The visual essay (VE, although the term is not without its problems as “visual” implies the lack of an audio track and “essay” sometimes denotes a form of scholarship lesser than a conference paper or journal article), for those unfamiliar with the format, is often a hybrid of documentary filmmaking and scholarship similar to an article written for an academic journal. I say often because the format is young, there are only a handful of scholars producing them, and because some visual essay artists produce texts that have a poetic structure that nurtures an implied argument. For the sake of this brief response, I will be discussing the explicitly persuasive side of the spectrum. My own VE, “From the Panel to the Frame: Style and Scott Pilgrim,” illustrates the concept of stylistic remediation with regard to comic books and their film adaptations and how analyses of style can complicate our understanding of transmedia storytelling. The essay, unlike the poetic mode, is voice-over driven and seeks to define, analyze, and elaborate upon Jay David Bolter and Richard Grusin’s theory of remediation and Henry Jenkins’s definition of transmedia storytelling.
The VE format is a gift to scholars in disciplines focused on the study of visual media (Cinema Studies, Media Studies, Comics Studies, etc.) for several reasons. Speaking anecdotally, my dissertation was a formal analysis of the relationship between comics and film. In the form of the dissertation, I needed to rely on prose and the occasional image of a comic book page or frame grab to capture a complex stylistic relationship. If you were to read the chapter that I adapted into the visual essay, the pairing of prose and imagery would give you a general sense of how comic book artists and filmmakers differ in their representation of space. However, the visual evidence in the VE provides a more vivid and nuanced portrait of the phenomenon of stylistic remediation because its representation is not limited by static images and text. In short, we can use film to analyze film.
Furthermore, the VE format is capable of both reaching a larger audience (“From the Panel to the Frame” has been watched more than 12,000 times) and inspiring a more participatory discussion than an academic article - accessible via subscription - can. The visual essay is digital and openly published. Yet, ease of access is only part of the equation. After all, a scholar can publish PDFs of his or her scholarship openly. More significantly, the artist needs to adapt his or her prose to the medium, away from academic prose and towards the aural friendly. That is not to say the academic visual essay avoids engaging in the theoretical; it simply engages in the theoretical in a more accessible and concise fashion.
To avoid furthering the concept of an academic digital utopia, the visual essay as a digital publishing format is not without its problems. Obviously, fair use and copyright are obstacles (this appears to be more of a problem for those VE artists that seek mainstream distribution, like Jean-Luc Godard’s Histoire(s) du Cinéma and Thom Andersen’s Los Angeles Plays Itself). More significantly, most published VEs suffer from a perceived lack of academic integrity. This false perception stems from multiple factors, with the most significant being the lack of an academic journal solely devoted to publishing, nurturing, and furthering the format. The good news is that a team of visual essay scholars and practitioners (myself included) are collaborating with two organizations focused on furthering digital publication in Cinema and Media Studies in establishing the first peer-reviewed videographic (as opposed to visual essay) academic journal. We hope this legitimization encourages scholars interested in the format to take the leap and bridge theory to practice, further developing and defining what this presentational format can offer.
Comments
Process for creating VEs
I really enjoy watching well-made VEs ("From Panel to Frame" was great!) and, as a game researcher, hope to try my hand at constructing one in the future. However, one of the biggest mental hurdles for me is both the time and self-training that are necessary for constructing them. What was the process of creating "From Panel to Frame" like for you in these regards?
As academics, we've been writing for our entire careers. And, even if a topic might be better served in the VE format, I wonder if the inclination is to default to the written text due the process of finding the right video editing software, media capture software, recording multiple takes of lines of speech, etc. becomes impractical or overwhelming for people whose time is already stretched thin. I also wonder about the structure of VEs. For all of their shortcomings, traditional academic papers make it relatively easy to find the author's literature review, methodology, and discussion sections. Do you see carrying over a similar structure to VEs? Or do you think audiences would be better served in another way?
Tick of the Clock
Matthew,
Thanks for your comment. Self-training and time are two major hurdles in creating a visual essay. The good news is that once you train yourself with the software (I use a Mac, so Handbrake, MPEG Streamclip, and MacX YouTube Downloader are the main asset collection tools I use to bring footage into Final Cut or - now - Adobe Premiere CS6), it becomes second nature and it helps give you a deeper understanding of the tools that the subjects of our studies utilized. Moreover, given that many Assistant Professor positions are now asking for a combination of practical knowledge and theoretical knowledge, this can be a great way to elaborate upon your skill set and position yourself on the job market. The trick, with anything, is moderation (keep doing articles while exploring VEs!).
Now, in terms of time, yes - a VE can be incredibly time consuming. "From the Panel to the Frame" took me roughly a week to draft when it was a chapter in my dissertation (this was AFTER all the time I spent researching). The VE took me more than a month to put together (I'd say roughly 100 hours). However, part of this was because I was refreshing my memory, as I hadn't done one in a few years. When I started work on my follow up project ("Free Will in THE SHINING," http://vimeo.com/64695910), I had streamlined my process. I knew how I worked best and - despite doing more technologically challenging transitions and split-screens - my familiarity with the software cut a couple weeks off the process.
I do not see any reason why a VE artist cannot find a way to segment lit review/methodology into sections with time stamps (or even into discrete videos). At the same time, I think it is limiting to think about the format purely in terms that are analogous to print. I would ultimately argue that the author's objective and subject matter should determine the publication format. Certain subjects may not produce great visual essays. Moreover, more poetic visual essays may not need a lit review or methodology. My concern is that drawing parallels between the two can stifle the potential of the form. I know that lit reviews and methodologies are part of the article/book experience, but think about how those sections are adapted for when it comes to a book. They're hidden; they become more accessible and streamlined. My point is that there is variance across print formats and I'm not particularly eager to establish formatting guidelines yet. ;)
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