Lecture 4 (...but technically only Lecture 2.)

The focus of the lecture today, held by Josh, a lecturer from the Gold Coast, began by concentrating on some of the information we’d missed the previous week due to Brisbane’s Public Holiday: The Ekka. The Lecture was titled: Cinespeak – Learning the Language of the Cinema. Josh began by referring to the ‘5 W’s and H’ (What, Where, When, Who, Why and How) and how [exactly] they correspond to the direction of film photography, meaning and narrative. He spoke briefly about some of screens more obscure ‘rules’ : The rule of thirds; Headspace; Talking Room; Shot Sizes and the 180˚ Rule. He discussed the evolution of the ways we use to view film; chronicling films first steps (The Story of the Kelly Gang (1906)) to Nickelodeon’s (theatre viewing for the cost of a ‘nickel’) to Apple iStore, legal and illegal video downloads, ‘iFilm’, ‘atomFilm’ and of course ‘YouTube’. Things really became interesting when Josh introduced the subject of fan films and their absurd popularity – screening the first 4 minutes of Kevin Rubio’s ‘Troops’ (an old favourite of mine) and the more recent ‘Awesometown’.