Mobile phones, mobile films

When mobile phone manufacturers started integrating cameras into handsets, they weren’t necessarily thinking of redefining the cinematic experience. But by adding value to a hugely popular product, they handed over much more than technology to the hands of the tech consumer. 

Nearly 300 million camera phone users are now collectively enriching our visual memory with snapshots of everyday life, records of fluid moments and movements of people going through the daily grind, and other portraits of the different and differing compartments of our public selves.

With still shots as the rage, can motion picture on mobiles be far behind?

Visual storytelling is an old art. The cellphone craze has merely taken the visual narrative to a new dimension. Got a big idea and a camera phone? Make each moment count, make memories, make films.

The recent venture of Discovery Network Asia and Nokia to launch a mobile film competition drew thousands of entries from 10 countries last year, and probably thousands more this year, proof that an emerging film genre is fast taking shape.

In the Philippines, 10 aspiring mobile filmmakers made it to the elimination round of the Discovery-Nokia Mobile FilmMakers 2006 Awards.

The 10 semi-finalists, Diadema Martinez, Eric Ras, Jacobo Nepomuceno, Jasmin Celestina Bernardino, Joel Anthony Cardenas, Manuel Franklin Coloma, Ponciano Subillaga Tabor, Reynaldo de Guzman, Roel Gonzaga, and Vernono Villapando, attended a special workshop organized by Discovery Networks Asia with local filmmaker Jeffrey Jeturian to help them gain insights on mobile filmmaking.

Workshops were also conducted in other countries to help the other semi-finalists hone their filmmaking skills, specifically with the Nokia N90, which they will be using to shoot a 30-second clip.

Two of the clips will be chosen from each country and brought to the regional workshop in Singapore where well-known Asian directors such as Singaporean Kelvin Tong (The Maid), Thai Ekachai Uekrongtham (Beautiful Boxer), Indonesian Riri Riza (Eliana, Merry Go Round) and Jeffrey Jeturian (Larger than Life) will provide tips on mobile filmmaking through interviews and webcasts.

At stake in the regional competition are a $10,000 cash prize and a three-month stint at Discovery’s regional headquarters in Singapore.

But more than the incentive, the overall goal of the competition is to fan the interest of people in expressing their creativity through a different medium.

"The Mobile FilmMakers initiative has clearly helped change the traditional concept of mobile phones and has taken filmmaking to an exciting new direction," James Gibbons, senior vice president for programming and creative services of Discovery Networks Asia, said in a statement.

"We were very impressed by the quality of the entries this year. We hope to uncover more new talent from the Philippines and other countries throughout the region," he added.

Rhomel Marcojos, product marketing head of Nokia Philippines, said they hope to make mobile filmmaking a common and enjoyable activity among camera phone users in the country.

Incidentally, the grand prizewinner last year was a Filipino, Janice Yu, who gained the nod of the jurors with her innovative underwater film.

"With the advancement of technology we have now, it is a godsend for videographers like me who can have immediate access to equipment that despite their small size, are packed with walloping features and quality, and we are not just limited to shooting footage during holidays and special occasions but any day and every day," the Mobile FilmMakers 2006 website quoted Yu as saying.

According to Discovery Networks Asia, to enter the contest, the applicants were asked to submit a written description of the theme "My Discovery." The challenge was to share a unique insight, knowledge or experience and bring to life a "discovery moment" as it is imagined on-screen.

Discovery said the semi-finalists were selected based on the strength of their ideas relating to the theme.

In this new film genre, the idea is the power behind a work. How that idea is translated into visuals and delivered on a tiny screen is the work of technology.

Today’s cellphones, especially Nokia’s N90 multimedia phone, which will be used in the competition, are equipped with high-end features that make capturing and editing video clips possible.

The N90 itself, with its unique "twist and shoot" design, has a two-megapixel camera with a Carl Zeiss lens. It also has a 262,144-color (352 x 416 pixels) main display, which provides good viewing experience. The handset comes with 31MB internal memory and a complimentary 128MB RS-MultiMediaCard.

Incidentally, Nokia and Discovery Networks Asia were not the first to launch an international competition for mobile phone filmmaking.

Before it, there was BigDigit, the World’s Smallest Film Festival, held in 2003, which, according to the Mobile FilmMakers Awards 2006 website, "was among the pioneer events that encouraged the production of short films to be played specifically on mobile devices."

The website also mentioned the efforts of the Edinburgh International Film Festival, NESTA (the National Endowment for Science Technology and the Arts) and a technology company called BLINK in commissioning short films.

Aside from the Mobile FilmMakers Awards 2005 and 2006, Nokia also launched a short film competition in the United Kingdom in 2003. 

A competitor, Siemens, also had its own Siemens Micro Movie competition, which was held in 2003 and 2004 as part of the St. Kilda Film Festival.

As short films shot from mobile phones are now becoming a regular feature in film festivals, more people are taking part in re-imagining and reconfiguring the possibilities of the film medium.

If the mainstream film industry is viewed by many as a dying proposition in the Philippines, perhaps, the mobile phone phenomenon can give it a needed boost, albeit a temporary panacea.