07/3/13

Moving Image as Cultural Artifact

It is uncontroversial to argue that the moving image has had an immense impact on the development of human culture, but it is unclear exactly how those mechanics have played out in human history.  One reason for this is the lack of a central repository or reliable index for the existing source materials.  A second reason for this is the difficult nature of approaching visual imagery as a scholarly source.  The goal of this website is to challenge both of these problems head-on, and attempt to generate solutions through interdisciplinary dialogue. The first problem will hopefully be handled through the database and mapping tools, giving academics a better understanding of  which material has and hasn’t been archived, digitized, and made available for study.

This video blog is designed to challenge the second problem by experimenting with the analysis of video footage as a scholarly source. In this blog, I will broach questions about what conclusions can be reached from analysis of video footage, and what conclusions can be reached through the evaluation of audience response data, such as correspondence to the station.  These issues, along with many others, are mandatory for scholars to try and evaluate if we are to make any real headway in utilizing moving images as artifacts of human culture.

The attached video is a brief introduction to this blog’s purpose, which will highlight thirteen of the most influential news sequences of video footage recorded during the last 120 years, since the invention of the moving image.  Each sequence — from the victory celebrations of World War I and the dropping of the atomic bombs during World War II, to the video recordings of civil rights protests and the terrorist attacks on the World Trade Center — has played an intrinsic developmental role in forming our conception of who we are, both as individuals and as a nation.

 

 

07/2/13

WSB

Digital archive, but only some of the material is accessible offsite from the archive.

 

07/2/13

WWL

Digital footage kept with the Louisiana Secretary of State. Can be searched online, but only viewable on site. Some footage indexed does not match footage in system, or does not exist.

07/2/13

WDSU

No access given to me at the time.  Film is not visible to the public without paying fees associated with digitization, but it is unclear how much film there is and what those fees are for digitization.  The only thing accessible to the public are the log books.  While they report to have footage from 1948-1995, there are no log books for those dates, and therefore there is no evidence as to what footage exists or not open to non-archive employees.  There is no viewing equipment on site.

Archive employees state that they have reel footage, but it is unclear if footage was aired or not.