Soft Cinema is a collaborative new media art project headed by Lev Manovich. Manovich states that "soft cinema is a digital editor that provides an interface between human editors and a database of footage to 'perform' different edits of the footage. Each performance is unique because software works with a set of parameters that allow for 'potentially every dimension' of a film to change." [1] Soft Cinema juxtaposes the aesthetics of software culture, cinema, and architecture into an interactive manifestation of computer-driven films, dynamic visualizations, installations, architectural designs, print catalogs, and DVDs. Soft Cinema takes advantage of real-time software-based cinema, and how it may be applied to aspects of the contemporary life we live in. For example, the creation of "mega-cities", or how new technology has come to effect subjectivity. The software in soft-cinema completely relies on the use of databases, choosing, organizing and editing movies on the fly in a non-linear but structured fashion, based on a set of variables defined by the authors. The database is programmed so that the story is almost never the same. Manovich views soft cinema as allowing the human mind to create a story for themselves, as each scene is going to require a unique interpretation. Other contributors in the project include: Marshall McLuhan and Andreas Kratky.
Soft Cinema attempts to address four issues:
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The original piece was created for the 2002 "Soft Cinema installation", for an exhibition titled "Future Cinema: Cinematic Imaginary after Film."
Texas looks at the 'Modern experience of living between layers', that is, how time has created different 'layers' of space throughout the world we live in. The film calls on a number of databases, each structured in the same fashion. The database containing video footage (as opposed to music) holds 425 clips selected from footage that Manovich himself shot at various locations over several years. Manovich aims to capture the idea of a "Global City" throughout these shots. Each video clip in the database holds 10 parameters, including location, subject matter, average brightness, contrast, the type of space, the type of camera motion, and several more. The software uses these parameters in selecting each clip, finding clips that are all similar in some fashion to the next.
The original piece was commissioned in 2003 by the BALTIC Centre for Contemporary Art in Gateshead, UK.
Mission to Earth symbolizes the experiences of a modern immigrant as well as the experiences of those during the Cold War. It attempts to show the trauma associated with a shift in identity as one changes his or her life. The Soft Cinema software uses several frames at once in this piece, displaying different things in each frame to portray the split in identity that the main character, Inga, experiences. The software also changes the size and number of windows as it grabs the content from the database. Most of the video used for the database was shot in London, Berlin, Rio de Janeiro, Buenos Aires, and Sweden.
The Absences piece was created without a pre-set narrative. It takes advantage of the assumption that, given different sets of images and footage, the viewer will connect what is seen and create their own structured narrative. The theme surrounds the aspect of natural and urban surroundings. Like previous works, the images shown each hold unique parameters which the soft-cinema software chooses from when viewed by the user. These parameters include brightness, contrast, texture, activity, frequency, and several others.
-media database (videography, animations, narratives), editing rules, image processing software, sound design, screen layout and installation design concepts.
-implementation logistics, edit list generation software, display software, screen layout system.
-graphic design (Soft Cinema catalogues).
-Website Production
media database visualisation.
-music database.
-the announcer.
-video logging.
-voice over editing.
-voice over editing.
-text editing, voice over.
-voice over.
-voice over.
-architect (the version for Cinema Future exhibition).
architect.
-architect.
-installation construction + hardware.