Gravity of Beauty
Beau, Bellissimo, krasivyy, smuk, mooi, Schon, whatever language you speak, we all understand in our own unique way what beauty is. But what is it really, and why as a production company is this word so important to understand?
“To love beauty is to see light.”
Fig. 1 BEAUTY
Noun, interjection, adverb
beau·ty | \ ˈbyü-tē
Merriam-Webster
the quality or aggregate of qualities in a person or thing that gives pleasure to the senses or pleasurably exalts the mind or spirit : LOVELINESS
Oxford
a combination of qualities, such as shape, color, or form, that pleases the aesthetic senses, especially the sight.
dictionary.com
the quality present in a thing or person that gives intense pleasure or deep satisfaction to the mind, whether arising from sensory manifestations (as shape, color, sound, etc.), a meaningful design or pattern, or something else (as a personality in which high spiritual qualities are manifest).
Cambridge
the quality of being pleasing, especially to look at, or someone or something that gives great pleasure, especially when you look at it:
Macmillan Dictionary
the quality of being beautiful or very good to look at
THE WORD
The word beauty is an ascription of a property or characteristic to a person, place, thing, or idea. There are several takes on the definition from different dictionary sources (Fig. 1), but the one thing they all have in common is that beauty provides our senses some sort of perceptual experience of pleasure or satisfaction. Because of it's perceptual nature, understanding what makes a subjective experience beautiful is nearly impossible to accurately measure and fully grasp.
After all, the saying goes that "beauty is in the eye of the beholder," which ultimately suggests that beauty doesn’t exist on its own but is created by its observers. A beholder is someone who sees or otherwise experiences things, becoming aware of them. To be a beholder, you have to actively pay attention to a subject. Whether that subject has sucked you in by some mystical gravitational pull or you made the choice to observe in order to fulfill something inside yourself... Our experiences to an object are unique as we digest different aspects of it like a witness recounting their experience at a crime scene.
As a production company, the beholder is always on our minds. They are the audience. Trying to understand what makes a beholder is extremely important when crafting a video. After all, we make things meant to be seen and felt (emotionally) by others.
“Beauty lies in the eyes of the beholder.”
Before I dive in, I'd like to point out that writing a blog on beauty is a bit of a monster. To truly crack the surface would mean writing a thousand page book. It's an extremely complicated word and idea that can be explained and interpreted thousands of ways. You could even say the idea of beauty is as diverse as we are people! You could approach the topic with mathematics, aesthetics, theology, social psychology, sociology, biology, and all the other "ologies". Not to mention all the historical understandings and philosophies about beauty from our ancestors that must be considered, and they were way more connected to nature and their natural surroundings then we are! So in this blog my goal is to try and touch on a little of each and relate it back to our craft, because to learn about beauty is to learn more about what it means to be human, how we connect with each other, and what our purpose is.
Also for the sake of this blog, I’ll focus on the pleasures of hearing and seeing that are activated from something "beautiful". Smell, taste, and touch, are heavily debated as to whether or not they can be considered as “beautiful”, and can’t be experienced in the literal sense through a video… yet.
“ Beauty in things exists in the mind which contemplates them.”
Fig 2. This photo is not up for debate.
The video production industry is a diverse profession housing hundreds of jobs and skillsets. From the storyboarding and creative direction to the actors, camera crew, and editing suites. Regardless of the budget or ambitiousness of the project, there are multiple steps you must take to get to a final product. In my immediate experience, it’s always a high stress, high reward trade. Pinpointing the area most “beautiful” to me is challenging. As one of the directors here, we see the entire video creation process from start to finish, and the best way to describe what makes the process so enticing to me is comparing it to dominos, and I’m not talking pizza… although that’s one of the most beautiful things there is (Fig 2.).
Think about this: when you play with dominos, you carefully set them up one by one, creating these intricate and beautiful designs and pathways. Each of these is intrinsically entwined, and it only takes one domino to fall to create that stunning effect and reveal the entire design. What person would look away from that? Video, as you can imagine, is the same thing. For many, the harder someone works on a production, the more satisfaction there is to be had after pressing the “play button” or pushing over the first domino. Seeing art come together in one beautifully finished design is the captivating part we wish to share with the world. On a personal level, you could say we enjoy the process of setting up each “domino” almost as much as we like watching them fall. You feel me?
Fig. 3 (Rectangles)
But why? Why do people love watching those dominos fall? Why are we so addicted and connected to our screens adding our view to the millions of others who watched the same thing? Well, there are a lot of reasons as you could imagine, but maybe at a base level, you could contribute it to the rectangle! Fun fact, the rectangle is a shape that we all react warmly to, and it is the most effective shape in helping our brain configure images and information (Fig. 3). Think about it. The vast majority of things deemed beautiful or captivating come in a rectangular shape – from the canvas of the world’s most beautiful artwork and tall buildings to our TV screens and smartphones.
What we do know for sure is that our bodies are packed with neurons and transmitters, alongside the endocannabinoid system, which serves to regulate our chemical response to the emotions we feel. Pinpointing what makes beauty is next to impossible but what we do know is that the things we consider beautiful come from the Default Mode Network within our brains. It is an idling part of the brain which shuts down as we work but lights up when we relax and do things such as watching TV or viewing art.
This, however, is hard for a mathematician to accept. They need a number for everything… During the renaissance, they tried to come up with a way to calculate beauty using the Divine Proportion or better known as the golden ratio (Fig. 4) used to calculate functionality and aesthetics. To be fair, it has merit. You can see this 12 digit number worldwide: 1.61803398875 to explain our attraction to certain compositions in paintings, photos, and architecture. The reality is that it may be only a tiny piece to a much larger puzzle, and no amount of math can calculate the amount of pleasure one “unit of beauty” can have on every individual's senses. Nice try, DaVinci!
Fig. 4 (Golden Ratio)
With new technologies developing at a hyper-speed, we can get better and better through statistics and studies on measuring what is beautiful, based on peoples responses both emotional and physical… or more importantly for us living in a capitalist society, we like measuring beauty on its monetary value. Where certain aspects of beauty might align among groups in consensus it is still hard to pinpoint because culture is forever an unstopable train of change and certain aspects of beauty tied to our emotions and external influences change with it. For example, what we consider beautiful today is vastly different from 100 years ago. Nowadays, the color pink is associated with girls, but back in 1927, it was thought to be equally as much of a boy’s color. Think about the experiences you’ve had in your own life and how quickly fashion and style trends have changed.
So back to the beholder. Beauty is something they themselves create. No one owns it. It’s our job to create an effective message through these tiny rectangles using our knowledge of things like the golden ratio, our understanding of storytelling techniques, and a deep connection with our fellow man, all packaged in a box wrapped in pure passion and the chase to experiences and share those pleasures when that first domino is finally pushed over.
“Everything has beauty, but not everyone sees it.”
When we see something we enjoy, and that’s beautiful… it’s simply a positive experience, that once you catch an eye for it, it can be used to make a real tangible impact. Beauty might be in the eye of the beholder, but the right effort can ensure everyone sees your video as a thing of beauty. Creating something beautiful that keeps a beholder's attention connects with them and their immediate experiences. With video production, creating the right script, lighting, camera build, actors, location, wardrobe, music, etc... combining all of them gives you the best chance in eliciting a response from your audience. Whether it’s a video urging them to vote, buy a specific brand of toilet paper, accept an opposing opinion, be inspired to try something new, live a healthier lifestyle, or escape one's immediate reality.
Trusting in a production team that understands how video affects the beholder is crucial if you want your brand to stand out, just like trusting a doctor to prescribe you the right dosage of medication or a sommelier to present you the right wine for your dinner. Breaking down what makes beauty and how people will connect with it is imperative to making sure your message is fully consumed and enjoyed by the “beholders” in a world where the competition is fierce and the battleground to stand is out is ever-changing.
That’s why video is one of the most essential tools in marketing today. The beauty and art of the right video production can transform how users engage with a brand, and 92% of marketers now admit that video content makes up a significant portion of their marketing plans, and there is no signs of it slowing down. In 2021 experts say the average user will be watching over 100 minutes of online videos every day, and the competition to get those eyes and keep those eyes on the screen to communicate whatever the message is only getting tougher and the bar for what is beautiful when reaching a large audience or an audience in general only gets higher.