Abstract
In this chapter I examine how Instagram allows mobile filmmakers to produce and distribute granular, personal documentary projects about everyday events through the use of various archive and database methods. Using a practice-led research methodology, I will be reflecting on the processes and outcomes of the of the mobile media film Quo Grab #02, a film made with a series of granular moments that were originally shared on Instagram. As in other mobilementaries, it uses the portability of the mobile device to capture everyday moments, that subsequently were remixed in order to create new meanings through juxtaposition. While the initial granular media objects had a life of their own when posted on Instagram, the final film created with them allows them to take on a broader meaning thanks to the critical distance of the maker to the personal meaning and context contained within the original source material.
This is a preview of subscription content, log in via an institution.
Buying options
Tax calculation will be finalised at checkout
Purchases are for personal use only
Learn about institutional subscriptionsBibliography
Astruc, Alexandre. 2009. “The Birth of the New Avant-Garde: La Caméra-Stylo.” In The French New Wave: Critical Landmarks, edited by Peter Graham and Ginette Vincendeau, 17–23. London: Palgrave Macmillan.
Batty, Craig. 2014. “Smartphone Screenwriting: Creativity, Technology, and Screenplays-on-the-Go.” In Mobile Media Making in an Age of Smartphones, edited by Marsha Berry and Max Schleser, 102–114. New York: Palgrave Pivot.
Bennett, Tony, and Janet Woollacott. 2002. “Texts and Their Readings.” In The Film Cultures Reader, edited by Graeme Turner, 14–19. Oxfordshire: Routledge.
Berkeley, Leo. 2013. The 57 (MINA Mix). Motion Picture.
Berkeley, Leo. 2014. “Tram Travels: Smartphone Video Production and the Essay Film.” In Mobile Media Making in an Age of Smartphones, edited by Marsha Berry and Max Schleser, 25–34. New York: Palgrave Pivot.
Berry, Marsha. 2016. Wayfarer’s Trail. Motion Picture.
Berry, Marsha. 2017. “Wayfarer’s Trail.” Sightlines Journal 2. http://www.aspera.org.au/research/wayfarers-trail/.
Briggs, Marlene. 2008. “The Return of the Aura: Contemporary Writers Look Back at the First World War Photograph.” In Locating Memory: Photographic Acts, edited by Annette Kuhn and Kirsten McAllister, 113–134. New York: Berghan Books.
Brown, William. 2014. Selfie. Motion Picture.
Cammaer, Gerda. 2012. “Jasper Rigole’s Quixotic Art Experiments with Home Movies and Archival Practices.” The Moving Image: The Journal of the Association of Moving Image Archivists 12 (2): 41–69. https://doi.org/10.5749/movingimage.12.2.0041.
Chacon, Benjamin. 2017. The Ultimate Guide to Instagram Stories. https://later.com/blog/instagram-stories-for-business/. Last modified October 25, 2017.
Cowlard, David. 2016. Lung. Directed by David Cowlard. Motion Picture.
Cruz, Edgar Gómez, and Helen Thornham. 2015. “Selfies Beyond Self-Representation: The (Theoretical) F(r)ictions of a Practice.” Journal of Aesthetics & Culture 7 (1). https://doi.org/10.3402/jac.v7.28073.
Cuevas, Efrén. (2013) “Home Movies as Personal Archives in Autobiographical Documentaries.” Studies in Documentary Film 7 (1): 17–29. https://doi.org/10.1386/sdf.7.1.17_1.
Duhem, Sebastien. 2016. Iceland Contrast. Directed by Sebastien Duhem. Motion Picture.
Dumont, Guillaume. 2015. “Co‐creation and New Media: The Entrepreneurial Work of Climbing Photographers in Digital Times.” Anthropology of Work Review 36 (1): 26–36.
Haseman, Brad. 2007. “Rupture and Recognition: Identifying the Performative Research Paradigm.” In Practice as Research: Approaches to Creative Arts Enquiry, edited by Estelle Barrett and Barbara Bolt, 147–158. London: I.B. Tauris.
Hight, Craig. 2014. “Shoot, Edit, Share: Cultural Software and User-Generated Documentary Practice.” In New Documentary Ecologies: Emerging Platforms, Practices and Discourses, edited by Kate Nash, Craig Hight, and Catherine Summerhayes, 219–236. New York: Palgrave Macmillan.
Hjorth, Larissa. 2014. “Co-present and Ambient Play: A Case Study of Mobile Gaming.” In Mobile Media Making in an Age of Smartphones, edited by Marsha Berry and Max Schleser, 59–68. New York: Palgrave Pivot.
Hjorth, Larissa, Jean Burgess, and Ingrid Richardson. 2012. “Studying the Mobile: Locating the Field.” In Studying Mobile Media Cultural Technologies, Mobile Communication, edited by Larissa Hjorth, Jean Burgess, and Ingrid Richardson, 1–7. New York, NY: Routledge.
Keep, Dean. 2014a. “Artist with a Camera-Phone: A Decade of Mobile Photography.” In Mobile Media Making in an Age of Smartphones, edited by Marsha Berry and Max Schleser, 25–35. New York: Palgrave Pivot.
Keep, Dean. 2014b. Decombres. Motion Picture.
Keep, Dean. 2015. “From Barbie Video Girl to Smartphones: How Portable Media Devices Are Shaping New Screen Production Practices.” ASPERA Annual Conference 2015: “What’s This Space? Screen Practice, Audiences and Education for the Future Decade”. http://www.aspera.org.au/research/from-barbie-video-girl-to-smartphones-how-portable-media-devices-are-shaping-new-screen-production-practices/. Accessed September 20, 2017.
Keep, Dean. 2016. Remembering Hiroshima. Motion Picture.
Kelly, Patrick. 2013. North. Motion Picture.
Kelly, Patrick. 2014. “Slow Media Creation and the Rise of Instagram.” In Mobile Media Making in an Age of Smartphones, edited by Marsha Berry and Max Schleser, 140–149. New York: Palgrave Pivot.
Kelly, Patrick. 2017a. Quo Grab #01. Motion Picture.
Kelly, Patrick. 2017b. Quo Grab #02. Motion Picture.
Manovich, Lev. 2002. The Language of New Media. Cambridge, MA: MIT Press.
Manovich, Lev. 2005. Remixing and Remixability. http://www.manovich.net/DOCS/Remix_modular.doc.
Miles, Adrian. 2014. “Interactive Documentary and Affective Ecologies.” In New Documentary Ecologies: Emerging Platforms, Practices and Discourses, edited by Kate Nash, Craig Hight, and Catherine Summerhayes, 67–82. New York: Palgrave Macmillan.
Robards, Brady, and Siân Lincoln. 2017. “Uncovering Longitudinal Life Narratives: Scrolling Back on Facebook.” Qualitative Research 17 (6): 715–730.
SBS Australia. 2017. Putting Together a Proposal for SBS. http://www.sbs.com.au/shows/commissionedcontent/tab-listings/curr-tab/i/1/tab/Putting%20Together%20A%20Proposal. Accessed September 24, 2017.
Schleser, Max. 2011. “Mobile-Mentary (Mobile Documentary) 2.0.” Expanding Documentary 1 (2): 7–9.
Stewart, Robyn. 2001. “Practice vs Praxis: Constructing Models for Practitioner-Based Research.” Text 5 (2). http://www.textjournal.com.au/oct01/stewart.htm. Accessed September 12, 2016.
Author information
Authors and Affiliations
Corresponding author
Editor information
Editors and Affiliations
Rights and permissions
Copyright information
© 2018 The Author(s)
About this chapter
Cite this chapter
Kelly, P. (2018). Instagram as Archive: Constructing Experimental Documentary Narratives from Everyday Moments. In: Cammaer, G., Fitzpatrick, B., Lessard, B. (eds) Critical Distance in Documentary Media. Palgrave Macmillan, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-96767-7_11
Download citation
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-96767-7_11
Published:
Publisher Name: Palgrave Macmillan, Cham
Print ISBN: 978-3-319-96766-0
Online ISBN: 978-3-319-96767-7
eBook Packages: Literature, Cultural and Media StudiesLiterature, Cultural and Media Studies (R0)