National Film Board of Canada's "Out My Window", part of the Highrise Project.
Tracey Boyer, founder and managing editor of the Innovative Interactivity blog, recently posted about "Out My Window", a web-based interactive documentary filmed in 360-degree panoramic video, directed by Katerina Cizek, a participant of the National Film Board of Canada’s Filmmaker-in-Residence (FIR) project.
After I read Tracy's blog post and explored her link to Out My Window, I felt that it was worth sharing it on this blog. Tracy's post provides a good description of the project, which represents a collaboration of over 100 people from around the world: Multimedia must-see: NFB's interactive 360 panorama documentary, "Out my window"
The opening page/view/scene of Out My Window provides the following description to the viewers/participants:
"You see them all over the world.
Concrete residential highrise buildings are the most commonly built form of the last century.
On the outside, they all look the same. But inside these towers, people create community, art, and meaning. Explore."
For the best experience, I recommend that you take the time to find a nice large touch-screen display or IWB to participate in the documentary - and maybe with a friend or colleague. (Some of the content is in French.) I also recommend that you take Tracy Boyer's advice and make sure you experience the interactive documentary with a good speaker system. The soundtrack is awesome!
HIGHRISE Trailer
The NFB's Highrise project unveils its new interactive web documentary, Out My Window
Julie Matlin, NFB.ca Blog, 10/15/10
About HIGHRISE and Director Katerina Cizek (From the Highrise website)
"HIGHRISE is a multi-year, multi-media, collaborative documentary project about the human experience in global vertical suburbs. Under the direction of documentary-maker Katerina Cizek, the HIGHRISE team will be making lots of things. Web-documentaries, live presentations, installations, mobile projects and yes, documentary films. We will use the acclaimed interventionist and participatory approaches of the award-winning National Film Board of Canada’s Filmmaker-in-Residence (FIR) project. Our scale will be global, but rooted firmly in the FIR philosophy — putting people, process, creativity, collaboration, and innovation first.
In the first Filmmaker-in-Residence project, we worked at a major inner-city teaching hospital with doctors, nurses, researchers, and patients, challenging the conventional notions of “documentary” and academic research — and did more than just observe and record. We produced dozens of documentaries — and photo exhibits, participatory media workshops, and a feature-length web documentary.
How can the same approach be applied to urbanism? How can documentary help re-invent our cities at their edges? By going global and local at the same time, HIGHRISE is based in intensive community collaboration, married to an international vision for what documentary can be."
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