The formation of D I R E C T reflects an important moment that has followed on from the early digital periods of ‘convergence’ and then ‘integration’. D I R E C T represents the acceleration of what Digital Cinematography can accomplish to build upon the excellence of film as an atmospheric image capture medium, but with capabilities that vastly improve on those of film. As a production medium, film was limited by financial constraints: if you wanted to shoot a 35mm film at 48 frames per second, the stock costs would have been prohibitive unless you were on a feature or a commercial. In normal Digital Cinematographic practice, increased frame rates cost no more than extra data storage and what that means for data handling.

In terms of electronic capture, the future demands a parallel course of both practice and research and D I R E C T aims to provide a national resource for the interested industry professional as much as for the traditional academic researcher. We are partnering the BBC to create an MA in Wildlife as well as partnering BBC R& D and University of Bristol to look at the effect on the audience of higher frame rates, higher dynamic range and higher resolutions. In the near future we hope to initiate one of the only MA courses in Cinematography in the UK, not just a pathway in MA Film or similar, with input from internationally known and award winning cinematographers backed up by acclaimed theorists and a group of the most knowledgeable teaching fellows in Europe, who also maintain all of our high-end cinematography equipment.

But Digital Cinematography is developing fast and breaking out of its traditional descriptions: It is now any technical or artistic development that affects both image capture and image display. We will be looking at focused or foveal vision as well as unfocussed or peripheral vision – and their combinations. We will look at 360 degree work and immersive imaging too - but we will develop high level skills in image production centering on lighting.

How a camera used to be thought of, is now only one of its possible definitions. The idea that the camera is simply a device for capturing an image misses the possibility that it is also a device (similar to a sonar or radar device) that can output and receive a signal that then creates a representation of the world within computer space. Images are no longer temporal – they are spacial too; and if the camera can now do this – it can enable access to the entirety of the digital realm incorporating visual information into the ‘internet of things’ with ease.

The above does not preclude our interest in the traditional form of image making and we seek to research and practice the art of lighting and film and television craft in both classroom and amongst fellow moving image workers. We seek to discover new histories of television and one of our core research projects looks at the electronic capture and display of images going back to John Logie Baird's public Coliseum demonstrations in July 1930 and the production of the 1st truly electronically captured drama on Electronovision, 'Harlow', a derivative of the French 819 line Secam system, for theatrical release on film, starring Ginger Rogers in 1965. Our intention is to be realistic about the way practice and research informs the way the world is represented on screen - and a screen today can be redefined as any kind of display, whether it be cinema, television, platform display device, or the screens' very latest iteration in Higher Dynamic Range Display, which seeks to represent the range of the eye and brain pathway. We will seek an integrated approach to theory and practice which unites our teams of practitioners and research groups under the banner of lens based research, where the production and display of the image is produced by light travelling through glass – from the history of its use from its inception in the 13th century, through to and including training for students in the newly developing areas that cinematographers need to understand: Computer Graphics, VFX, green screen, virtual and motion capture environments.

We will be organising conferences and symposia and various events with our partners at the Watershed Media Center which seek to unify the understandings of professionals and academics alike; we will develop two strands of bi-annual festivals in i) cinematography and screenwriting (beginning in September 2011) and ii) experimental moving images and also smaller yearly events around the politics of unrest and other associated subject areas that concern both documentary and narrative.

The University of the West of England with its theory and practice research groups, its departments of Robotic Vision and Artificial Intelligence, places our collective research initiative at the highest level of image capture and display worldwide – in terms of both practice and theory, with a growing staff and set of affiliate members that is equivalent to the expertise represented by the best in the world.

Our collegiate relationships are with: the University of Bristol, the Bristol Vision Institute and the Faculty of Engineering, BBC Bristol Natural History, BBC Research and Development, Creative England, the British Society of Cinematographers, the British Film Institute, Films at 59, 422 South West, Quantel, the Arnolfini's educational research department and the Pervasive Media Studio within the Watershed Media Center and the Watershed Media Center itself, and our international partners at the American Film Institute and the American Society of Cinematographers.

Please return to this site as we grow, for further details of affiliate membership, emeritus professorial membership, professional and industry affiliations and reseach and teaching resources.

UWE currently holds 5 Red One Digital Cinematography Cameras and has access to Epic, Scarlet and Arri Alexa, plus Phantom Gold and Phantom Flex, Sony F5, F55 and F65 camera units.