Sabrina Debrard

Dr. Kathleen Yancey

February 6, 2017
ENC5700
Triptych Plus Project: What is Composition Beyond Writing?
As I remember writing in my first triptych, I came into this class with a rather restricting
view of composition, only considering the formation of text and writing as valid applications to
the term. I immediately learned otherwise, realizing that almost everything created is composed,
and branched out to consider other mediums and modes of composition.
The first medium of composition I thought of outside of written word was music
(probably thanks to my orchestral background). There is an actual composer and a conductor,
both composers in different ways (one composes the music while the other composes the
performance). But then there are the actual performers whose ad libs are composed on the spot,
their process arguably different from the composer and conductorwhen the performer
composes and plays simultaneously, are they composing by ear or by muscle memory, or another
process entirely? I shifted then to thinking about several other mediums (such as video, images,
and webpages) before I began contemplating composition and storytelling in film.
What I immediately noticed about composition in film was the sheer amount of
composed elements that can go into the films creation. Other than the most obvious composition
of the movies story, there is the composition of the frame (guided by camera positioning
techniques), there is composition of the scene (guided by camera movement or lack thereof,
color, setting, lighting, characters, dialogue, music), ultimately leading to the films presentation
as a whole. Considering this meant that everyone that worked on a film was a composer in their
specific niche, working with other composers to convey meaning or inspire emotion or simply to
just tell the story. I wondered how they worked together and collaborated, and if the success of
conveying a films intended meaning depended on whether or not each composed element fit
together towards the larger whole.
To further examine this, I looked at Mad Max: Fury Road (2015). There was no way I
would be able to analyze all the composed pieces in the entire film so I focused on one specific
scene, which led me to understand that the multimodal aspects of each frame, cut, and overall
scenery contributed to the context I received by watching the clip. The scene combined directing,
acting, CGI, music, filming technique, color editing, and screenwriting (as well as several other
elements that I probably am just unable to identify), with each element likely composed by a
different person or even another team of people. The summation of these compositional elements
not only worked to tell or show the story within the film, but oriented my attention towards what
was important in the film.
Through these two portions of my project, I learned that composition can easily be a
widely collaborative effort despite having several separate elements. Film composition almost
feels like a matryoshka doll, where the whole doll is visibly apparent to me as a whole, but once
I look past the first layer Im confronted with smaller and smaller dolls. I was intrigued by each
composers process after breaking this idea down into its smaller contributions, but hearing class
discussion about other means of composition broadened my boundaries even further. My peers
talked about composing through knitting and crocheting (I hadnt even considered these
methods) and I was even more interested about composing through prosecution and criminology
that some other classmates also touched on. Each of these frameworks of composition seemed to
have multimodal elements as well, which is a theme I think I can add to my own working
definition of composition.
The third portion of my triptych project required me to go back and review a CCCs
chairs address, of which I selected Dr. Keith Gilyards December 2000 address, Literacy,
Identity, Imagination, Flight. I selected this piece because I had read it before and didnt quite
grasp his point, and while I feel like through the multiple subsequent readings I completed I do
understand what he represents as composition now, I find it difficult to relate his address to the
nuances of film composition. A main focus of film composition, like I have discussed, is
multimodality and layers, but Gilyard mostly considers identity and inclusion as key focuses. At
first I thought this address might relate to the overall feminist message of Mad Max: Fury Road,
but Gilyard touches more on the language and discourse of speech and its impact on what is
included in community conversation and what is excluded.
I do think that Gilyards emphasis on inclusion and identity applies to film composition
as a whole though, and I am curious as to how the elements of composing in film can include and
exclude certain social groups, political ideas, and overall interpretations of the story. I wonder
how we as an audience are manipulated by the discourse of films visual rhetoric into
understanding a specific view of the story while discouraged from identifying with an opposing
view of the story.
Overall I learned that composition is definitely not just writing, although it is often
presented in this way in schools and in media. I learned that film composition specifically is
often intensely multimodal, and requires a team of individuals (and smaller teams within that
team) to create the elements needed for an understanding of the story being presented both
visually and audially. I learned that nearly everything created is composed, and that this includes
any verbal composition or argument, musical composition, or fabric composition. I noted that
what is chosen to be composed says a lot about what groups and ideas are included in public
discussion and what groups are excluded, and that often the tools we use to express our
compositions can alter interpretations (i.e. using words versus using pictures). Through this
project, we learn that composition is a daily process that differs across every mode and medium,
and that the summation and completion of this process creates what we encounter in day to day
life across all spans of interaction and communication.