SNAPlab

During November, I visited several colleagues at various universities in England and while travelling by train, I read Adam Nixon’s book. Prestigious British universities and no-budget filmmaking – you may wonder why I would connect the two, but I will show you that there is a connection.

Nixon’s book is one filmmaker’s reflection on how filmmaking has changed and a report on the possibilities of film with virtually no budget. His perspective fascinates me. He is able to think about audiovisual culture in a very broad sense. In the preface, he prepares the reader for the fact that the best film of the present day may not be the work of a professional crew, let alone a film studio. We may already be living in an era where the best films are made on TikTok.

“Imagine an unknown artist is producing the best film of the current era right now. They are creating it outside centers of power, using a cheap camera with little expense. Cineastes are waiting to discover it. The question is, where will they find it? Will it debut on TikTok, Instagram, or at one of the thousands of fringe film festivals that dot the globe? The anticipation of this discovery keeps the cinema world exciting and ever evolving.” (p. viii)

Nixon’s experience as a film school teacher shows how the situation and function of schools in my field have changed. Whereas in the past they were places where students could access the best filming technology, today everyone has a 4K camera in their pocket. Access to technology alone does not make it easier to make a film. (Let’s leave sound aside.) This attitude is very similar to what my colleague from Olomouc, Tomáš Jirsa, says—students don’t go to school because of the availability of technology and don’t expect us to teach them how to use it. They have other reasons.

Nixon’s perspective shed a completely different light on what I saw at the workplaces I visited. Paolo Russo at Oxford Brookes University showed me around the campus, showed me the facilities, and we briefly discussed the technology available to their students. With Murray Smith at the University of Kent, we discussed his recent experience with interdisciplinary research and its applicability in teaching. Ceylin Ertekin from the London School of Economics showed me around their eye-tracking lab. Deborah Klika from the University of Greenwich gave me a tour of their studios, including virtual production. And everywhere I went, I thought to myself that it would take us a very long time to catch up in Czech film and humanities departments in general.

Nixon’s book puts this into a different perspective. Thanks to smartphones, we all have a camera in our pocket (in new iPhones, even with an eye tracker). Thanks to TikTok and YouTube, we all have access to a global audience. The democratization of technology may have completely redrawn the field in which we operate. The best Hollywood producers are suddenly meeting amateurs, and gatekeepers are losing power.

Don’t get me wrong. I still think technology is essential. The fact that Royal Holloway and the University of Greenwich have virtual production studios means that they have enormous opportunities in terms of research. The excellent sound technology at Oxford Brookes University offers unparalleled opportunities for their students, even if they use it to shoot on their phones. But if we stick to the educational dimension and student expectations, Nixon is probably right and access to the latest technology is not essential. After all, the best films are already being made for TikTok.

For me, Nixon’s book is mainly an inspiration to rethink what film studies are for and what their place is in today’s education system.