Aerial View in Cinema

 

Aerial View as a Cinematic Tool

Panoramic landscapes in cinema are an essential part of filmmaking. They can create a sense of beauty, vastness, depth, grandeur, and magic. 

The panoramic aerial view is a powerful cinematic tool, enabling filmmakers to create a wide range of visual and narrative effects. It can be used to create a sense of space, depth, movement, and drama.

For instance, an aerial shot can emphasize the size and power of a natural landscape, expose social disparities within a large city, or create a sense of threat and danger in a chase scene.

Through the aerial view, filmmakers can manipulate the audience's perception of perspective. They can play with relative size, camera angles, and depth of field to create optical illusions and evoke specific emotions.

For example, an aerial shot of a small figure walking alone in the desert can create a sense of loneliness and helplessness, while an aerial shot of a vast crowd at a demonstration can create a sense of power and solidarity.

The aerial view can also serve as an important narrative tool. It can be used to present the plot from a broader perspective, reveal crucial information inaccessible to the characters, or create dramatic effects of surprise and discovery.

For example, in Alfred Hitchcock's film "Psycho", the aerial view is used to reveal the isolated location of the motel and the danger lurking for the protagonist.

The aerial view is particularly prevalent in certain film genres, such as war films, Westerns, and science fiction films. It allows filmmakers to create spectacular and breathtaking scenes, transporting viewers to imaginary worlds. 

"2001: A Space Odyssey" (1968) and many other science fiction films dealing with space flight incorporate panoramic views of Earth as seen from space, landscapes used to create a sense of immense scale and to emphasize the smallness of humanity within the universe. In the "Star Wars" films, the aerial view is used to create impressive and action-packed space battles.

The development of cinematic technology, especially the invention of drones and digital cameras, has expanded the creative possibilities of the aerial view in cinema. Today, filmmakers can create more complex and sophisticated aerial shots than ever before.

"2001: A Space Odyssey" - Earth seen from a distance 

History of Aerial View in Cinema

The aerial view in cinema is more than just a matter of vision; it's also a matter of sensation. The feeling of flight is central to the aerial view, as is the pleasure derived from observing the Earth from an unusual perspective. The particular pleasure of the cinematic gaze, concerning the aerial view, lies in the oscillation between static visual perception and dynamic perception.

Cameras abroad Balloons Sensation:

The modern aerial view is the result of two technological processes: The automation of vision and the expansion of human visual range. The automation of vision began with the invention of the camera in the mid-19th century. The camera allowed people to capture images of the world from a new perspective, that of a detached observer. The expansion of human visual range began with the invention of the balloon in the late 18th century. The balloon allowed people to see the world from a higher vantage point, providing new insights into space.

The aerial view in cinema is a combination of these two processes. The movie camera allows for the creation of cinematic images of the world from a high perspective, similar to that obtained from an airplane.

Cinema emerged during a time of great focus on conquering the skies and liberating the human gaze from its physical limitations. As early as 1898, the Lumière brothers filmed a short film from a balloon tethered to the ground. The film was shot from a vertical perspective, allowing the viewer to see the landscape in a very different way than they usually would. The film shows movement both inside and outside the gondola. The movement inside the gondola is created by the passengers, and the movement outside is created by the people and vehicles moving on the ground. The film also illustrates how space looks from a vertical perspective. The horizon line disappears, and the world appears flatter and more organized. The film reveals, probably for the first time, the concrete kinetic and static dimensions of the aerial experience in space.

Cinema, thanks to its unprecedented freedom of possibilities and mobility, became the accepted way to convey the aerial experience, along with the inherent instability of perspective. The verticality of the viewpoint is originally a strange kind of visual effect, a unique fusion of macroscopic vision and microscopic observation. Observing the world from above allows for an unprecedented expansion of the field of vision but also makes the world seem smaller and more distant. Early cinema maintained a combination of "I see" with "I fly''. The field was far from being limited to cinematic representation and was connected to the broader question of visual culture.

The history of the aerial view in cinema can be divided into three stages:

The Experimental Stage (1898-1914): During this phase, filmmakers experimented with various aerial filming techniques. They used balloons, airships, and airplanes to capture the world from new and surprising perspectives.

The Developmental Stage (1914-1939): In this stage, aerial filming techniques became more sophisticated. Filmmakers used these techniques to create special effects and tell new stories.

The Cinematic Focus Stage (1939-present): The aerial view has become an integral part of cinema. It is used in a wide variety of films, from documentaries to feature films.

The development of aerial photography in cinema until 1914 led to spectacular and highly significant presentations. Even before the First World War, some photographers began equipping airships, and later airplanes, with movie cameras to explore the feeling of free flight in space. An article from 1911 recounts the filming of an aerial tour in agricultural France, aboard various aircraft. The footage presented was excellent in terms of its image quality components, such as clarity and sharpness. It was also good in terms of its documentary quality, for observation, topography, and touring purposes. A second article from 1912 focuses on the technical aspects of aerial photography. One of the main challenges in aerial photography is the need to use a wide-angle lens to capture the entire picture. It is also important to use a camera with a fast shutter speed to prevent blurring due to the aircraft's movements.

In the first decades of the 20th century, an almost blind faith in the objectivity of mechanical reproduction methods, such as photography and cinema, only emphasized the purposeful tendency that saw in the vast images obtained from the air the natural replacement for cartographic maps. However, these images often proved less "readable" than a conventional map. For example, when examining large structures from a completely vertical view, it is impossible to identify them because they appear as two-dimensional geometric shapes.

In an Airship Over the Battlefields:

In 1918, after the end of the First World War, aerial films began to appear more widely in cinema. One of the most significant projects in this field was the series of short films "In an Airship Over the Battlefields", produced by the French military cinema. The series, filmed between 1918 and 1919, documents the destruction caused in France during the war. The first film in the series depicts the journey of an airship over France, starting in Paris and ending in the front-line areas. The second film depicts the battlefields of the Somme, while the third film depicts the battlefields of Ypres. The fourth and final film depicts the process of France's reconstruction after the war. The films in the series use an aerial perspective to present the destruction caused in France dramatically. The footage shows destroyed houses, ruined churches, and neglected fields. They also show the bodies of soldiers killed in battles. The films were an essential historical document and were also used for propaganda purposes. They emphasized the extent of the destruction caused by the war and the need for the country's reconstruction. The films in the series were shot using special movie cameras developed for aerial photography. The cameras had a wide angle and a fast shutter speed. The filming in the series was technically challenging. The airship was limited in its movements, and the photographers had to deal with strong winds and its vibrations.

This series of short films significantly impacted developing aerial photography in cinema. They showed the potential of aerial photography to create dramatic and accurate images of historical events. They also influenced the development of aerial photography for propaganda purposes, demonstrating how aerial photography could be used to present reality dramatically and manipulatively. From a specifically cinematic perspective, these short films represent an important milestone in developing aerial photography in cinema. They were the first to make extensive use of aerial tracking shots. The aerial tracking shots in them are unique in that they manage to create a sense of free and energetic movement. The shots pass over vast areas, emphasizing the damage caused to the space. The use of aerial tracking shots allowed the camera to create a sense of intimacy with the viewer. The viewer feels as if they are flying with the airship and observing the destruction from a bird's-eye view. The films were also a source of fantasy. Aerial photography allows the viewer to see the world from a new perspective. The viewer can see the world as they do not usually see it, from a viewpoint above and beyond the human world. The films illustrated the potential of aerial photography to create a sense of freedom and transcendence. The shots allowed the viewer to feel as if they could fly above the world and see it from a bird's-eye view. 

"In an Airship Over the Battlefields" (1918-19)

The "In an Airship Over the Battlefields" films also significantly impacted avant-garde cinema. Avant-gardists saw in these films the potential of aerial photography to create new forms of cinematic art. They used aerial tracking shots to create a sense of free and energetic movement. They also used aerial tracking shots to create a sense of intimacy with the viewer.

The City as Aerial View

The cinematic focus on aerial photography solidified in the 1920s, particularly with the "city" as a central theme. Many filmmakers saw the city as a challenging and innovative place for filming, and aerial footage allowed them to see the city from a new angle.

Prominent examples of the use of aerial photography in cinema of that period include the following films:

"Berlin: Symphony of a Metropolis" (1927) is a film by Walter Ruttmann that uses aerial views to present the German city from a new angle and includes an avant-garde perspective.

"Skyscrapers" (1929) is a newsreel film by the Gaumont company, presenting aerial photography of the skyscrapers in Chicago.

"Flying Over New York" (1932) and "Beneath the Snow" (1934) are two more newsreel films by the Pathé company, presenting aerial shots of New York.

"Flying Over New York" (1932)

The World Order Around Israel

 

 

  

   

Paul Virilio - Camera movement over eighty years

The properties of the element of fire guide Virilio in writing on the subject. Fire is an almost imageless element, except for three: light, heat, immediacy. The light according to Virilio is the light of the camera, the heat is the weapon, the immediacy is the decision making.

Virilio reviews how the development of the camera was due to the development of the machine gun, and in general how the development of cinematic photography was due to the consequences of various military developments. Observation and visual intelligence are the cornerstone of the military. That is why they have been at the forefront of technology since the dawn of history to the present day. As the weapons became more sophisticated and the slaughter on the battlefield increased, so did the need for more sophisticated means of observation. The observation plane became the most effective means, and in this way the battlefield, and later the whole world, also became cinematic. The war itself became a spectacular visual spectacle, due to the sophistication of the night lights and the intensity of the shells, in parallel with the sophistication of the defenses against them, trenches and fortifications, which created a sense of disconnection.

The function of the camera is first to connect the fragments of the whole that are revealed to it in separate images, into one complete image. Unlike more modern photography, which focuses on details and create resolutions. Nowadays, with the development of means of observation also for the invisible, such as infrared and radar, and other electronic means, the problem is the management of the information that comes from them, which is the most reliable, but also dense. This created the need for computing, and from there it was a short way to make automatic decisions. In this way the war became a nonstop film, and the nonstop time management replaced the management of space. There was also an obsession with stealth weapons, simulations, and electronic deception. As a result, the war became impersonal and intangible.

Because the sense of reality went wrong, so did human reason. The need to filter information under the conditions of human-machine combined activity was first discovered in World War II, with the sophistication of air defense equipment. Thus was founded the science of cybernetics, based on the concept of the system and the feedback, and in particular the negative feedback, which allows for the screening of human errors through practices.

A detached worldview was created as a result, making motion pictures more tangible than reality. Reality, which has been imprisoned and eliminated by the electromagnetic cyber world, is being revived through the worlds of guided imagery of cinema. Movies have become the telescopic rifle through which we look at war in particular, and the world at large.

In World War II, aerial observation, which has become very sophisticated, has become the most important means of feeding raw materials for films designed to portray reality with an objective eye. But the aerial observation also turned the surface into a detached object, as in a laboratory. Everything became too clear and immediate from the air, and repeated evidence was required, as in a laboratory experiment, to confirm any report. This is due to the increasing speed and mobility of the modern ground military movement. The need for a broad verbal interpretation of the outcome of air battles and bombings, has turned silent films into talking films, among viewers in the command rooms. The ability to carry out nocturnal attacks using bright lighting and the use of radar added to the sense of cinematic detachment from reality. The speed of the decision became more important than its correctness. Mobility, the hallmark of the military force, has become a series of means of communication, sent only by the commander-in-chief to any force on the ground. Statistics have become a major tool for him in decision making.

The citizens of the home front have also became partners to the reality of the command rooms. They were attentive to alarms, under the cloud of uncertainty of the bomb approaching them on the one hand, and watched at night the spectacular spectacle of the air defense spotlights and light bombs.

A similar spectacle is currently being experienced by Israeli citizens watching from a protected area in the background during clashes in Gaza, such as in Operation ''Wall Guard'', in which trails of thousands of missiles illuminated the sky. The first Lebanon war is an early and different example of the means of sight taking over the war, using the unmanned aerial vehicles to asist the airplanes.

In World War II, the culmination of the spectacle of light and fire was the atomic bomb. Immediately after the war it was replaced by the exhaust from the jet aircraft engines, and a few years later the fire emitted by the missile engines launched into space. The Cuban Missile Crisis of 1962, which required an immediate response from the United States following fears of launching missiles from the island, expressed the empowerment of the processes that connected the observation, immediacy and weapons, that are a modern incarnation of primodial fire.

In the Vietnam War, unmanned jet aerial vehicles were used for the first time, as part of a sophisticated electronic system of aiming and collecting data from various sensors. The UAVs, and the missiles launched by pilots remotely using the Send and Forget method, contributed to the disengagement of the fighters from the war. What remains is the link between the flash of light and the war. For war as a vision in Vietnam contributed the use of drugs by soldiers. War as a cinema has become a default.

In the 1970s, the advanced flight simulator was developed, which enabled full simulation of operational flight, and became almost its replacement. The flight has become a cinematic misenscene. Strategic deterrence was also practiced through electronic war games. The computerized maps, created using the aerial scan of the surface, created a new world of computer mapping, imaging and navigation. The pilots were given an overhead display, sophisticated helmets, and the ability to fly and launch through speech and eye focus. The flight became automatic. The eye and the weapon merged.

Maps Of The Human Mind

Martin Mak

The human mind think in pictures and mental maps help us to visualise ideas, concepts and enhance memory and learning.  Like the maps our forefathers use to navigate the oceans and discovery new lands, mental maps help us to think out of the box.

The human brain learns and orientates itself by forming mental maps of familiar places and situations.  Similar to a physical map, these mental maps not only shows the perception of the maker, they form landscapes in their own rights.

“Looking at a map can teach us more with our eyes in an hour than we can learn from our ears in an entire day”.  This valuable insight was expressed in 1605 by the cartographer Thomas Fuller. By looking at a historical map, you will get an idea of how strongly a particular image of the world can determine people’s thoughts and actions.  For many thousands of years, most Europeans believe that the world was flat and therefore had no idea of the real position of the continents and the oceans in relation to one another. This conviction imposed considerable limitations on how far seafarers were willing to travel.   It obviously hindered any endeavours for discovery. This was because people believed that they would fall off the edge of the Earth if they traveled far enough. They had a limited idea of the vast expanse of the oceans and the lands beyond the horizon.

Before sea adventurers could venture into new lands and uncharted seas, a new picture of the earth had to be thought of.  Once this gained gradual acceptance, the speed with which exploration took place took off. Bit by bit, mile by nautical mile, the whole world gradually opened up to explorers and discoverers.  If the Genoese seafarer Christopher Columbus (1451 to 1506) had not had the audacity and vision to imagine that the earth might be round, and that new land might be discovered by sailing westwards,  sea exploration might have been held back by decades or centuries. Later generations of Europeans would have held on to the erroneous opinions that Asia was on the eastern part of the world and cold therefore only be reached by crossing the eastern oceans.

In our modern work life, we often use many expressions that show the significance  of visual pointers for human action. For example, when your company has embarked on a marketing plan, you might say that you can “see what is wrong with our marketing strategy and decide on the next course of action”.  Quite often, it is very difficult to organise an action without having a mental picture of the result you wish to achieve. For example, if you have a problem, the solution to that problem comes easier if you can visualise it.   Then you devise a map to find solution or routes to solve the problem or work around the problem. Similarly, mentalists who to achieve great feats of memory recall use mental maps to train their memory and improve their memory techniques.   Students have also been trained to use mental maps to improve memory, their study skills and accelerate their learning. They do this by breaking down course structure down to subjects, down to topics and down to detailed concepts or formulas, much like the a map of a city or town.

Basically, your mind think in pictures and having such mental paths help anyone from a busy executive, managers or marketing people to plan new campaign or product  strategies. The paths make it easy to link a seemingly unrelated concepts or ideas to a bold new strategy or package an old product into something new using fresh ideas.  With such mental maps, you use your ability to retrace paths in your mind and to store maps to your memory in a manner much more easier than you think.

So like the maritime  maps of old, new frontiers are being discovered by understanding the natural way the brain thinks, stores information and solves problems.  All made possible because mental maps frees the  limitation of conventional human thinking.

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ABOUT THE AUTHOR

Martin Mak has developed a new program to help people enhance their memory and learning experience.  Find out how with his free and popular ecourse at

http://www.mightymemory.com/memoryarticle.html