The 10th Anniversary Of The iMac
Sweet As Candy And The Birth Of i...
That's
right. 10 years ago Apple released the first
iMac. It was in its time a revolutionary product
on many levels and can in many ways be
considered the first big step in the
resurrection of Apple.
The most obvious differentiation from its peers was the way that it looked. The all-in-one-enclosure was a friendly looking egg-shaped machine in a blueish hue. The material had reportedly been created in cooperation with a candy-factory and I think it is safe to call the machine a genuine design-classic. It was by and large the first computer made where the manufacturer really considered the esthetics to be as important as the technical specifications. As Steve Jobs (Apple's CO) said: "...the back of this thing looks better than the front of the other guys'...".
It also gave birth to a new naming convention, starting the name with a lower-case "i". Today, using a lowercase first letter is fairly common, but back in its day it was another thing that told the audience that the iMac was something special.

Apple is today one of the strongest, most popular companies in technology. This is of course largely down to the fact that they release high quality products. But, it is also because Apple honors the fact that the "story" matters...
First iMpressions (ooh, that's clever)
As I've been mentioning going on and on
about in my last posts, the first impression is
incredibly important. Apple's focus seems to be on
delivering the best possible user experience and they
obviously understand the importance of a good first
impression.
That's why they spend money on stuff like packaging. Where most PC-manufacturers will send out their machines in a brown cardboard-box, Apple will pack their machines in specially designed cartons with 4-color printing and often creatively designed styrofoam designed to make the unpacking easy but also to create an experience in its own right.
Ad for the original iMac
Telling A Story
Some will shrug at this and say that it doesn't matter. Well, it doesn't matter if your product doesn't live up to the experience, but it certainly puts the receiver in a mood where he or she is ready to be further impressed by the hardware. When people spend hundreds, maybe thousands, of dollars they want to feel well catered for. The same feeling of quality and attention to detail seeps through from Apple's advertising all the way to the finished product. It tells a story. The story of a company that cares about their products, not just about cutting costs to improve the bottom line.
Above you'll find a video from the release of the birthday-kid. It's also a nice example of how to give an effective presentation.
Reinventing the wheel
Why not use the round wheels of filmmaking?

Changes don't always equal improvements
I'm a fairly conservative guy when it comes to Film Aesthetics. I don't mind people experimenting with the form and trying out new approaches . It is actually required to improve the art-form. What I really don't get though is how some of the world's current directorial hot-shots seem to let style getting in way of their stories. Surely storytelling is what directing is all about?
The problem
Yet, several "modern" directors go out of their wits to cram so much spectacle and fancy camerawork in there that it's bound to detract from the story. When watching films with excessive Camera Movements and edits that seem to be made simply to look "cool" I'm just annoyed. Huge vistas, helicopter fly-bys and some incredible effects-work is perfect to make great trailers, but have to be used with care if they're not to hurt the story.
So if it looks cool what's the problem? The problem is it pulls me out of the reality of the story. I dabble a bit with film-stuff myself and am generally interested in the technical side of things. Yet, I find that if a film works I never consciously notice the techniques while watching a film for the first time. (I probably will on second or third viewing). When I notice the filmmakers have failed in my book. It would be like reading a Crime Novel and then starting to think about how the sentences are built or perhaps what a brilliant font they've used.
The Wheel - it really works!
There
are of course times when an author
wants to attract attention to the
language, but this is seldom the case in
Thrillers where the narrative is the main
focus. The odd bit is that there is a classic,
well established language of film that seems
to be lost on some contemporary directors. In
many ways honed to perfection as early as 1941
with Orson Well's Citizen Kane. The choice of
lenses, the lighting, composition and angles
are all made to enhance the viewers
understanding of the characters' psychological
state. The brilliance of this is that it works
on a subconscious level. If you want the
viewer to empathize with a character you make
sure that character is close to the camera and
that we see the world through his or her eyes
it. When the majority of the camerawork
consists of huge battle-scenes shot from afar
the viewer will eventually loose interest.
Watch the master

The guy who knows how
The thing that makes the situation even more
absurd is the fact that the most successful
director of the last 30 years does use this
language. Steven Spielberg seems to have an
incredible understanding of the psychological value
of the camerawork. This is probably the reason why
many will have a hard time pointing out what
makes his films work so well. Witness the T-Rex
attack on the car in
Jurassic Park:
Almost the entire scene is shot from inside
the car. This way we, the audience, can feel
the fear and despair experienced by the
charcters. This is done despite having the
coolest and most expensive animatronic T-rex
available. Oh, how tempting it must have been
to show off the beast in all its splendour!
Yet, Spielberg obviously knew that this would
work against the film.
Unfortunately a lot of the younger filmmakers today seem to have missed the point completely. While they are more than willing to let themselves be inspired by the fantastic premises of Spielberg's films the key to great filmmaking seems to elude them...
Resolution Schmesolution
Why image quality in films doesn't really matter
Okay, that last sentence is a lie, but it got your attention didn't it? But while image quality does matter I am convinced that resolution and general image-quality is among the least important aspects of storytelling. The information the images contain and the look (composition, colours, lighting, etc.) is however vital if you want to succeed in telling your story.

To some of you the mere idea that resolution is unimportant is bordering on blasphemy. If you spend a large chunk of your money on home-theatre equipment and an equally large part of your time fine tuning the equipment you're probably fuming at these preposterous lies! And I understand. Really, I do. I own a Laserdisc Player for Pete's sake! I too prefer to watch films displayed in the best technical quality possible, but I've also found that good films work fine even when presented in more meager ways. If not, how did television ever succeed? It has never been able to compete with the vivid imagery found in the cinema.
Lo-fi Success Story

Sing, Sing, Sing
I am of course singing the age-old "story, story, story"-chorus: If the story is strong enough and it is told with the right use of visuals most viewers will soon forget the technical quality. This is something worth keeping in mind in an age when everyone is trying to sell us the latest Real-HD-1080p-BlueLaser-X-Camstation-3000-Videoplayer. Even more importantly than the consideration for our wallets: It is something for those of us dabbling with visual storytelling to be mindful of. By all means - get the best quality imagery you can, but don't let a few missing pixels prevent you from telling your story...
*Don't worry Hollywood I bought both on VHS and DVD later on.
Winning visuals
Visual storytelling and the secret of greatness
This blog was eventually dedicated to visual
storytelling simply because most of the posts I
made had something to do with the subject.
Reflecting over this made it clear to me that
visual storytelling has always been a big part of
my life. I've always been inclined towards the
visual arts and traditional fairy-tales were a
natural part of my upbringing. The last bit is
something I as an adult find rather fascinating.
The fairy-tales have been passed down through
generations and are in many ways links to our
forefathers. Their storyteller tradition is often
referred to as an oral tradition but I find this
definition a bit narrow.
What makes a great storyteller
The best storytellers have always been the ones who could paint the most vivid pictures. Surely these individuals used every trick they had up their sleeve. Acting out the different parts of their stories: An attacking boar. A sneaking hunter. Essentially creating visuals to enhance the experience.

Some of them might have used shadow-images on the cave walls and we know ancient men made beautiful cave-paintings, perhaps in an attempt to strengthen the impact of their words. The point I am trying to make is that we have always used visuals when telling our stories. It almost seems like it is an integral part of who we are as a species.
Think
It
does not work without an effort though.
Storytelling does not automatically become
great simply because visuals are added. The
imagery has to support the story. If the two
competes for attention neither one will reach
their full potential. In the same way
abstractions may confuse the audience. We are
however probably more advanced when it comes
to reading complex visuals than ever. No
surprise, as we are constantly bombarded with
the stuff. TV-commercials, billboards,
computer-games, magazines, websites and films.
We couldn't avoid it if we wanted to.
Tough crowd
The flip side to this is of course that your audience is not so easily impressed. Some try to counter this with a more-is-more approach. I personally find this incredibly annoying. Spectacle will make a spectacle of you. You might keep your audience's interest for a while, but both you and your audience might loose track of the story in the process. While the correct use of great visuals will help the story become all that it can be - they cannot elevate a mediocre story to greatness.
The good thing about the omnipresence of advanced visual stimuli is of course that inspiration should not be hard to come by. Inspirational sparks from other people's works can be the starting point of greatness. We all have to find our ideas somewhere and can't all expect to have a divine muse available every time we feel a bit dried out creatively. I am of course not talking about copying the work of others.
Be great
The final piece of the puzzle is not exactly revolutionary: Work. We all want to be the best that we can be and most of us can't expect to have more than a couple of truly great ideas in a lifetime. We might have quite a few good and decent ones but greatness is hard to come by. But as a great idea can be buried by poor execution we owe it to ourselves to make sure our moments of inspiration reach their full potential.

So to sum up:
- Have something to tell.
- Enhance/tell it with visuals, but make sure the visuals are right.
- Work until you're satisfied it is as good as it can be.
Not the most original list of tips but certainly something it can be easy to loose track of. The first of these points is something that should be written on Hollywood Hill for every movie-executive to see...