Discusses the relevance of the text in relation to how it will inform the design and production of the hypertext essay.

This text aims to inform the design and production of the hypertext essay by familiarising students with new forms of writing through new technologies. Manovich’s text is concerned with how dense information surfaces can influence that of cinema, resulting in the development of spatial montage. Spatial montage will influence the design of the hypertext essay as it forms as a means of communicating information not only within the realm of the cinema, but also the internet. As previously stated in another blog entry of mine, spatial montage forms as a non-linear visual method of communication as opposed to one that is written. Whilst Manovich primarily speaks of spatial montage as a new narrative form in cinema, it is necessary to draw on how text and image also constitute as spatial montage within the internet. Once again, I draw on the artwork by Olia Lialina, My Boyfriend came back from war, that relies on the “multiple and simultaneously active icons and windows of GUI [to create] multiple and simultaneously active frames and hyperlinks in this web artwork” (Manovich 2001). Whilst our hypertext essay will not function as an artwork, it will still rely on spatial montage as a method of communicating the information accumulated from this annotated bibliography to the reader.

The process of uniting our group’s individual annotated bibliography responses will rely on HTML coding not only to construct and design the webpage that will bear this information, but also to create hyperlinks that will connect responses, much like the concept of spatial montage. However, given spatial montage’s affiliation with visual imagery the hypertext essay is likely to utilises visual modes of communication that will inform viewers of our findings. Moreover, Manovich outlines how spatial montage coincides with granularity, demonstrating how smaller parts of moving image can be cut into a number of different sections or shots. Similarly to our hypertext essay, we will cut different sections of our annotated bibliography responses and assemble these sections within our webpage to connect them together.

Academic sources:

Bizzocchi, J 2009, “The Fragmented Frame: the Poetics of the Split-Screen”, Media-in-Transition 6 Conference – stone and papyrus, storage and transmission, Cambridge, pp. 1-18.

Hagener, M 2008, “The Aesthetics of Displays: How the Split Screen Remediates Other Media”, Refractory: Journal of Entertainment Media, vol. 14, viewed 25th August 2011, Refractory.

Manovich, L 2001, New Media from Borges to HTML, California, viewed 25th August 2011, <http://manovich.net/articles/>.

Manovich, L 2001, ‘Cinematic and Graphic: Cinegratography,’ in L Manovich, The Language of New Media, MIT Press, Cambridge, pp. 309-330.

Metz, C 1976, ‘The Fiction Film and Its Spectator: A Metapsychological Study’, New Literary History, vol. 8, no.1, pp. 75-105.

Wardrip-Fruin, N & Montfort, N (eds) 2003, Introduction to the New Media Reader, The MIT Press, United States of America.

Secondary sources:

Manovich, L 2003, About Lev Manovich, Lev Manovich, viewed 13th August 2011, <http://manovich.net/>.

Wikipedia 2011, Lev Manovich, Wikipedia, viewed 18th August 2011, <http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lev_Manovich>.

Indicates what field(s) the text is situated within.

The title of Manovich’s article as well as his background in computer animating and programming indicates that the text is situated in the field of new media. Manovich outlines that “new media is the parallel tendencies in modern art and computing technology after the World War II” (2001). The concept of new media is undoubtedly broad but if we pay attention to the allocated chapter within Manovich’s text that concerns spatial montage we can infer that new media “is a mix between existing cultural conventions and the conventions of software” (Manovich 2003). As a cultural convention, the “popular press often refers to new media as the cultural objects that use digital computer technology for distribution and exhibition. Thus, Internet, Web sites, computer multimedia, computer games, CD-ROMs and DVD, Virtual Reality, and computer-generated special effects all fall under new media” (Wardrip-Fruin & Montfort eds 2003).

More specifically, it is necessary to acknowledge how new media and “new media technologies such as computer programming, graphical human-computer interface, hypertext, computer multimedia, networking” (Wardrip-Fruin & Montfort eds 2003) informs spatial montage in cinema. Spatial montage in the cinema is a form of new media that proves not only as an alternative narrative system but also as a device employed to remain up to date with the consistent trends occurring in other forms of new media.

References:

Manovich, L 2001, New Media from Borges to HTML, California, viewed 25th August 2011, <http://manovich.net/articles/>.

Wardrip-Fruin, N & Montfort, N (eds) 2003, Introduction to the New Media Reader, The MIT Press, United States of America.

Throughout this annotated bibliography I have attempted to illustrate how Manovich’s text argues that spatial montage provides as a new form of narrative in cinema, derived from the dense information surfaces that contemporary society is subjected to. Additionally, his text emphasises that spatial montage forms as an alternative method of communicating a visual narrative not only in cinema, but also in the network through hyperlinks and HTML coding. Ultimately, this will assist in influencing the design and construction of a hypertext essay. Moreover, the annotated bibliography will primarily offer alternative perspectives on spatial montage in cinema, elucidating its importance in enhancing audience active participation in film whilst simultaneously revealing its position as a mode of the “cinema of attractions,” utilised to keep up with trends in new media.

Annotation 1: Provide background on Lev Manovich

Annotation 2: The field of the text

Annotation 3: Manovich’s main argument

Annotation 4: Spatial montage and Networked Media

Annotation 5: Limitations and strengths of the text

Annotation 6: Specific sentences that proved useful in understanding the text

Annotation 7: A personal viewpoint on the text

Annotation 8: Spatial montage as a method of informing the design and production of the hypertext essay

Annotation 9: Full list of references

Outlines the main argument presented by the author(s)

Manovich’s text surrounding the language of new cinema argues that individuals’ familiarity with dense information surfaces, particularly multiple graphic user interfaces on a computer will eventually result in a new form of multiple narrative cinema called spatial montage. Contemporary society’s adjustment and subjection to viewing multiple screens, as demonstrated through playing video games, watching televisions news reports and using computer desktops illustrates how we are now accustomed to “switching our attention rapidly from one program to another, from one set of windows and commands to another” (Manovich 2001). Manovich (2001) argues that by similarly incorporating multiple streams of audio visual information into cinema this may be more satisfying than the single stream of traditional cinema we’re witnessing today.

References:

Manovich, L 2001, ‘Cinematic and Graphic: Cinegratography,’ in L Manovich, The Language of New Media, MIT Press, Cambridge, pp. 309-330.