I decided to set some guidelines that a prospective author has to follow in order to produce a short story that can be added to this project. I wanted all pieces to be roughly of the same length and to cover the topic area of fairy tales. Within the overall theme of fairy tales, and with the visual component in mind, I wanted to get submissions that go beyond creatures that exist. As such, I encouraged people to include dragons, elves, and mystical creatures. In regard to length, I initially asked people to submit their work, in both writing and as a voice recording, at a suggested length of roughly 100 words, which I anticipated would generate voice recordings between one and two minutes long. Some of the authors went slightly over that length, however, with general feedback being that 100 words is very little space for a fairy tale. As such, I decided to accept submissions that were slightly longer, to accommodate for narrative content, or shorter, as I realised that 100 words could also be spoken in less than one minute, depending on the pace of the reader. There were other factors, too, that influenced the authors’ choices to write shorter or longer pieces. For example, one submission is a poem, and the author decided to retain its longer length so as not to break the work’s rhythm. Overall, this variable structural constraint was implemented in the manner of a guideline, rather than a fixed set of timings and word length that authors had to confirm to. Further to the above, I only accepted original submissions and entries that had not been previously published.
The rules discussed above constitute constraints that directly affect the author, and although the filmmaker is therefore indirectly influenced by the constraints, the filmmaker has their own set of constraints that relate specifically to the visual content of the film. For instance, when I listened to the stories, I did not seek clarification from the contributors as to how they imagined the visual content of their stories. This was so I could create a visual narrative based on the verbal storyline, using their words as clues for the nature of the aesthetic content. The visual material that I have created thus exhibits a strong focus on what is featured in the descriptive parts of the stories being told. In many cases, I took the objects that were mentioned in the narrative and placed these objects against a background setting of my choice. For example, in the story about Baba Yaga, I decided to personify this mythical creature with the help of a black piece of cloth.
Given the visual focus on the descriptive elements of the tale, the extent of the literality of the approach has to be addressed. To take a literal approach would be to show the audience what they are hearing, with the audio being simultaneously taken as describing what they are seeing. When using the medium of film, the interplay between what can be seen and heard is very important, often differentiating it from other art forms. We can take as an example the transformation of novels into screenplays which are then turned into films. Certain aspects of the storyline that were described with words by the novelist are transformed into visual images, and the verbal description is not essential, in the form of a voice-over narration for instance, as readers become viewers in the shift from literary text to film. Leaving silent film aside, the role of the viewer usually includes the additional element of listening. Aside from the use of
contrapuntal techniques, sound design tends not to put an additional strain on the viewer, as the sound and image work together and are often received by the audience as one cohesive entity. For this film project, however, it is essential to recognise that these are ultimately two distinct areas of spectatorship. This is because, during the production stage of the project, the sound and the visual images are treated as two separate entities. It is because of this that the project might come across as very descriptive to the spectator, however, even if the images are a representation of what the viewer can hear, they are nevertheless my own visual interpretation of linguistic content. Although the filmmaker cannot change the narrative, they make decisions on colour, location, and items. As the five stories of Tales and Tellers show, the outcome can vary – some of the voice recordings are turned into abstract films, whereas others are depicted in a more traditional manner. The process of filmmaking here can be compared to that of illustration, interpreting a story and transforming it into images. I chose which elements of the narrative ought to be present in the visuals, and I further had the option to add additional elements to the sound track during the post-production phase, for instance adding music and sound effects. In this respect, the approach was less that of transforming the linguistic text in a literal manner than in an interpretive manner.