Alexx Henry and Greg Williams are making names for themselves as Red magazine photographers.
Alexx has an Outside cover this month (here):
And Greg Williams has Esquire’s sexiest woman alive cover (here):
So, what did these two magazines do with all the awesome technology they employed in these forward thinking cover shoots. Nothing. That’s right as far as I can tell Outside made their normal cover (the photographer made all these cool futuristic looking living covers and inside spreads in his BTS video) and Esquire made a video to go with their normal cover. It’s sort of like buying a Ferrari and hitching a team of horses to it. Beyond idiotic.
75 Comments
and the photographers made their standard little fees while the publications paid in spades for the camera……..
@Kathleen Clark, That’s what I was thinking too.
@Kathleen Clark, “publications paid in spades for the camera”
The beauty of owning your own equipment. Photo Editors often joked with me how the equipment rentals were more than the creative fee + page rate. For the magazines, that’s totally acceptable… but paying us more? no way!
@Kathleen Clark, what were the fees these photographers got?
Good stuff. The Alexx Henry video is a great example of a quality BTSV. Interesting story, great production and a positive message. Just glad I didn’t have to push that dolly all day.
It seems like these are moreso gimmicks that will also produce some video content for each respective website.
Of course, with the recent axing of Gourmet, it’s kind of a smarter move to have more supplemental content online regardless.
I’m wondering how much that shoot cost. Especially when the publishing companies (especially Outside) is trying to keep things thin. I’ve seen Alexx in other Red camera PR videos. Very talented dude. We were talking about this not long ago when the shoot will no longer need a digital tech but a Final cut pro and After-effect tech. I like where it’s all going but cost to rent Red and the crews to make it happen are higher then a still shoot. The benefit is you get two for one. So if the media needs are there and budgets are good then that is the winning ticket. Skadoosh!
Interesting BTS.
Did I miss something with the Alexx Henry piece?
Apart from the advantages of creating stills and motion on one shoot, with one team, the message I was hearing was ‘we are creating content for a delivery medium that doesn’t exist yet’.
Don’t get me wrong, I’m all for new technologies and a changing landscape. I have no problem with that. I guess I’m left with a feeling of ‘well, what’s the point then?’
Kudos for the BTS with it’s mock ups of future magazine content.
@Thomas Pickard,
Yup, seems like they’re trying to put the cart before the horse. Getting stills for publishing and video for web is nice but video for printing? That a very long throw, esp. at a times when everything gettins shuffled around and magazine can’t seem to survive!
Side note – I personally found kate beckinsale LESS attractive in her effort to model/act. There’s magic of one still image that i don’t think video can replace anytime soon.
Sure. Great production. Although I thought magazines were struggling right now, hence the lower editorial fees for still shooters. Pay the photogs more. Produce even better content. I don’t know about anyone else, but reading a magazines content online isn’t something I do or plan on doing. I still like a quality publication in my hands. If someday they can put motion graphics on 1/32″ piece of paper, then were getting somewhere.
@Matthew brush, I agree to an extent. They taught us in broadcasting school about eight years ago that newspapers wouldn’t go away because its readers wanted the “hands on experience”. Look what’s happening now. If someone solves the riddle of convenience anything is possible.
@Matthew brush, I can see what you’re getting at, but I doubt it’ll happen the way it’s shown in the video. I think there will be paper sized medium, but it’ll be more of a futuristic Kindle vs. something disposable. In essence it’s still a computer screen.
With actual paper publications, the reader has no electricity needs, you can tear out articles and images and toss the rest, etc.
Should be truly interesting to see how it plays out. Maybe print will be a niche market like vinyl is in the music industry.
— On another note, I agree about producing better content if people are willing to pay more. I think photographers need to be more proactive as far as being able to also provide written editorial content and maybe video in some situations as well. I know I’ve had better luck pitching full packages.
Its not about how they videos are used today. Consider these motos as R&D for the future. If the publications are smart they are developing cutting edge versions of their mags for iphone and tablet computers that will out in the next few years at price points anyone can afford.
Right now magazines are struggling to keep afloat and they are trying everything they can to hit the mark so they can turn a handsome profit again. Consider what Alexx and Greg are doing as paid experiments.
Keep in mind that this technology is in its infancy. We have no idea where its going but the first one to figure out how to do it right is going to make tons of money.
We’re in an industry that is quickly becoming one that is happy with “good enough” photography and low prices. My business took a shit in 2008 and this year has survived because I can shoot HD. Right now business is actually growing again and its all because I’m able to make motion from a still photographers perspective. I can tell you that I’m very happy now that I can finally make use of my animation and motion skills I learned in college. :-)
With cameras like the 5DMKII you can start making your own motos. They are going have less definition then the RED but thats ok. I’m sure in a year Canon will have a RED killer for less money.
I was hired to shoot a still pinup calendar this year but when the client saw an experiment I did with the 5DMKII he wanted them all to be still and moving. Sadly the client ran out of money and is fighting me so I cant post them on my vimeo page. Heres a link to one called Lady Liberty. Its in 720p.
http://files.me.com/gsciorio/xddtui.mov
I’m sure the productions cost far more then a still shoot. Just check out the BTS vids for the motos. Also if you want to see better quality motos check vimeo not youtube.
Here’s Alexx’s Vimeo page
My recommendation is for photographers to get comfortable with After Effects, make some experiments and market them.
A quote from that Outside video: “(In the future) We can walk up to a news stand and for a couple of dollars hold a piece of living art in our hands”.
Shucks, silly me. I thought still photography, well done, was “living art”.
And what’s with that moronic phrase, “living art”, anyway?
Plus, I find it interesting that many TV programs (SNL, some CNN programs, etc.) show still images at the beginning and end of segments. I believe that this is because the distillation of the stream of life into one certain moment will always resonate with people.
Think, too, about iconic news images (Tiennamin Square, man getting shot in the head in Saigon and so on. These images, seared into our heads, started as film clips. But it’s the moment we crave and remember.
And, finally, am I the only one who thinks that the video of the fellow running that’s been superimposed onto the pages of Outside is just plain boring?
@Tony Fouhse,
I think both videos are boring. Substitute the sexy actress with an ordinary person and see how visually interesting it is. (Of course, that’s the case with a lot of supposed great still photography nowadays too.)
@wb, Tony…I agree with your thoughts on the video. I never thought I would get tired of watching a beautiful women, but that’s how poor the video was. I can say the same for the magazine cover. Not sure if it was edit or design but there was no life to the image of Lieto. Far cry from the energy you see in Alexx’s images
@Tony Fouhse,
Yeah I don’t really agree with Alexx about a newsstand that looks like the back wall at Best Buy. I do think an advertisement for that issue of the magazine where the cover subject moves is awesome and will be super effective… in a subway, on a billboard, online.
The more crowded the marketplace the higher the value of an image that can convey a message in 1 second. Video just takes too long.
Can we see some invoices for these “moving” covers?
I’d like to see the business models for both the creators and the publishers.
Are these loss leader promotions for both, either?
Wondering how green these new technologies will be when produced in millions/billions of units across the entire publishing markets.
Patiently waiting for the emotional train wreck of comments (including assumptions and anger) about why the production and use of this BTS video is inappropriate :-^
Was the Esquire cover a freeze frame of the Red Video? ( a rendered Raw freeze frame file). That would be news.
@James,
The last cover he did was a Red Frame. You could tell it was as well. I wondering if this one is because last time they had a cool cover that moved and they’re not doing that again.
And how is this any different from shooting stills and also having a video camera on set for BTS (which is going to be displayed on the web anyway)?
The displays in the London tube would look just fine with footage from an HPX170…
If I’m not mistaken, I thought I saw a 5DMK2 mounted on the same platform as the RED in the Outside video… what’s the point, other than hype, extra cost, etc.?
Who has time to watch all these videos? One of the great things about photography is that it’s instantaneous….I don’t have to spend five minutes to figure out if the content is worth spending five minutes on.
I think there will still be space for photography. I spend far, far more time listening to radio programs now than I ever did five years ago, thanks to podcasts. And it’s great to be able to listen while I do other things (like retouching).
Saying video will replace photography is a bit like saying music videos will replace songs.
Good for the mags for trying it out, though. In the history of wasted money in the industry I’m sure this ranks pretty low.
@Pete Bohler,
Who has time to read all these blog posts let alone, post to the comments. Get back to work!
Maybe I’m showing a lack of imagination here, but the moving magazine cover just didn’t seem like a good idea to me. Okay, it looks interesting when it’s just one, but imagine the entire shelf being full of moving covers – it’ll just become so much visual noise. In the end magazines will have to stand out by having traditional static-image covers. And so the cycle repeats.
Not to mention, is a magazine really going to allow its logo to scroll off the top of the cover?
The mockup of the inside of the magazine, on the double page spread, also seemed like a huge loss of usability to me. With all the images changing and the text fading in and out, see how long it took to get to the actual article text? Even if you say the animation is a one-shot feature, will thumbing through the magazine trigger it, wasting the effect?
This is probably a solvable problem, but I think all these examples make the same mistake. They cite the newspapers in Harry Potter but don’t realise it’s not the whole page that moves, just the images illustrating the text right next to them. Text is always visible, as is the (looping) video. I think that’s where we’ll really see value from “moving” magazines, in a format which is oddly similar to the world wide web we see today. Maybe it’s the portable web. Maybe you’ll be able to view it on a cell phone. In fact, we aren’t far off that are we?
This is funny, it reminds me of the same futile attempts of the magazine industry when they discovered the web…”Living Art”, awesome euphemism for video.. Anyway, it will make no financial sense to produce millions of copies of a magazine when 100 of them could be downloaded to a “magazine reader”…
I have no doubt that video displays will be everywhere and replace public displays but I seriously do not believe a magazine with any brains will spend 2 million a month to put something on the stand when the digital version can be served to a dedicated reader…. this is once again heading the wrong path, or just PR which means nothing other than today, the magazine gets a “wow cool awesome dude, I can’t wait for the future”… I also seriously doubt that mags can compete with media behemoth at the video game…but we shall see, there’s going be more publishing blood on the street before this or anything else becomes “THE FUTURE”…..
First of all Kate Beckinsale is not sexiest woman alive. Ever cruised the streets of Bucharest?! It may be idiotic, but here Ferraris do indeed share the roads with horse carts.
@Davin Ellicson, Yes, bad teeth and sallow skin! That was 1992-93, so I suspect people have been taking care of themselves since then!
Is it just me, or did the still images from the Esquire shoot look total shit? It seemed the files looked pretty gnarly at web resolution, so I could only image what it looks like in print. I haven’t seen a printed copy though, so I’m not totally sure.
Not to mention that video was totally lame. I mean, looking through the slide show was fine, but I felt ripped off watching that video for 3 minutes.
If this is the future of photography — producing insipid short videos for online content, well… count me out.
I am however very interested in the potential of the moving ads in the subway system. I think those would be pretty striking to see in real life.
It’s times like these that I’m glad I have a Canon 7D, a new Mac Pro, Final Cut Pro Studio 3, and the professional skillset to be able to use all three.
Hee Haw, Cowboy Meow!
@Patrick Yen,
Wow, ur like so kewl!
Won’t you please sprinkle your many talents on the rest of us so you wont crush our jobs and dreams, Mr. ‘Futurist’.
“Living Art”, “Friendly fire”, ” Collateral Damage”, “Fair and Balanced” , “Activist judges”…,”Youthful Indiscretions”, I can’t stop laughing…anyway, I am off to make some “Living Art on YouTube….
What makes a magazine a magazine?
Why can’t a magazine just be a fusion of brilliant, artful still images called P-H-O-T-O-G-R-A-P-H-S along with exceptional written stories. Why must a magazine become a laptop? a dvd player? a screen?—gasp!
So what if a magazine cover becomes a moving billboard that keeps rewinding…seems pointless and kinda boring to me… Admittedly, it would seem novel for about the first three run-through(s) but then what?
Seems like it would be a big expense that ultimately under-delivers.
Then there’s the expense, I mean, six-ton dollies being pushed by camera crews of 8, how much does that cost? Not to mention the time factor. Are we (art directors and editors) supposed to craft the magazine then go straight into the film production phase of the editing process as well? Sure, there’s time for that. Ug.
Also, aspiring HD film shooters beware because you better believe that if an editor-in-chief throws down the cash for a shoot like this she’s damn sure gonna want to vet the editing process as well (assuming she has video inside her pages). I can see her new title now: Director-in-chief. That said, I gotta admit those flexible screens are pretty dang cool, though probably better served for advertisers than editorial content.
Samir Husni, a.k.a. Mr. Magazine, has the best take on all this technology mumbo-jumbo methinks. He says, “Folks are not frogs or rabbits who like to hop from one medium to the other. They want to lose themselves with whatever medium they are engaged in. Part of our problem in print is that we’ve stopped providing—in most parts—our customers with a whole experience in print. We have de-valued our content so much it is going to be hard, not impossible, but hard to bring back the value.”
In short, I wish we (print) would stop fretting over merging our medium with others (or there medium with ours) and focus on what print does best: communicate ideas and service fantasies through rich stories and powerful pictures.
@Marshall McKinney,
Well put. Or, to take the approach from the opposite end; a magazine that can be replaced by a website, should be.
I never throw away a copy of Esquire, but I use Rolling Stone to wrap used truck parts in (which is why I’m totally bummed they went to a standard format – less wrapping material)…
@STONER,Agreed! Think you could find me a 1987 Ford-F150 rear differential? If so, please wrap it in R.S. 969….cheers.
@Marshall McKinney,
“Then there’s the expense, I mean, six-ton dollies being pushed by camera crews of 8, how much does that cost?”
A dolly doesn’t weigh six tons. Looks like they are using a J.L.Fisher 10 — carry weight 420#. The dolly is sitting on a Matthews Centipede (27.5#). Motion picture equipment doesn’t cost much to rent.
And they will be paying commercial rates just like they do for TV commercials. This type of production may be new to magazines, but it is common to advertisers.
The one thing that may happen is that still shooters may be out of work. Back in the day a still photographer would come on the set and shoot his stills using my lighting (mainly food shoots), this could happen in some cases now. If you are not a good story-teller you could lose out to film director/cinematographers.
@Marshall McKinney, There are some valid points in most of the comments but this is by far the best argument about this still motion editorial trend we are getting into. Yes, there will be are healthy demand for motion images in the future and yes, still images will continue to grow. But what is really hurting the editorial market today in terms of content? In my opinion, magazines underestimating the intelligence and sophistication of their readers by producing safe, trendy (yes trendy) images they see over and over.
Esquire is one of my favourite magazines and I would love to shoot for them. But substituting great images and stories with how images were captured with high tech Red cameras, not so moving. I think they would be better off with Greg Williams’ still photography. A great idea would be advertising a new issue with a moving cover, like the way “Quantum of Solace” was promoted.
It’s GOOD!! Trying looking at it from a positive point of view instead of being dead cynical. It WILL happen – still photographers WILL be shooting video as standard and taking stills – it’s all just in it’s infancy yet.
Call it stupid if you want, it’s just your opinion, but you’ll look more stupid when it’s the norm in a few years (stills and video used more effectively across ‘print’ media due to new tech displays)
Personally, I’m EXCITED by the possibilities, and thanks to Greg Williams and Alexx Henry for being kind enough to share
Looks like the future is arriving first quarter 2010.
Thoughts of a Bohemian, Sept 30 “The future is promising” http://blog.melchersystem.com/
Gizmodo http://gizmodo.com/5370252/apple-tablet-to-redefine-newspapers-textbooks-and-magazines
Maybe the Outdoors and Esquire shoots were test runs.
Maybe BTS videos are more popular than you think. Rolling Stone does BTS for their covers and post them on both their site and YouTube. Different demographics need different approaches.
RED camera packages are not that expensive to rent. Google RED camera rental. Remember a Phase One P45+ BACK rents for $550.00 a day in L.A. Also digital still cameras rent for a four day week, film equipment rents for a three day week.
Always use the right tool for the job. Sometimes it’s a Leica M9, sometimes a DSLR and sometimes a RED.
Sounds like a bunch of butt hurt photographers who don’t get it. Motion, either through video, animated graphics or otherwise are going become more and more dominate as time goes on.
There will still be a place for strong stills but that market is shrinking or did you live in a cave for the last two years?
More and more digital billboards are replacing traditional billboards, tablet PCs oh and lets not forget something called iphone. All are places where a photographer can grow their business if they can offer more to their clients then just a still photo.
Add in the fact that more and more hobbyists are getting quite good with still photography and the idea of working with motion becomes more appealing.
I can see similarities with this conversation and some I was a part of when digital photography started becoming popular. The same photographers who didn’t get digital are still playing catchup.
@Giulio Sciorio, i kind of agree, but you are missing one basic thing in your argument: photography is just that, whatever medium it is recorded on, wether digital or analog. so that switch was something else.
and while moving pictures will gain a lot of momentum over the next years, the efforts to produce high quality videos is way higher than for most photographs. good models are much easier to find than good actors.
and then you always have to watch a video in full length to be able to judge it. with photographs one can even pick the best ones from thumbnails.
and than there is this issue with the accompanying “sound” = noise. please dont get me started on that…
The point is not the technology or the possibilities or what will happen or what will not happen, the point is that magazines keep trying to fit a round peg in a square hole…They keep taking the format of an old fashion magazine and applying technologies to it when those technologies DO NOT fit that format, or not well…First they took the magazine online, that did not work, now they are trying to make the magazine digital, that will not work either because they keep trying to adapt technologies to something which is essentially DEAD… This kind of death throes always happens to old formats, they keep trying to hitch themselves to their killer and apply their nemesis’s attribute to themselves until the whole thing collapses….The world is moving away from magazines, newspapers and even television, to be replaced by a whole new set of systems which will not be kind to the “Old Media”….it might take another ten years or much much less…and I do not think that shooting ‘Living Art” and making a magazine look like a video magazine will save them…FYI, there were many “video mags” in the 90s, all dead and GONE…because it was not convenient…. I could be wrong but trying to fit the moving image to a magazine format is not gonna work… unless may be you find a whole new set of NON magazine designers and NON magazine people…..Square peg, Round hole…all gone….
@olivier laude, Here, here!
All I know is that I use a pirated version of Photoshop and Lightroom etc. ect, download movies to watch for “free” as well as all my music. Not a cent paid. Good luck with going digital, old media.
I did, however, buy a book last month (yes, a real one – I prefer them) as well as a magazine at the newstand along with my subs. and the Sunday NYT twice to have the magazine in the flesh. Yes, I prefer the real one because of it’s content on the printed page…and their photos.
Respectfully to Outside and Alexx and crew who put together a really cool spot there, I’ll be reading that moving magazine over my Gourmet lunch that pops out of a little pill when I add water. It’s at least a generation before this kind of technology is economically viable for the average publisher (or consumer for that matter) to be involved in. When that day comes, bring on the robots! Until then, there is so much ridiculous opportunity for amazing storytelling with the mediums and tools we already have.
I mean, let’s all photographers assume today that photography is dead. Now, pick up your cameras and go create some amazing photography, combine it with some other dead arts like writing and music, and then present it on whatever medium makes sense.
Everyone just dropped the ball in the middle of the game and sat down to watch the clock run out. What would you do in that situation?
@Andrew Kornylak, but it won’t be “Gourmet” magazine as it was cut from the lineup this week! Your right…send me in coach.
@Gary Miller, ha – wondering if anyone would catch that. POP!
the esquire video sucks in almost every way possible
“I’m not a great believer in the power of the moving image. A still image has greater lasting power. A still photographer has to show the whole movie in one picture. On the screen, it’s over and back in the can in seconds. A still picture is going to be there forever.”
Quote by Eddie Adams
I find it intriguing, that after listening to Leo LaPorte on the future of podcasts and streaming I go on to read about two unknown, till now, street photographers who are doing it with film cameras. I then come to here, with Leo LaPorte, his ideas still resonating in my mind, begin to read, once again, about magazines putting motion into their content platform .
The issue is not magazines using still and or motion per say, but those who can acquire their material / content once in an all inclusive manner. They will then be able to stream, do a print on demand static issue, a special motion based issue, high quality audio and or video podcast and get it out into their chosen markets in near to real time . The micro / macro media companies that use the internet and social networking models will be the new Comcasts/ Murdochs.
As for the print magazine, is not going away for a while, but how the magazine redefines itself in this emerging content space will be a challenge for the foreseeable future. Still photography will still be a viable and highly respected medium for all story / content creation. As for Ad buys, I think the novelty of motion covers and charging higher ad rates because of those covers will become a wash. Everyone will be doing it so no unique buying / selling proposition.
Which leads me to this. Sort of touching on Marshall McKinney’s statement above.
Once the unions, IATSE 600 for Camera(National, U.S.A.), The local union halls, Local 480( here in N.M.), Local 1 in NYC., DGA and any body else that sees a threat to their revenue stream, the costs for doing these BTS and mag shoots will go up accordingly. Especially when cinema equipment is used, if it hasn’t happened already.
If a mag has any union members on employ, or if a rental house is renting and a union boss finds out that it is going to a non union gig that has union rep., ouch. This could be the new battlefield for content creators. AFAIK, the unions see motion as film and thats their turf.
That is why I too would like to know the costs. Not just equipment rental, but was this a union job? Do we as photographers have to become IATSE 600 members to shoot? Is this a new issue for ASMP, PPA, NPPA, and others? Will IATSE 600 demand initiation fees and their quarterly dues, for Still/ V-DSLR shooters? With thin budgets, I see these issues coming to the front, and what actually gets put up and/or out pushed to the back.
So, as to the videos, flavor of the month, but a pandoras box hiding in the background costs wise.
For a change of pace:
The use of a Canon 5D MK-II, on the battlefield at this link:
http://gizmodo.com/5373320/high-definition-war-footage-taken-with-canon-5d-mark-ii
@laurence zankowski,
Actually getting Local 600 involved would be a good thing. They have a pay rate (scale) that they have negotiated. There are no rules against working over scale many people do.
I’m always surprised that people who need a union most are anti-union.
Rental houses in L.A. have been renting to non-union companies, no big deal.
I’m retired from the IATSE now, but I worked NABET and non-union shows as well. Just don’t rub their face in it, i.e don’t light up six blocks of Hollywood Blvd. for a night scene for a non-union show.
@laurence zankowski,
Local 600 already represents still photographers and publicists.
@laurence zankowski, very compeling and interesting argument laurence..I think you are very right, this could get very complicated….
As much as I appreciate the technology,with the state of the business, I find it hard to believe that any magazine could afford to pay for the cost of using the Red camera. I’ve just begun to start directing music videos and online content and so far, due to costs, the Red camera is always out of the question.
With all these magazines dying, could it be that we’ve simply reached the saturation point, with information and stories thrust in our faces? We’ve got email blasted automatically into our iPhones; we’ve got Text Messages coming at us left and right; we go to the john in a restaurant, and there’s Larry King talking to some jaded celebrity, over the urinal; we come back into the restaurant and there are twelve 60″ wall mounted televisions screaming at us; we fall asleep on the sofa with a MacBook Pro next to us, with Facebook updates. How the hell could a monthly magazine keep up with that pace, even if it was “moving”?
And somebody tell me what was worth writing that check for that beach thing? Just a guy running down the beach, with some side fill…? That content was worth that Purchase Order?
And if the magazines are dying off, due to lack of advertising, how many guys running down the beach could one issue support?
The only time I *ever* buy a magazine is when I’m in an airport, and yesterday, my American flight offered WIFI, so that’s the last bastion eaten up right there.
What am I gonna do, carry a 15″ laptop, and also some kind of electronic ink magazine in my bag too? Why would I do that? Why wouldn’t I just look at a web page? What am I missing here?
@El Cee Dee, missing nothin’…
@El Cee Dee,
You’re missing nothing except that if you were an outdodor magazine that one day decided to put a guy with his shirt off on the cover for a workout package and suddenly that was the best selling issue of the year so you decide to do it every year except there’s diminishing returns so you have to kick it up a notch in some way each time.
Massive environmental problem waiting to happen. A billion tiny screens dumped into the ground. Until the delivery technology changes, this ain’t gonna happen.
Moving covers…?
You mean, like with my Cracker Jack surprises in the 70’s?
@Anon,
Laying dolly track, and catering, for this…?
http://i44.tinypic.com/2lkr4ew.gif
@Jesus Blinks, Exactly, but even worse with those vertical ridges.
Magazines don’t have screens. Period. Maybe in 10-20 years but not now.
these guys are out on set creating and pushing limits. kudos to em’ !
Dear Santa:
So all I want for Christmas is a trio of Red cameras, gear and a tech/production crew. Um, oh and a budget, haha!
Hey , Alexxxxx Henry is making ”living art ” man give the guy a break . although living art is a mouthful , maybe he should shorten it to ” video” .
We all pretty much know what editorial rates are at their best. Someone here took a big loss or had a great sponsor. I don’t see where rates will match the costs of a full crew and its equipment unless we’re talking about Ads , as in advertorials in one form or another.
There is nothing really new here. Dirck Halstead over at Digital Journalist has been pushing video, combined with stills skills, for over a decade.
http://www.digitaljournalist.org/
So the internet is being molded to become more like television, and now magazines are being molded to become more like television. Why must every media become television?
just because something moves does not make it interesting. When we talk about motion or video or motos were are really talking about film and cinema, and the defining characteristic of cinema is editing-the cutting from one frame to another. It is the cutting that defines film. The reason all of these experiments are looking dull is that there is nothing new created here-it is editing that creates meaning.
If a magazine cover could tell a story with moving images and editing it might work, but this to me seems like a commercial-15 seconds of a little story. The trouble with commercials is that they are really a product of television, and television was a medium defined by flow, at least in the beginning. You could not change channels, or the flow of the program made you not change channels so you sat through the commercial.
Flow is unique to television since “they” program the flow. So good luck trying to position commercials in other areas, we have too much control now.
My prediction is that motion for motion sake will be like 3D for 3D-sake, a gimmick that will not last long.
Don’t get me started on the effects of media consolidation caused by technology-the only reason we are getting the red shoved down our throats as content producers is that it suits the suits. Nearly all of the defining imagery of the twentieth century was created by one person with one camera-so tell me why exactly we want to lay a dolly track now for every “shot”?
Hi 5 to Alexx Henry for being a very engaging and smart entrepreneur who sees a market, coins a phrase, and convinces everyone that they need to have it. Who picked up the tab here though…I am guessing Outside Magazine didn’t, well at least not all of it. I’m guessing Alexx got his vendors to contribute (note the long list at the end) or Red One, considering they get a free viral ad every time Alexx makes “moving art”. Alexx does for Red One what Vincent Laforet did for Canon 5D, and god bless them both for laughing all the way to the bank.
Oh think of all the trees it will save. ahem
So we’re agreed that it’s all about the content, whatever the medium. And some guy jogging down a beach looking moody or a bird flouncing around in her pants trying not to look self-conscious does not content make. They may warrant a glance as a still frame, but five minutes of my time? At least tell me a story. The world’s already full of vapid tv, in case anyone hadn’t noticed.
There’s a place for both stills and “living art” in the future, along with stop motion, (Dan Chung just did a nice one on a Chinese military parade), slideshows, drawings, animation, cgi, or whatever, but getting hung up on one technology over another is just missing the point. It’s the gearhead’s response. Next year it’ll be vr, holographic projections or brainstem hookups, and they’ll all be saying video’s dead. If reading had disappeared with the invention of the phonograph then I could see something in this, but video has limited uses like any other medium. Essentially the experience is too passive – it lacks the interactivity and immediacy of reading text and pictures. You can’t take some things in at a glance, linger over others, pause for thought, re-read, or cross-reference in anything like the same fluid manner. Gawping is the past, not the future.
And as for magazine stands stacked with motion covers – c’mon. What advantage does buying an e-paper magazine have over downloading the magazine to your own e-paper device? Get a grip.
Oh, and I can stir my coffee with an electric drill, but using a spoon doesn’t mean I’m a luddite. I was totally convinced of the move from film to digital from day one. This, Giullio, is very different.
Good content is good. Bad content is bad no matter how it is served up.
The rest is just packaging isn’t it?
The latest technology has been used to produce, in these two cases, unremarkable images, hybrid images.Iit’s still about the end product, the pictures, isn’t it? I can’t imagine Avedon or Newton jumping on this bandwagon.
it is interesting to compare the two vids, the first one is pretty average bts, the beckinsdale shoot is more interesting because it show you the problem all this convergence brings.
Where the vid is clumsy is where you have the video doubling the still shoot, but the lighting is not right for video, so it has none of the drama of the still shoot. The other thing you run in to is that you don’t have the subject’s attention-the weaker stuff is when she is paying attention to the “real” shoot going on, so it loses the viewer there.
On the whole it tries very hard to be a music video but since the loyalty is divided it does not really come off, the best part is the ending and credits where he uses the walk off screen to segue into the credits.
I think overall it highlights the issue that for film or whatever you want to call it, you need a storyboard and a sense of how the shots are going to relate. Just taking a bunch of over the shoulder stuff is not going to cut it.
there is a reason why we pay to see films and don’t pay to see film stills or go to see museum shows of film stills….the stills photography is the ugly stepchild and suffers for it not being a priority.
same thing for this but in reverse.
think of it this way, the power of stills is that they “imply” what else is going on. If you then go on to “show” what else is “not” actually going on, what do you have?
conversely the power of film is that it creates willing suspension of disbelief-it transports you to another world and another story. All that these bts vids do is transport you to another “shoot”, which is a well fast going dry.
we are still in the infancy of the technology so its adoption is being driven primarily by those interested in promoting the gear. So the ideas are weak. Eventually it will all trickle down, hopefully, or settle into those areas that can afford the (in-the)RED camera and the ideas will come out and the gear will be secondary.
At that point, either this new niche or form is created, whatever it is, or it gets absorbed into already established forms like commercials, documentary, film, television.
Maybe it’s my my connection, or the server traffic or whatever, but I just watched a choppy video where the sound didn’t sync with the lips. Am I missing something here? Where is this technological revolution I’m supposed to be witnessing? There is a 1937 B&W movie on TV as I type this, and it’s much better quality. What is so new about all of this?
Still and video are so fundamentally different, I really hope this trend doesn’t catch on. Your average ad/editorial photographer ain’t no Godard, nor should s/he be. If all advertising or editorial content were moving rather than still images, a lot of power and mystique will be lost…especially in fashion.
I wonder – will photographers ever get that still images and moving images are something totally different?
In production, as a medium, how they are used, watched, perceived… and on and on
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