Digital Video and Still Photography: Converging Technologies

SFCC Photography will be teaching PHOTO 237 Introduction to Documentary Digital Video Production winter quarter, marking the formal adoption of full-motion video into our curriculum. Digital Video and Still Photography have been on a converging path for the past 7 years.

The national trade association ASMP first published articles about commercial photographers adding video to their services in 2003 and the most recent November 2007 issue of CalumetFocus has an article by Joseph Seif announcing Calumet's addition of video technology to their photographic equipment sales catalog. The calumet article outlines the paradigm shift that is taking place and says "Today there is (video) equipment that will capture 12MP full-frame stills at up to 60 frames persecond and has film like dynamic range." Still photographers are now being asked to capture video as well as still photography in order to provide images for websites and podcasts. Portrait photographers have been providing wedding videography for many years.

In preparation for this paradigm shift, SFCC Instructor Ira Gardner began training in video in 2001 and designed and taught workshop courses starting in 2002. In 2004, SFCC hired film maker Joan Conger who designed the current curriculum at SFCC that was approved in 2005. Ira and Joan have team taught video production and have been collaborating on a film project for the last two years.

In addition to this, adjunct instructor Colin Mulvany, who works for the Spokesman Review and teaches photojournalism for us, has seen his job change from producing still images for print media to producing video blogs. In September of 2005 Colin was featured in a Wall Street Journal article as being a national leader in the shift from traditional still photography to multimedia and video content creation. Colin is a member of our program advisory committee and has helped us with curriculum development and technology acquisition.

Students who enroll in PHOTO 237 will learn to capture and edit video using industry standard software Final Cut Pro. As we move towards the new year, we look forward to embracing the new imaging paradigm.

Click here to read the Calumet article by Joseph Seif starting on page 24