Home Videos: A history
Despite the prevalence of the video camera and its proliferation in our virtual and actual lives, the basic predecessor of what we now know as the itty bitty video camera came on to the scene in 1980, only thirty years ago. Of course, slides and slide projectors were available before this, but the ability to capture life in action, and to capture and sustain movement was something entirely new. Here are some important dates*surrounding the camcorder and other home video recording media: 1980 Sony demonstrates first consumer camcorder. 1984 Canon demonstrates first digital electronic still camera. 1985 Pixar introduces digital imaging processor. 1990 Kodak announces Photo CD as a digital image storage medium.
“At one extreme, one finds that the performer can be fully taken in by his own act; he can be sincerely convinced that the impression of reality which he stages is the real reality… At the other extreme, we find that the performer may not be taken in at all by his own routine. This possibility is understandable, since no one is in quite as good an observational position to see through the act as the person who puts it on.” (Goffman 17)
Home Videos: The conundrum (why make them?)
There is a large disparity between the number of home videos made and the number of home videos watched after the videos are produced. Many families have a surplus of home video footage that has not been viewed after it was recorded. If people don’t typically watch home videos following the production of these videos, why do people still go to the trouble of recording home video footage?
Reason 1: To give life meaning
To give life meaning. Many daily tasks are mundane and ordinary. These tasks may seem exciting in the moment, but when the actor reflects upon his tasks he is often bored. Having a video camera document activites elevates these activities out of the realm of mundane and ordinary, even if this elevation occurs for only a moment. Furthermore, there are even more opportunities for actors to elevate their daily lives above the average daily life when videos are uploaded to Youtube. The video "David After Dentist" is one example of the change from average citizen to fleeting internet celebrity, a kind of momentary fame that happens following a vdeo being uploaded to Youtube. David's dad recorded the video to show David's mother, since she had to work during David's hyperdontia (extra tooth) removal surgery. The fact that David's father felt the need to record this experience seems strange to me, as the father could have relayed any important information to the mother over the phone or once he and David reached home. Why create a video? David's father asserts that the video was planned and made possible by easy access to his iFlip video camera. Maybe David's father created "David After Dentist" as a way to maintain kinship ties with his wife who could not be present at David's dentist appointment. James Moran asserts a similar notion in his work There's No Place Like Home Video, "more than just souvenirs of the past, home made artifacts provide families with important cultural functions as well: retention of detailed memories of people, places, and events余 transmission of personal stories reformulated into the context of an individual lifetime余 kinship affiliation and generational continuity余 and connection to the land and accumulated good," (36足7).
Reason 2: A need to catalog and organize life
Having videos available and organized by the date the videos were taken creates order in the life of the person who took all the video footage. However, watching the video footage does not increase the amount of order in the viewer's life. In essence, the act of creating video footage, and then editing the footage and cataloging the footage on a disk creates order. Creating video footage allows the videographer to keep aspects of his life in one place, on a tape or on his computer. Taking video footage also creates order because videos portray life flatly. The way the audience interacts with a video is mediated by the way they look at the video, the angles used in the video, and the way the videographer took the footage. When the videographer edits his footage, he takes his materials and cuts them into the most concise piece of his experience, editing out what he deems to be unimportant or extraneous, this too creates order. Also, reformatting footage to work with newer technological devices creates order because new technology favors video cataloging techniques that take up less space. Reformatting video footage to work with current video technology is also an attempt to remain in touch with technology itself, which is covered more extensively on the next page. This video of the babies creates order because the footage allows the parents to haveaclearrepresentationoftheirchildrenatthetimethevideowas taken.Thisvideofootage alsoallowstheparentstoremembertheir children at the exact age when this video was taken.
Reason 3: To remain in touch with reality
At first glance the video may appear to be real, but viewers of videos cannot get a full picture of what is happening in the video. Videos can only appeal to two senses, hearing and sight. Video footage cannot give a viewer anyway to touch, smell, or taste what is happening in the video. The video can only cause the viewer to reflect on experiences he had that were similar to the video, situations where he used all five senses. For example, if a viewer saw footage of himself blowing out birthday candles and eating birthday cake, he cannot taste the cake or smell the blown out candles. He can only remember a time when he did eat birthday cake and smelled birthday candles after he blew them out. The video footage would trigger these memories. In the "Playable Angry Birds Cake" video, the video's creator has taken a part of his son's life that is virtual, The "Angry Birds" cell phone application, and made the game into a reality, and a way to interact with his son. The reality and tangible experience that the father has created in making his son a working birthday cake is mediated when he videotapes the entire experience. Videos are meant to be interacted with in a certain way, and the videographer expects his audience will sit down in front of his TV (or in this case computer) and take in the video clip at the angle it was filmed. Viewers cannot get all the angles in the video that they could get if they were actual observers. Viewers could get a different perspective on this video entirely if they could see every angle around the table the father set the cake on, and were able to see the slingshot working, and the cake falling, from different angles. The lack of angles in videos in general, and in the "Playable Angry Birds Cake" video, highlights how "flat" the experience of watching a video truly is.
Reason 4: To remain connected to technology
Once the video has been taken it is flat, stoic, cannot be changed (unless it is edited). In essence the video is a small frozen piece of time. The technology used to create the video begins to become obsolete as soon as the video is taken. In order to remain connected to technology, the videographer would need to continue to make videos using the newest technology available. Watching videos only allows the videographer to interact with older forms of technology. Yet, when the video creator interacts with new pieces of technology, he is also able to create more realistic representations of himself. Technology continues to move forward in order to make our viewing experiences mirror real life as closely as possible. By continuing to interact with home video technology, video makers would be able to continue to make themselves relevant in video form, but also evaluate (reevaluate) their perceptions of themselves in everyday life as well.
Relationship between the public and private in the "home" video
The proliferation of devices capable of taking “home video” footage coupled with the shrinking size of these devices has greatly increased the number of home videos taken. For example, “David After Dentist” was taken using a small portable video device called The “Flip”. A good number of the “home videos” taken with portable video cameras and cell phones enabled with movie capabilities are taken outside the “home”. So are the videos taken away from the home still “home videos”? Yes and no. Videos taken outside the home may not be framed in the community and the bonds of family, but many of these videos still take the “private” aspects of the home and put these private aspects of the home on display in the public arena. For example, the “Marriage Proposal Rejected at Basketball Game” is not a home video in the traditional sense. Neither of the actors in the video planned to take the video footage or recorded the video. And yet, the video still portrays a private moment that might be captured by a home video camera. In private, the girl in the video would be allowed (begrudgingly) to reject the marriage proposal. In public the girl would be expected to say yes to the proposal, or at least say yes in the public moment and then politely decline the proposal in private, as suggested in the video comments. Regardless of if a video is a home video or not, “when an individual plays his part he implicitly requests observers to take seriously the impression that is fostered before them. They are asked to believe that the character they see actually see actually possesses the attributes he appears to possess… there is the popular view that the individual offers his performance and puts on his show “for the benefit of other people.” It will be convenient to begin a consideration of performances by turning the question around and looking at the individual’s own belief in the impression of reality that he attempts to engender in those whom he finds himself.” (Goffman 17) An audience member can glean as much about the actors in a video (and the actors’ perceptions of themselves) whether the raw video footage is taken at home in “private” or out in a public venue.
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