Grab your camera. Frame something. Press record. See what happens.
Framing with My Hand was a fast, improvised introduction to visual thinking for students in Marymount’s new Video Art & Moving Image elective.
Working beyond the classroom, students used the video cameras on their mobile phones and other portable devices to capture footage in their everyday surroundings, bringing their recordings back into the classroom for editing and further exploration.
The challenge was simple: What belongs in the frame? What doesn’t? Where should we look, and why?
By partially covering the camera lens with their hands, students created an irregular, circular frame through which to explore their surroundings. This simple physical intervention made students conscious of the frame itself.
They were not merely recording the world; they were actively constructing how we see it.
A discarded shoe, a building, an everyday object or an unexpected detail became the starting point for a moving-image investigation.
Working instinctively, students explored how camera movement changes what we see, how objects enter and disappear from view, and how stillness, movement and framing influence our reading of an image.
There was no script, no elaborate planning and no expectation of polished results. The emphasis was on quick decisions, experimentation and learning through making.
Raw, playful and deliberately DIY, this opening exercise introduced the fundamental language of moving images: selection, composition, movement and the act of looking.
A first step towards increasingly ambitious explorations of video art and moving-image practice.
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