RE:MEMBER

This documentary concept is based on my growing interest in media history, nostalgia, and mediated environments, which began all the way back in college, where I had to make a short experimental film about the topic of memories. The production of this film led me to researching on how childhood memories are captured as well as the aesthetic of memory, both in media and in our heads. After this short film, I began searching for more old photos and videos of my childhood and restoring them. These individual projects only deepened my fascination for exploring the space of memory and media, and when I eventually got the option to enrol onto a module at university called Media, Memory, & History, I immediately joined. This module expanded my previously limited view of mediated memories and related topics, introducing me to elements such as media bias, human perception, and media archeology. With this documentary, I want to employ all I have learnt about media, memory, and history into a non-fiction format, which will allow us to peer into other people’s memories, nostalgia and how they perceive the world in a mediated manner.

Cinematographer’s statement

In audio-visual arts and visual arts in general, lighting involves much more than just allowing the proper amount of light to go through the camera in order to achieve a correct exposure. “Light influences what your subject looks like, how people feel about what they see, what attracts their attention” (Millerson, G. 2001). It is the fundamental aspect that not only makes filmmaking possible, but also shapes each film’s corresponding aesthetic and visual tone. The apparatus, the cinematic techniques and all the different variations, are some of the filmmaking aspects that, as the cinematographer for this project, my duty is to fully utilize them to be able to give shape to the director’s vision in the most communicative and visually evocative way possible.

My intention was to make our documentary a visual experience with semantically connected sequences that explore rather than blankly describing the concepts of nostalgia and memory. The narrative structure is not there for suppling the audience with answers, but to raise further fundamental questions regarding human emotions. The filmic language exists to balance the expository aspect of RE:MEMBER by adding a poetic touch to the whole experience. Despite the difficulties and reconsiderations that followed the film’s actual production, the initial vision was eventually achieved and made the whole group appreciate the overall practice of filmmaking.