We'd like to extend a hearty congratulations to Patrick Brodie - former organizing member with the GEM Lab - and his co-author Patrick Bresnihan on the publication of their new book From the Bog to the Cloud: Dependency and Eco-Modernity in Ireland (Bristol UP, 2025). You can order the book here ! About the book: The green digital transition is underway. But what does this transition look like when dictated by the energy and resource demands of monopoly tech? How has this si

//Tuesday, November 25th //5:30 PM //GEM Lab //FB 630.15 This talk explores how archival research can evolve into cinematic storytelling. Taking Roberto Rossellini – Più di una vita (B&B Film, 2025) as a case study, Margherita Moro reflects on the transition from archival investigation to film creation, drawing on her work within Renzo Rossellini’s private archive, which contains thousands of documents and previously unseen 16mm reels. The talk examines how archives can shif

Presented by The Platform Lab, GEM Lab, & Raah Lab //Friday, November 7th //4:00-5:30 PM //Raah Lab //FB 630.17 Telecom companies advertise their services of download speeds and seamless streaming as “unlimited,” but studying the distribution backends of mobile media infrastructures reveal that telcos tend to often brush up against “limits” that involve resolving storage and bandwidth bottlenecks. In my forthcoming book,  Unlimited: Aspirational Politics and Mobile Media Dist

For the Film and Moving Image Studies Ph.D. Community at Concordia: The GEM Lab will be hosting a GEM Spring Symposium at the end of February 2026. This year we invite proposals from students at the advanced stages of their PhD research to share their work and receive feedback. Preference will be given to proposals that resonate with the GEM Lab’s commitment to the critical study of global new media. Proposals of no more than 300 words should be submitted by December 15th. Pr

A GEM Lab screening of artists’ films and videos set across and beyond Hong Kong, Indonesia, South Korea //Monday, Nov. 10th //Doors @ 6:30 //Screening @ 7:00 //Bar @ 8:30 //Cinema Moderne //5150 St. Laurent Blvd. Space is limited and tickets are required Reserve your seat here . Films and videos by Aslan Goisum, Ayoung Kim, Riar Rizaldi, Tiffany Sia, The Propeller Group and Superflex Organized by the GEM Lab, this screening brings together artists’ films and videos set acro

//Tuesday, Nov. 4th //5:30 PM //GEM Lab //1250 rue Guy, FB 630.15 The 2021 ‘Metaverse moment’ cast the game engine as a speculative...

A Works-in-Progress talk with Nicholas Avedisian-Cohen and Anna Sidun //Thursday, Oct. 23rd //6:00 PM //GEM Lab //FB 630.15 This case...

//Thursday Oct. 30th //5:30 PM //GEM Lab //FB 630.15 Abstract: Taking my lead from Henri Lefebvre’s contention (1974) that film, like...

// September 22, 2025 //5:30-7:30 PM //GEM Lab //FB 630.15 Contemporary art and media art do not exist in separate worlds. In 20th...

This article is the first in the series about basic sound, specifically microphones. We'll cover pickup patterns, mic types and their uses.

This article discusses an approach to shooting documentary material, specifically in how you think about what you shoot when on location and how to give yourself the most possibilities in the edit.

This is a follow up to Shooting for the Sequence, where we discuss shot and sequence continuity (rather than conventional continuity which is focused on art direction and blocking in narrative films.) Serving to point out what rules you should follow to improve your documentary shoots.

This article focuses on simple techniques for Handheld cinematography; how best to hold the camera and move to produce smooth results.

This article provides a more in depth (but still beginner friendly) discussion of "Depth of Field", the range of distance rendered in focus by your camera. It discusses the various ways it is controlled outside of just adjusting your Aperture.

This article discusses ISO, or sensor sensitivity, the third member of the "Triad of Exposure. It also discusses noise in video, the primary bi-product of ISO adjustments.

"Tokyo Train Platform, with multiple white balances" Tea L I find that White Balance is often a concept that is a bit confusing to...

This is an overview of Shutter Speed, one of the primary ways we control exposure in cameras and part of the "Triad of Exposure." This also discusses motion blur, the bi-product of shutter speed adjustments.

This article explores Aperture, one of the basic controls for exposure and part of the "Triad of Exposure" the three principal controls you use to manage exposure when operating a camera. This also discusses "Depth of Field" which is the primary bi-product of Aperture adjustments.

This is the "cheat sheet" quick reference for some best practices when it comes to preparing for a video shoot and taking on the video shoot itself.

Welcome to the technician's blog here at the GEM Lab. This post features information about the tutorial series of posts in general as well as an organized index of those posts.