Short film

Animations Conjunction Art Short Films Fermentation Art Posters Distillation Art Art Books Coagulation Art... 

The site http //www.nyu.edu/pages/mathmol/modules/water/info water.html hosts a nice discussion of water, including two short video clips (1) the quantum-mechanically computed movement of two water molecules united by means of a single hydrogen bond, at http //www.nyu.edu/pages/mathmol/modules/water/dimer.mpg-, (2) a short film of several hundred water molecules dancing within a cube at http //www. nyu. edu/pages/mathmol/modules/water/water dynamics.mpg. 

In case of deposition on a dielectric substrate, the trajectories of arriving nanoparticles are additionally disturbed (in the vicinity of the surface) by the Coulomb interaction with nanoparticles deposited in the preceding pulses. As a result, nanoparticles occupy vacant places on the surface and, at short film deposition times, their distribution over the substrate is virtually uniform. At longer deposition, as well as in the case of conducting substrate, particle arrangement on the surface may be more sophisticated, that is... 

To have an active information desk, supported by a library of short films and information sheets to provide answers to questions raised... 

The winner of numerous awards in 2003, Bill Do-monkos short film. The Fine Art of Poisoning, uses animation and music by Jill Tracy to layer nightmare visions in the creation of a strange, unsettling world. 

This book is primarily intended for film and video students or independent video- and filmmakers who are faced with the necessity of writing a short narrative script. For our purposes, we consider a short film to be one of 30 minutes or less, as films longer than that usually need a secondary, or minor, plot-line to sustain audience interest and, in addition, are much less likely to be eligible for festivals or suitable to be shown as "portfolio" work. 

But for our purpose in this book, Un Chien d Andalou—because it is so challenging to the narrative conventions often associated with film— remains an experiment in form rather than a case study for scripting the successful short film. Nevertheless, the audacity of the film cemented a relationship between film and the visual arts and ideas closely tied to art (for example, surrealism and the growing importance of psychotherapy in the visual arts) this has become a continuing source of short films, from the work of Man Ray and Maya Deren to the more contemporary work of Stan Brakhage, Michael Snow, and Joyce Wieland. 

While it is true that there are filmmakers in the experimental and documentary area who continue to work in the short form, more and more filmmakers in these areas are moving to the long form as well (Bruce Elder or Su Friedrich in the experimental film genre, and the work of Ross McKelwee and Barbara Kopple in the documentary, for example). The short, at least in North America, is more and more an economic necessity for the student filmmaker and the novice professional, and while there are still short films produced in the educational corporate sectors, they are far fewer than in the past. 

In Europe, however, the short film remains a viable form of expression, one supported in large part by cultural ministries. Magazines devoted to short films as well as festivals devoted exclusively to the form assure, at least for the medium term, that it will continue to thrive. Internationally, film schools have provided continuing support for the short film. The international organization of film schools, CILECT, has held a biannual student film festival focused on the European schools, and an annual student festival has been sponsored by the Hochschule in Munich. Another important biannual festival is the Tel Aviv Film Festival. All of these festivals are related to the CILECT organization and focus on the work of students in member schools. The Oberhausen Festival in Germany and the Clement-Ferrand Festival in... 

France are devoted to short films, including fictional, experimental, documentary, and animated films. 

Nevertheless, we believe that, just as the short story has experienced a renaissance in the past 15 years, so too it seems that a new and longer-term interest in the short film is developing recent cable programming initiatives and specialty market developments suggest that it too may experience a renaissance. 

One of the more promising developments at present for the short film is the combining of three or more shorts to produce a film that can be marketed as a feature. A recent example of this is writer/director Rebecca Miller s well received first "feature," Personal Velocity (2002)—three short films of under 30 minutes each, which are unified by theme, rather than location or use of the same actors. Each main character is a woman on the verge of a major change in her relationship to the man she lives with, and to the world. 

Are the characteristics of the short film variations of those of the long film In most cases, no. It is true that the two forms rely on visual action for exposition and characterization, as well as on the illusion of reality inherent in the use of film as a visual medium. Beyond these two characteristics, however, the short film proceeds in both a simpler, and a potentially freer, manner. 

The simplicity lies in the restricted number of characters, often no more than three or four, and the level of plotting, which is usually a simple story. This does not mean that the main character is necessarily simple in the short film, but it does mean that an economy of style is employed to create that character. There is no time in the short film for the kind of pauses for elaboration of character so often deployed in the long film. 

The freedom of short film relative to long lies in the possibilities of using metaphor and other literary devices to tell the story—a luxury not available in the commercially driven, realism-oriented long film. Indeed, one of our major points about the short film is its linkage to literary forms such as the short story, the poem, the photograph, and the one-act play. 

Rust Hills, a well-known editor, characterizes the short story as a story that tells of something that happened to someone. Second, the successful contemporary short story will demonstrate a more harmonious relationship of all its aspects than will any other literary art form excepting perhaps lyric poetry."1 He also suggests that the story is dynamic, that the character is moved in the course of experience of the story, and that there are few secondary characters and no subplot. Often the story will unfold around a choice that presents itself to the character, who never returns to his or her former state closure is attained by virtue of making or avoiding that choice.2 Rust Hills s observations about the short story could be as readily applied to the short film. 

Another film, Gare du Nord, written and directed by noted ethnographic filmmaker Jean Rouch, uses the same structure to explore a very different territory. It is one of an anthology of six short films made by European directors, each set in a different section of Paris. 

Write brief descriptions, using the present tense, of two quite different main characters as they go about their lives. Be sure to choose characters that engage you and situations you know something about. End each description with an encounter or incident that would make for a change in the character s situation. Set up one synopsis as if for a short script in which you employ the journey structure, and the other for a screenplay in which you use the ritual occasion. At this point, don t concern yourself with plot, although if ideas occur to you, be sure to jot them down for possible later use. Here are a couple of examples to illustrate we turned to the short films described above for inspiration ... 

Like the wardrobe in the Polanski film, the personified balloon in Lamorisse s contemporary fairy tale is presented in a logical and convincing manner. Unlike the wardrobe, however, the balloon is an object with the distinct attributes of a character, much like one of the magical animals who befriend the heroes of fairy tales it is the "stranger" in the ritual occasion structure. Using visuals alone to establish the situation, this short film "proves" to us, in Cocteau s use of the word, how a spirited, lonely little boy, and the playful balloon he encounters, go about becoming friends in a provincial world that does not look with kindness on little boys or balloons. 

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