For Tuesday’s discussion we will use a list of “brand personality” traits employed by product marketers to stimulate our thinking about the uses of cinematographic techniques.
“down-to-earth, honest, cheerful, wholesome, daring, spirited, imaginative, up-to-date, reliable, intelligent, successful, upper class, charming, outdoorsy, tough”
These traits represent dimensions of brand personality that were factored from an analysis of consumer preferences by Jennifer Aaker (Dimensions of Brand Personality. 1997. Journal of Marketing Research. 34:3. pgs. 347-356.).
The goal is to identify as many ways as possible that cinema techniques can be used. We will consider the possible uses of :
- lighting
- lenses
- framing
- camera movement
- camera position
- camera angle
- editing
For each of these categories identify all of the possible configurations that could most effectively communicate each of the personality traits you are given. Do this in groups of 3-4.
Think critically about what the effect of each technique is and how it makes a connection to the characters, their point of view, the plot, etc..
The drawback is the direct link to advertising and other high concept ideas of filmmaking that rely solely on genre convention. By this I mean that we may not all agree on what camera angle communicates “cheerful.” Try to come to a consensus within your group, but also try to include all possible solutions/techniques.
Remember, there is rarely any formulaic way to communicate these personality traits. They often rely on their context. Nonetheless, we can begin to come up with solutions by asking ourselves these questions.
One challenge is to consider how we might communicate non-human personality traits.
