The power of eyes in film.

Cognitive Film Theorist extraordinaire, David Bordwell has recently posted two wonderful blog posts about the power of eyes in film. His first post on emotional communication and acting in Fincher’s The Social Network is a brilliant introduction to the psychology of facial expressions and its subtle mastery by the actors. A very fun and clever exercise in how we can use cognitive psychology to inform our understanding and analysis of film.

http://www.davidbordwell.net/blog/?p=12186

In David’s second post he extends the discussion to a topic very dear to my heart: the eye movements of film viewers.

http://www.davidbordwell.net/blog/?p=12332

By providing an introduction to eye movements and summarising Yarbus’ work on the influence of task on eye movements during picture viewing he provides the foundations from which we can start hypothesising about the relationship between film form and viewer attention. In next week’s post, David has given me the honour of building on this foundation by explaining first-hand some of my empirical research into film viewing utilising my eyetracking methods. Watch this space to find out more!

Source: Continuity Boy

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