Technology and Scenography in Film and Television: Crafting Visual Worlds

Dear Colleagues,

Production design in film and television has been developing steadily as a critical field in the last decade, forming a significant cultural contribution to media production studies. This Special Issue of Arts is interested in contributions that take a scenographic approach to unpick and illuminate the relationships between production design (and related disciplines) and technologies of screen production. 

Scenography is an approach that emerged in mid-century European theatre as a way of understanding the contributions of the performance, design and technical elements and how they contribute to the overall aesthetic experience of theatrical production. Film and television are, by their very nature, technological aesthetic forms, but they are rarely understood through the lens of scenography because of industrial practices that separate the vast array of production responsibilities in their organization. The finished qualities of film and television production design are marketed and simplified into the single, understandable authorship of directors and producers. If aspects of design and technology emerge from a production as being of particular note or spectacle, then they are often promoted as anonymous elements of “movie magic” or “technical wizardry”.  

Virtual production studios and their enhancements of computer-assisted design appear to be radically altering the shape of screen industries, upsetting the balance of working practices in pre- and post-production, and making the production design and technical spectacle of production become very visible. Like any disruptive technological emergence, however, this might not be so much of a revolution as it is an evolution as new technologies uncover and rediscover older working practices and relationships. We are at an interesting moment of production studies in film and television. This call for papers reflects that moment and is interested in contributions that expand the field of production design studies or production studies in technology for film and television. 

It seeks to understand current industrial practices and workflows using scenography to understand their aesthetic impact. It welcomes contributions made in collaboration with practitioners, production designers or other industrial partners as well as practice research or research co-authored with production specialists, producers, and makers. Production design is broadly understood here to encompass costume, props, visual and special effects and their scenographic relationships with production technologies. 

We welcome proposals that explore, but are not limited to, the following themes: 

• Production design and virtual production. 
• Production design, animation and post-cinematic aesthetics. 
• Chromakey extensions, technologies and their production design affordances. 
• Historical technologies and their contemporary contributions to production design. 
• New cinematographic practices in contemporary production. 
• Practical, digital, and hybridized special or visual effects. 

We request that, prior to submitting a manuscript, interested authors initially submit a proposed title and an abstract of 200 words summarizing their intended contribution. Please send it to the Guest Editor, Dr. Geraint D’Arcy (g.darcy@uea.ac.uk), or to /Arts/ editorial office (arts@mdpi.com). Abstracts will be reviewed by the Guest Editor for the purposes of ensuring proper fit within the scope of the Special Issue. Full manuscripts will undergo double-blind peer-review. 

I look forward to receiving your contributions.

Dr. Geraint D'Arcy
Guest Editor

Manuscript Submission Information

Manuscripts should be submitted online at www.mdpi.com by registering and logging in to this website. Once you are registered, click here to go to the submission form. Manuscripts can be submitted until the deadline. All submissions that pass pre-check are peer-reviewed. Accepted papers will be published continuously in the journal (as soon as accepted) and will be listed together on the special issue website. Research articles, review articles as well as short communications are invited. For planned papers, a title and short abstract (about 100 words) can be sent to the Editorial Office for announcement on this website.

Submitted manuscripts should not have been published previously, nor be under consideration for publication elsewhere (except conference proceedings papers). All manuscripts are thoroughly refereed through a double-blind peer-review process. A guide for authors and other relevant information for submission of manuscripts is available on the Instructions for Authors page. Arts is an international peer-reviewed open access semimonthly journal published by MDPI.

Please visit the Instructions for Authors page before submitting a manuscript. The Article Processing Charge (APC) for publication in this open access journal is 1400 CHF (Swiss Francs). Submitted papers should be well formatted and use good English. Authors may use MDPI's English editing service prior to publication or during author revisions.

• production design
• film design
• television design
• production technologies
• aesthetics
• virtual production