile phone use. Schleser assigns three levels of Keitai aesthetics. To begin with, the visual level which is characterized by the pixelation of the image. Even though he doesn’t mention HD built in cameras, he marks a certain periodization: “In mobile phone filmmaking, the period between 2005 and 2008 is characterized by advancement from the 3GP mobile phone video file format to the mpg4 compression format.” (Baker et al. 2009: 102) Schleser’s own work is a good example of this as it contains both formats in one video: Max with a Keitai (2008)[11] produced with two cell phones during 56 days in 2006. (Baker et al. 2009: 102-103)

 17_CBL_003 - Max with a Keitai (M.Schleser - 2008)

Moreover, Odin suggests certain “tendencies” that can add further meaning and information about the pixelation aspect within the visual level of Keitai aesthetics. Odin mentions contingent elements that depend on the pixelation of the image: constrains “which can be quite productive in terms of creativity” (Odin 2009: 367).  Having in mind the above-mentioned periodization, we can consider his examples as early works made with mobile phones with certain characteristics: first, pictorialism, in which we find a direct reference to painting, mostly due to the resemblance between the brush stroke and the pixel but also because of the correspondence between the vertical format of the painting and the mobile screen. Examples of this would be the short film La Perle[12] (Marguerite Lantz, 2006); in this short film a young girl uses a cell phone as a mirror to dress and compose herself as the lady in Johannes Vermeer’s painting Girl with a Pearl Earring. Odin argues this effect works as long as the pixel is visible to make reference to the brush stroke.[13] Another tendency would be abstraction; referring to the short film Tourner en rond et se laisser consumer (Vincent Moon, 2006)[14] Odin describes a “frenetic rhythm of lines and of spots which scroll at great speed on the screen, a visual sarabande on which he couldn’t help adding violins” (Odin 2009: 367) And last, diegesis of the pixel effect, this means the importance of the pixel within the narrative of the story. For example, in Nocturne pour le roi de Rome (Jean Charles Fitoussi, 2005) where the pixels gain a subjective character that supports the portraiture of the protagonist’s physical and psychological state. (Odin 2009: 367).

In Aesthetics of mobile media art, the authors don’t mention yet the possibility of making HD films with a cell phone; they do bring forward the format difference which seems to point towards an improvement of the image quality, becoming this slightly less pixelated. An example that can illustrate my concern towards the quality image issue is the work by French filmmaker and producer Benoît Labourdette. Labourdette made a 64-minute feature film Triton[15] (2007) shot with mobile phones and HD cameras, as he explains on his website[16]. Within the film we notice different image qualities. If we take a later work from 2010, for instance Etude pour main 11[17], we don’t find the pixelation from 2007.

 17_CBL_004

As I have suggested before, pixelation becomes an option at a certain point and therefore is not a continuous “unique” characteristic to mobile phone aesthetics but an optional trait.  Dutch filmmakers Cyrus Frisch is an example of this, as he shot his film Why didn’t anybody tell me it would become this bad in Afghanistan (2007) with a low resolution mobile phone (he purposefully bought the lowest resolution possible) in order to stress the alienation feeling the protagonist feels when he looks at the world from his balcony;

 17_CBL_005 - Why didn’t anybody tell me it would become this bad in Afghanistan  (C.Frisch - 2007)

in this case the narrative becomes stronger by the use of a pixelated image: “I started to film teenage immigrants. Because of the limitations of the medium, you can’t hear them so well. It seemed a threatening and scary experience. […] It became a perfect metaphor for what was going on with society at that time. People are scared for things they can’t name. […] I saw this view of the world through the images recorded with the phone”. (Botella 2011: 25-27)

Intimate, immediate and everyday aesthetics.

A year after the publication of his co-authored article, Max Schleser comments about the improvement of mobile technology and its influence in filmmaking. In a short period of time, camera phones have gone from not being recognised by manufacturers as filmmaking devices to having mini-jack connectors; this gives the possibility of recording digetic sound and interviewing with microphones. Further than this, the focus can be manually adjusted and filters and add-on lenses are becoming available[18]. Where does this leave the first level of Keitai aesthetics? The attention shifts from visual image quality to a deeper understanding of the identity of the image: intimacy, immediacy and everyday images which are available to us due to the portable, daily use of the device become now the elements to define mobile aesthetics; as Schleser writes: “as a portable and personal medium that one has always in reach every day and night, the notion of the everyday remains prominent.” [19] The attention shifts from low-resolution to the camera phone as a tool that captures our everyday reality.

Schleser summons up two other kinds of aesthetic levels which consider not only the surface of the image but the implications of new media’s processes. The second aesthetic level is related to the effect cell phones have on body language and how this is assimilated in the viewing and screening process using cell phones. (Baker et al. 2009: 103). This brings together new media aesthetics with the theory of embodiment: the experience of the world (as maker and audience) is not only limited to our vision but involves the whole body. A change of paradigm is suggested: from a “dominant ‘ocularcentric’ aesthetic to a ‘haptic’ aesthetic rooted on the embodied affectivity. (Baker et al. 2009: 104)[20]. This has changed media experiences incorporating “the capacity of the body to experience itself “as more then itself”, and thus to deploy its sensorimotor power to create the unpredictable, the experimental, the new[21].” (Baker et al. 2009: 104) These elements as characteristics are what the authors suggest to adapt “to the works produced for and by mobile devices. The mobile device incorporates the haptic notion as one touches the device actively to record/playback an audio-visual media file.” (Baker et al. 2009: 104)

The term haptic has a history in film theory, previous to mobile made films but we can easily connect it with the second aesthetic level. To begin with, the haptic refers to  “the way the eye is compelled to “touch” an object […]”(Marks 1999: 172). Haptic properties in film and video include distortion of the image such as out of focus, under- and overexposure, graininess, etc. By deploying such effects the viewer engages with the screen rather than the represented objects. As a result, “haptic images may also encourage a more embodied and multisensory relationship to the images in the films that use haptic qualities in combination with sound, camera movement and montage to achieve sensuous effects […] ” (Marks 1999: 171-172).  The characteristics and styles described until now regarding cell phone made films can be found in Mark’s idea’s; for instance pixelation as a form of graininess or Odin’s explanation of abstraction in the use of image and sound. Secondly, in the same way as Baker et al., Marks go beyond the surface by using the concept of “tactile epistemology”: the knowledge we can filter through our skin or giving significance to someone else’s physical presence. (Marks 1999: 190) Moreover, Marks refers to haptic cinema in terms of an object with which the audience interacts rather than just a narrative illusion (Marks 1999: 190). Both physical presence and interaction are embedded in Scheleser’s ideas. By means of considering the mobile device’s ability to link any location to a digital image, Schleser adds the “haptic sense of physical location” and “being there” which “allows the audience/viewer to identify with the location” (Baker et el. 2009: 105)

Finally, the third aesthetic level dwells in the previous one; it is “connected to qualities of a state of “in-betweenness” which refers here to “how mobile media operate in between photography, video and the internet, while simultaneously establishing new links.  The mobile phone merges communication and lens based media.”[22] This translates into a reflection about the private and multimedia role the cell phone has gained in the past years, not only as an object to take pictures or make movies but also as a tool for verbal communication. We can find a trace of these multi-media related levels in Odin’s categories and examples. For instance: he suggests the tendency the telephone and its different uses.[23] The cell phone is reflected upon in its GPS function in GPS yourself[24] (2008 Rémi Boulnois). In this movie where a man uses his own telephone in order to locate himself via satellite, we could find a metaphor to the second level of Keitai aesthetics which relates to the mobile device as locative media. (Odin 2009: 371)[25]. Another example of the cell phone as locative media but in relation the haptic is Fear Thy Not (Sophie Sherman, 2010). The filmmaker’s hand remains always in close-up and guides us through the space she finds herself into. By this means she is able to communicate her experience of a certain location[26].

Cell phone made films also reflect the cell phone’s identity as a place where communication and images blend. This is expressed through various means such as recording image and the voice of a telephone conversation. An example of this is the above mentioned Max with a Keitai, through which we hear the author have a conversation about the video he is making while we see the footage he took in Japan and hear the beep of incoming SMS messages. French filmmaker Alain Fleicher explores the different aspects of mobile representation conveyed by voice and image. One example of this is Chinese Tracks (2006), in which the filmmaker, lost in China, communicates his whereabouts to someone on the phone, while we see the images as he walks the city. As Fleischer says: “First of all what interests me is that it [the camera phone] is primarily a phone, an object of speech transmission […]. We don’t hold it as a camera (there is no viewfinder, no handle), we don’t stick our eye in it but our ear. […] I decided I would keep his phone as a phone, that is to say, against the ear.”[27] The cell phone is also seen as a multimedia object which substitutes others such as the television, the pen, camera, pocket lamp, book note, computer, etc in Totem[28] and Object à Usage[29] (2008, Delphine Marceau). This aspect represents the different links which are established by the use of the mobile device. For others, the invasion of the mobile phone as a tool for everything is translated into absurd scenes, such as in Extension du domaine du portable (J.B. Pouy) where the mobile becomes a shaving razor and La Savonnette (Sylvie Moisan) where it is used as soap bar under the shower.

It should be clear by now that defining mobile made films’ aesthetics is an intricate and changing enterprise. It becomes clear that it involves different levels of and approaches to reality: on the one hand we consider how the cell phone filters the world through different types of lenses (low-res, HD), on the other how we experience our environment (and vice-versa) through a mobile device and even further what kind of communication and information we have access to through the device. It is the combination of these levels and approaches that point towards a unique way of filmmaking. As Schleser point out, since the pixel is not a distinctive trait anymore and HD becomes the norm, cell phone films face the risk of blending with the rest of the video content and the challenge of remaining distinctive through developing their own image language and identity points towards the creation of “personal and autobiographical statements”.[30] Therefore we find aesthetics that derive from the portability of the mobile device, such as the immediacy, intimacy and the everyday which a cell phone camera can deliver and which become a unique aspect of mobile filmmaking. This brings us back to Odin’s subcategory of p-cinema: the size and mobility of the device stimulate a certain use of the camera phone which translates into what might be a new shooting aesthetics. Moreover, Baker et al. suggest[31] that portability facilitates the movement of the camera which creates a gesture and blurring effect. On the other hand portability and size encourage intimacy which translates into personal images and a predilection for close ups. Finally, the portability factor brings the world closer to the user through the lens and the mobile screen which becomes a “window on the world”.  (Baker et al. 2009: 108-109) Thus, regardless of the image quality, Odin’s p-cinema seems open to convey and embrace the three aesthetics levels mentioned here above. All important and enduring aspects of cell phone made films seem to derive from the accessible and portable characteristics of the filming device: it ultimately makes reality available to record (as it becomes the “window on the world”) and therefore possible to construct personal narratives. An already epic example of how directors director use a cell phone camera as a “window on the world” to construct a narrative is La Paura by Italian director Pippo Delbono. Delbono makes a “mobile-mentary” by filming things such as populist political and religious meetings, t.v. programs, the reality of poverty in Italy, etc. With this raw material he constructs a critical discourse about the current political and socio-economical situation in Italy.

Mobile conclusions

The changing, unstable identity of the mobile phone as a multimedia device reflects upon the works made and the theories written. The device’s place within a cinematic tradition but also within the history of media calls for a multidisciplinary approach that will allow us to have multiple views and a better understanding of the uniqueness of cell phone made films. In this article I have brought forward several considerations which were coming from different disciplines: from film and media scholars to filmmakers and media artists. This transversal analysis is the key to regard cell phones made films within and beyond traditional film practices. For instance, based on the last levels of Keitai aesthetics -the embodiment of a physical location and the hybrid character of the mobile device which merges communication with lens based media,- we find ourselves in the realm of new media (as Baker et al. suggest) which might represent an invitation to challenge the traditional way of using the camera phone for the sake of making movies and embrace a more unique practice that includes the internet and other media platforms. The analysis and understanding of styles and aesthetics unique to cell phone films have become more complex as technology itself becomes more intricate. I have attempted to disclose this development: from the first observations that focused on the limitations of the camera and pixelated image to this last suggestions that encourage to look beyond the traditional use of the camera.  Without entering the realm of other media platforms, the uniqueness of a portable camera phone with a screen offers already a wide range of possibilities. The complexity of the mobile phone within the cinematic context (not only as a portable camera but also as a portable viewing tool) can be exemplified by the following: film festivals are starting to transcend the traditional viewing situation of the projected image for an audience to making use of the cell phone’s screen as viewing “dispositif”. Curiously enough, an example of this can be found in Japan, Professor Masaki Fujihata founded his own film festival; honoring the land of keitai, the Pocket Film Festival in Yokohama, focuses on showing films on the small screen. (Hart 2009)

In order to be able to develop a theory about the aesthetics of cell phone made films and therefore about how they relate to reality and to what reality they relate to, it is necessary to consider all disciplines which are involved in the field: film scholars, filmmakers, artists, festivals, etc. Briefly having done this, I would like to suggest two approaches to understanding and analyzing mobile made films: a traditional, film oriented approach (e.g. Odin, Amaducci) which places films within a historical tradition and attempts to differentiate tendencies and styles; and a second approach which integrates new media, the Japanese influence represented by Schleser’s consideration of the cell phone’s cultural roots and Fujihata’s approach to unique viewing characteristics of the cell phone. Moreover, Fujihata, who also teaches young people to use the cell phone as filming camera, attempts to define a specific uniqueness to mobile phone filmmaking. His ideas are comparable to elements which have been brought up here and underscore the fact that a mobile phone is not to be used for making a traditional film, they can offer a unique way of looking  at reality. Simple and spontaneous films shot from the hip, almost like a “sketch or a memo”: these are Fujihata’s tips to develop a specific filming language for mobile phones. In his teachings, the movies to be recorded are simply not meant for the big screen but for the small, mobile screen. (Hart: 2009) Whereas the first line of research robs cell phone made films of the aura of novelty the press so much likes to announce, the second one offers a path for exploring unique styles and aesthetics of mobile made films. Perhaps this will offer a set of ideas that come closer to the ontology of the images made with mobile devices as a reflection of our “mobile” existence. After all mobile devices are constantly changing the way we communicate with others and for us, most importantly, the way we filter our daily, everyday life through an incorporated camera.

THE AUTHOR

Caridad Botella Lorenzo

Caridad Botella Lorenzo (Madrid, 1977) is an Amsterdam based art historian, film scholar, curator and art/film critic. She has recently graduated from a Film Studies MA at the University of Amsterdam with a thesis about cell phone made films as an emerging film practice. In March 2012 she will participate in Udine’s International Film Studies conference with a paper about how professionals teach mobile movie-making.