Czech New Wave texts:



Into - For my contextual studies essay, I will be exploring Czechoslovakian new wave cinema and the obscure ways in which the texts are constructed while reflecting the society of the time. Through my research, I will also be looking at the impact that the society and political state had on the movement and Czechoslovakian cinema in general.

The three Czechoslovakian new wave texts that I have chosen to focus on particularly are: Dasies (1966), The Firemen's Ball (1967) and Valerie and her Week of Wonders (1970). I have chosen these texts because I think that they are some of the most interesting and obscure texts of the Czech new wave movement. 

Czech new wave:

As previously mentioned, the main influence for the Czech new wave was the political and creative freedom that they were given towards the end of 1960s, liberating film makers and other artist and allowing them to create works which contained controversial imagery and spoke about/mentioned taboo topics - before this liberation, all texts (from newspapers and radio to television and cultural event organisation) had to be sent through the public domain before publishing. 

Lasting from the 1960s till the early 1970s, a great deal of creative and obscure texts, including films, were produced and displayed for the public and creators enjoyment. Some of the major figures of the Czech new wave movement were: Milos Forman - who produced one of the first Czech new wave texts that helped launch the movement, Milan Kundera, Vera Chytilova and directing the director team of Jan Kadar and Elmar Clos - who ended up wining Czechoslovakia's first Oscar in 1965 for the film A Shop on the High Street. 

History of New Wave/The French New Wave:

The French new wave is the style of film making that broke Hollywoods rules and inspired a new way of film making that has carried through to the present day. As an artistic movement that changed the way Hollywood saw film making - choosing to use natural environments rather than studio sets - it gave the directors a great deal more freedom when it came to shooting their films and has been remembered as a great influence much like cubism and surrealism. This style of film making meant that the craft was opened up to many young, aspiring film makers and other amateurs - the French new wave was a cultural revolution. 

The new wave movement showed and reflected the change in lifestyle that was happening during the 1960s and how society was evolving. It took normal peoples lives and put them into cinema, being centred around young people, youth and a something new/a new life. 

Shutter Speed practice:

To investigate and practice using shutter speed, I chose to shoot three videos at different shutter speeds (1/30, 1/50 and 1/60). When it came to shooting the videos, however, I decided that it would be more effective to show a  very high shutter speed as it would be a clearer exploration of the effect of shutter speed on the quality and visuals of the video. This video is shot at shutter speed 1/30, meaning that there is a slight motion blur and the aperture I used had o be very low so as to not over expose it. 

To achieve this effect, I chose to use the following camera settings: ISO 200, shutter speed 1/30, 25fps, and aperture 5.8ff. When shooting at such a slow shutter speed, I found that it was difficult to make out the detail of the water and the over look of the video was quite dull. 

This scene shot highlights what I mean and shows that the slow shutter speed increases the amount of motion blur and makes the water appear as though it is a smooth continuous stream. I do feel that my choice to shoot a garden hose/water was good though as it means that the full effect of shutter speed on film is evident. 

For this video, I shot at shutter speed 1/50 so that the visual appearance of the water would be closer to that which humans see with there naked eye. The shutter speed should always be double the number of the frame rate, for example: if you're shooting at a frame rate of 25fps you should shoot with a shutter speed of 1/50. This means that although the appearance of the water is still smooth, it is what people see with their natural eye - this is also the type of frame rate to shutter speed ratio that most directors and film makers use.

To achieve this effect, I used the following settings: ISO 200, shutter speed 1/50, 25fps, and aperture 7. Because I was shooting at a higher shutter speed, I had to change the aperture to allow less light into the camera and prevent it getting over exposed, however, this meant that I had to refocus the camera.

This scene shot shows that the higher the shutter speed, the less motion blur there is. It also shows the trouble I had when it came to refocusing the camera, however, that could also just be a little amount of motion blur from the garden hose moving as it was hand held.








This final video shows the effect of the shutter speed on the footage at both 1/100 and 1/400. The stream of water presented at this shutter speed shows that there is no visible continuous stream and instead the individual droplets of water and details are clearer. 

To achieve these effects, I first set my camera to: ISO 200, shutter speed 1/100, 25fps, and aperture 10; and then to: ISO 200, shutter speed 1/400, 25fps, and aperture 10. As these two shutter speed are quite high, the details are very clear but the exposure also made the lighting a great deal crisper, meaning that it looks more like a photograph or unreal that the other two videos do. Because of this unnatural looking appearance that shooting at such a high shutter speed gives, directors and film makers usually elect not to use it.

These two screen shots show how much detail is visible at high shutter speeds - because there is such a high shutter speed there is very little motion blur. I found that it was a great deal more difficult to focus the camera when using these high shutter speeds because I had to focus on the individual droplets rather than on a constant stream like with the slower shutter speeds.

Aperture practice:

I shot these three videos to investigate the use of aperture in filming and to experiment with the effect it has. This first video shows my experimentation at shooting with an aperture of 2.8ff. The use of shallow focus draws the viewers attention to the object/person that is in focus, meaning that it is a good device for narrative story telling in films and other moving image texts. To gain this low aperture, I chose to use the following camera settings: ISO 200, shutter speed 1/60, 25fps, and aperture 2.8ff. This video was also shot on a 50mm lens  meaning that the aperture was able to go lower than most normal/wide angle lenses. To make sure that I got the correct exposure, I decided to change the ISO so that the aperture and shutter speed could remain the same and the overall quality of the video was not affected. 

When shooting this video at aperture 2.8, I found that it was difficult to find an area/place that would allow me to explore the full use of such a shallow depth of field. I do feel as though my choice to shoot the clips using an old plant pot on the corner meant that the desired effect of a low aperture was shown clearly. 


In this video, I shot at an aperture of 8ff meaning that there was a larger field of focus than there was at 2.8. This type of aperture is usually used when there is more to focus on in a scene, but it isn't necessary to be aware of the background. To achieve this depth of field, I used the settings: ISO 400, shutter speed 1/60, 25fps, and aperture 8ff. This video was shot on a standard/wide angle lens, meaning that the aperture could go down as far. Like the previous video, to try and gain the correct exposure for this clip I chose to alter the ISO and leave the aperture and shutter speed as they were.

Although the video is clear, in post-shoot editing I realised that the exposure is incorrect/the ISO was too high and has resulted in the footage being slightly over-exposed. This means that the overall quality of the clip isn't as good as the top video and appears to be foggy and possibly focused wrong. In the future I am going to make sure I check the footage before finishing a shoot so that I don't end up with videos that are over exposed again.


This final video, I shot at aperture 16ff meaning that there was a wider depth of field and a greater amount of the footage was in focus. This aperture is often used when the director of a text has encoded a variety of subjects in the mise-en-scene that the audience should take notice of or there is no particular object that the viewer needs to focus on. To achieve this effect, I chose to use the following camera settings: ISO 400, shutter speed 1/60, 25fps, and aperture 16ff. I shot this video on a standard camera lens, meaning that the aperture couldn't go as high and I had to shoot at an aperture of 16. 

The exposure of this video, much like that of the video above, is not correct/too bright meaning that the appearance of the footage isn't clear and appears almost foggy. If I had to reshoot this video I would make sure that I reviewed the quality of the footage before finishing the shoot, this would mean that the exposure could have been corrected before it came to editing and that the visual quality and appeal of the video would have been better.

Investigating different types of new wave:

Although each new wave style has the same goals and concept, there are slight differences between them - this was due to them all being strongly influenced by the society of the country in that time period. In Czechoslovakian New wave, the main influence was the political liberation that was introduced in the 1960s giving film makers and other artist the freedom to create work with a more controversial twist and about taboo topics. This new freedom lead to the Czech new wave film makers being a great deal more creative and making very obscure, and often indecipherable texts. The Czech new wave movement lasted from 1962 through to the early 1970s meaning that a large amount of film texts were created and produced during this time. 


The Hong Kong new wave movement happened a little later than the new waves from places like France and America, taking place in the late 1970s to well into the 80s. The greatest influence for this new wave style was the western influence that the Chinese directors had and the western-style education given to them through their lives. This lead to Hong Kong new wave film makers creating texts that chose to be stylistically incoherent - meaning that there was a clear distinction between the new filmmakers of the era and the older ones.


French new wave was the spark that egnited an explosion of new, creative styles of film making. Taking place from the late 1950s through to the early 70s, the french new wave movement produced a very large number of films which were influenced by the directors and their personal lives/experiences. Due to the french new wave being the first of its kind and sparking such a massive and memorable change, films like Breathless (1960) and The 400 Blows (1959) have been remembered for all their new, creative and interesting was of film making.

New Wave Cinema:

The new wave style of film making was created in the 1960s as an answer to the repetitive and formulaic structure to Hollywood films. New wave cinema, pioneered by directors such as Jean-Luc Godard and Francois Truffaut, was designed and created to break the rules and create something completely different and a new experience, which audiences loved. New wave film making is recognised as freeing the way that films were made - it is profound for the use of natural footage out on the streets as opposed to using studios or fixed sets and is enduring, much like cubism and surrealism. 

There are various different types of new wave cinema, due to it being a wide spread film making style across various countries. Some of these include: French New Wave, American New Wave, Hong Kong New Wave and Czech New Wave. Some of the notable conventions for new wave cinema are the following:
 - They included mistakes in the final film
 - Handheld camera
 - Hidden cameras in natural environments (e.g. streets and buildings - meaning that the reactions of people are genuine)
 - Breaking the forth wall and director having cameos in their own films
 - Syncopated editing
 - Jump cuts (often moving from one scene to another with no explanation)
 - Long takes with static/mobile or lateral tracking
 - Interior monologues and random comments
 - Sound doesn't always match the video, due to the sound being added post filming