academic teaching staff, a parttime resident film-making fellow who handles most of the boot-camp training, two research fellows (one supported by the AHRC, the other by the RCUK), a fulltime AV technician and an intern supported by the Higher Education Academy who acts as the Film Resources Officer. This involves looking after the film lending library of 2000+ titles and developing an archive of the material that the Centre itself has produced about the city of Manchester. The Film Officer is also working on a collection of ‘Masterworks of Ethnographic Cinema’ that we are building up with the aid of a grant from the Granada Foundation. This is now the only part of Granada that continues to support the Centre. The funding that we received from Granada Television ended two years ago, but for many years its contribution, though much valued, had been far outweighed by funding from within the University anyway. We have retained the name because it has become an important part
EIDOS is a new research unit within the
of our own ‘brand’. Ironically, now that the television company has completely dismantled
Granada Centre. The original Greek
its documentary department,we remain the only entity bearing the Granada name that is
term combines the notions of ‘sight’ and‘idea’, but here it is an acronym
still making documentary films.
standing for ‘Ethnography, Images,
But none of this would have been possible had it not been for the University Media
Documents, Objects, Sounds, Senses’.
Centre. Under successive heads – the redoubtable Bert Curtis, then Eddie Poole and
EIDOS houses the Masterworks film
now Linda Turnbull – the support that we have received over 20 years has been immense.
collection funded by the Granada Foundation, which aims to complement with research collections of ethnographic photography and sound
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The Granada Centre has always provided its own cameras. Currently we are still using the Sony PD170 though we will shortly be upgrading to an HD model. But we have always relied on the Media Centre for post-production facilities. These presently consist
recordings. But more important than
of ten off-line suites equipped with Avid Media Composer 3 and a shareware system
these resources are the research
linked to two on-line edit suites. The Centre also offers copying, standards transfer and
projects supported by EIDOS. Projects by Granada Centre staff include the creation of a soundscape at the world
DVD authoring facilities to our students. Staff of the Centre provide training during the year and an on-line ‘polishing’of graduation
heritage site of Luang Prabang in
projects. This has enabled our students to achieve an impressively high level of technical
Cambodia, a film about land
quality and is undoubtedly one of the main reasons that our films have been accepted
demarcation of a black community in
at festivals all around the world. The Media Centre has also enabled us to achieve a very
northeast Brazil and a major study of
high level of productivity. Over a two-month period between August and September,
the work of French filmmaker Jean
twelve thirty-minute documentaries emerge through fifteen days off-line, two to three
Rouch. But EIDOS also welcomes
days on-line and one to two days sound mix. This is no mean achievement.
selffunding. Fellows to work with our facilities and those of the Media Centre,
Last but not least, the Media Centre provides us with graphic design support to produce
contributing to a broad ‘conversation’
posters, maps, DVD covers. To celebrate our 20th birthday, it gave our ‘eye’ logo a
about the role of film and other sensory
make-over,making it twinkle. Appropriately, because, or so it seems to me, those twenty
media in anthropology. Current fellows are working on such diverse topics as AIDS and the consciousness of mortality in Uganda, charismatic healing churches in Botswana, birthing in NorthWest England and editing practices in ethnographic film-making.
years and all that activity – over 250 students, perhaps 800 film projects – have all gone in the proverbial twinkling. Paul Henley Professor of Visual Anthropology paul.henley@manchester.ac.uk http://tinyurl.com/cjmggm