Digital aesthetics of filmic realism (since 2017)

Angela Rabing, M.A.

Filmic realism cannot be separated from digitization of film. Digitization represents a transformation of film and cinema that affects the technical, economic, and aesthetic aspects of the medium. The doctoral project deals with filmic realism in contemporary feature films and documentaries under the terms of digitization. The focus is on films that explicitly use digital media in their production, such as films that use smartphones as cameras, YouTube videos as source material or the desktop itself instead of an external camera. By using these digital media, a distinctive digital aesthetic is created that is discussed in terms of filmic realism and the effects of realism that result from using these media are described accordingly.