Sometimes inserting technology and digital media into a conversation can alter the outcome in a negative way. Having bright lights and cameras inside of an intimate setting intrinsically alters the flow of the discussion. But often, the stories that are told in intimate settings deserve to live on if you can find the right balance.

Such was the case with deciding whether to film last week’s heavy-hearted conversation between Olympia-based singer songwriter Kimya Dawson and Detroit-based writer, and filmmaker dream hampton. Both are highly analog individuals with strong presences online. They have an engrained understanding of the need to switch between hyper-connectedness and simply turning everything off which created an important paradox for us. The natural inclination for many of us in the MCDM program is to capture stories with authenticity. Given that MCDM is now partnered with Michael Hebb’s salon style Night School events, filming portions of them are key for the story to live on, but having a camera running the entire time changes the nature of the events themselves.

Luckily, we found a happy balance. Below check out footage that Scott Macklin pieced together from the green room sessions of Kimya and dream laughing about motherhood as Kimya sings a personal ode to her five year old daughter. It’s precious and only a handful of us witnessed this in person. After that check out a full live stream of the green room session itself with nuggets of wisdom galore from both of these women.

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In case you didn’t already know, women rock! It’s an non-debateable fact that gets overlooked far too often in society and a group of graduate students and professors at the University of Washington and Seattle University have organized a two day conference and film festival this week to help change that. On February 17th and 18th, the inaugural Women Who Rock festival is taking place on the UW campus (Thursday) and Seattle University (Friday) aiming to shed more light on rock star women that exist within and around the music world at large. Some innovative media components are expected to be a part of it. And the two day conference is free to the public.

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posted by Adri

Ethnographic films (documentaries) are an emerging research method used to understand culture, consumer behavior, and social constructs that transcend mere data and can provide a rich understanding of a subject and its environment. Here’s an interview with the Chief Technology Officer of the UW College of Education, Scott Macklin discussing Documentaries as a research method and how it applies to his latest film: Masizakhe.

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