Mobile Story Making in an Age of Smartphones

Max Schleser, Marsha Berry, Max Schleser, Marsha Berry

• Publisher: Palgrave Pivot
• Year: 2018
• Print ISBN: 9783319767949
• eBook ISBN: 9783319767956
• Topic: Sciences sociales
• Subtopic: Journalisme

The participatory turn in media, arts and design along with interrelated developments in the proliferation of social and network media have changed our understanding of the contemporary mediascape. Mobile Story Makingin an Age of Smartphones reveals how smartphones and storytelling are forming a symbiosis that empowers twenty-first century citizens and creatives around the world.The edited collection further develops definitions and debate around creative mobile media and its impact on media, art and design.It brings together mobile artists, digital ethnographers, filmmakers working with smartphones, illustrators, screenwriters as well as musicians utilizing apps and mobile devices, who explore new directions in the creative arts with a focus on screen production. Lastly, it demonstrates how mobile devices and smartphones can make a difference in peoples' lives and catalyses creativity in order to tackle current socio-cultural issues.

© The Author(s) 2018

Max Schleser and Marsha Berry (eds.)Mobile Story Making in an Age of Smartphoneshttps://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-76795-6_1

Begin Abstract

1. Introduction: Creative Mobile Media II—Making a Difference

Max Schleser¹ and Marsha Berry²

(1)

Swinburne University of Technology, Melbourne, Australia

(2)

RMIT University, Melbourne, Australia

Max Schleser (Corresponding author)

Email: [email protected]

Marsha Berry

Email: [email protected]

Abstract

Creative Mobile Media II: Making a Difference provides an overview of the edited collection and outlines its structure in the three sections: Story-making, Making spaces and Making change. This introduction frames the book theoretically and illustrates the continuation from Creative Mobile Media in an Age of Smartphones. While our previous volume focused on creative projects as inspiration for debates relating to aesthetics, space and place, knowledge and stories and the self, Creative Mobile Media II explores how smartphones may influence to social change and can further expand the definition of creative practices relating to the field of screen media. Story-making can contribute to formulating democratic processes and equity, which are imperative to create change and challenge traditional models of media production and consumption.

Keywords

Story-makingMaking spacesMaking change

End Abstract

This volume outlines how story-making contributes to co-creation , co-design and co-production with “the people formerly known as the audience ” (McGuinness 2016) and explores people’s engagement in the process of production as more than that of pure consumers or passive agents. As media -making has moved from broadcasting channels to digital platforms , the contemporary media environment is characterised by Manovich’s “media mobility ” (2008, p. 203), ephemeral media (Grainge 2011) and what Jenkins labels as “spreadable media ” (Jenkins 2013). The now well-established recognition of audience engagement through participatory culture is a baseline for the discussion of story-making . Digital enterprise has developed content creation strategies that embrace these developments. Here, one could point at Google ’s content creation guidelines (CCC—content framework: Create, Collaborate, Curate—Google Brand Lab); “rather than using video exclusively as a storytelling mechanism, think of it as a tool for story-making , in which consumers get to take part” (Larson 2015). In Mobile AR : Creating Augmented Experiences, David and Schleser (2013) point at the significance of participants in defining the meaning for MR (mixed-reality ) works. This article also cites Danah Boyd’s (Principal Researcher at Microsoft Research and the founder of Data & Society) critique of the term “user” as having drug-user associations. By means on shifting the conversation from the horizontal to a vertical plane of co-producers and co-creators, a conceptual shift takes place . Even in user-centric design and user-based storytelling the dichotomy is maintained. Through modifying the context of “the other” as opposed to the professional or amateur , creator or user, a different model of thinking and engagement is presented. Smartphones as nodes in networked media have illustrated how local networks and visual communication structures are shaped and co-produced.

While our previous volume, Creative Mobile Media in an Age of Smartphones, focused on creative projects as inspiration for debates relating to aesthetics, space and place , knowledge and stories and the self, Creative Mobile Media II explores how smartphones contribute to social change and add further nuances to the definition of creative practices related to smartphone media and screen production. Story-making can contribute towards formulating democratic processes and equity imperatives to create change and challenges traditional models of media production and consumption. This edited collection further investigates how the smartphone has been taken up for story-making and includes research fields such as children’s book design, screenwriting , personal media , Aboriginal knowledge , music sharing , place-making and play , mobile virtual realities, experimental filmmaking , MR experiences , smartphone–spacetime , vertical video and Pasifika youth empowerment .

The chapters in this volume have been arranged according to three themes.

Story-Making

Story-making can lead to self-representation and can engage twenty-first-century citizens who understand the risks of commercial and political discourses anchored within social media . According to the 90-9-1 formula (Arthur 2006; Nielsen 2006), there is a participation inequality on the internet with only 1% of people creating content , 9% editing or modifying that content and 90% viewing content without actively contributing. Mobile Story Making in an Age of Smartphones challenges this formula. The binary opposition of author/audience or producer/user and active/passive cannot move the conversation forward as it is framed in a traditional broadcasting model of thinking, with traditional vertical structures of media production.

In the context of design , Chapter 2 explores mobile media as a development for children’s book design and illustration . In orde...

Table of contents

• Cover
• Front Matter
• 1. Introduction: Creative Mobile Media II—Making a Difference
• Part I. Story-Making
• Part II. Making Spaces
• Part III. Making Change
• Back Matter