vivo joins hands with partners to recap their accomplishments in 2021, look ahead to plan for 2022, and continue conveying the “Joy of Humanity” with professional photography
vivo held the 2021 VISION+ Special press conference online, marking the resounding success of the 2021 VISION+ Project on 17 December 2021. At the press conference, vivo, together with partners including ZEISS, National Geographic, FIRST International Film Festival (“FIRST IFF”), and Three Shadows Photography Art Centre (“Three Shadows”), along with 38 creators, shared the achievements of the 2021 VISION+ Project in human-centric practice and behind-the-scenes stories. vivo invited the 38 worldwide creators for the 2022 journey to encourage more people to document, express, and share everyday life stories through images, and depict contemporary human-centric imaging.
“Inspiring more people to enjoy the fun of creation empowered by technologies is the human-centric vision and original aspiration of vivo, a brand with 400 million users globally,” said Yanchun Xu, Brand Communication General Manager of vivo. “This year marks the second year of VISION+. We are honored to build a platform that promotes professional mobile imaging to this level; we are able to do so with both our domestic and overseas partners, as well as around 70,000 worldwide creators. We have been able to explore the charm of imaging and depict the authentic portrait of life in 2021. In the future, vivo will continue to improve our notable technology towards human-centric professional photography and be committed to deepening the partnership with partners in the imaging industry to empower the ‘Create Together’ initiative.”
At the press conference, Elaine Xu, Head of Communication & PR ZEISS in Greater China, expressed her appreciation for all the creators participating in the VISION+, and acknowledged the successful cooperation with vivo, “The amazing results of VISION+ Project this year showed what is possible on smartphones photography …it motivated us to continue with providing consumers with more professional smartphone photography features.”
Recapping the VISION+ achievements in the past year and depicting the “Joy of Humanity” of the times with diversified images
As the long-term brand project was initiated by vivo in 2020, 2021 VISION+ Project took this opportunity to optimize based on the events held in 2020. In addition to the VISION+ Mobile PhotoAwards and VISION+ Short Short FilmAwards launched with National Geographic and FIRST IFF, the 2021 VISION+ also launched the VISION+ Academy in 10 cities. This was to comprehensively meet the public demand on image creation, motivating more people around the world to record the present moments and express their feelings with their smartphones.
The 2021 VISION+ Project successfully attracted around 70,000 creators from more than 40 countries and regions, and were able to collect 384,878 photos and 3,160 short short films. This fully interpreted the image creation value advocated by vivo – focusing on wonderful moments in our everyday lives. To comprehensively recap the accomplishments of the 2021 VISION+ Project and display these touching pieces to the public, vivo worked with Three Shadows to host the VISION+ Grand Exhibition (“Exhibition”). With the theme “Create Together, Our 2021”, the Exhibition linked creators’ thoughts on everyday life and present moments in 2021.
“These creators in different regions documented their surroundings throughout this unique year, showcasing their original scenes of everyday life, as well as the diversity and possibilities of images,” said RongRong, Curator of vivo VISION+ Grand Exhibition 2021 and Co-founder of Three Shadows. “It is a privilege for us to plan and host this exhibition together with vivo, bringing these excellent mobile imaging pieces from online to the physical exhibition, and to present the power and charm of mobile imaging to more people.”
Revealing the behind-the-scenes stories of smartphone photography, and feeling the passion of mobile imaging creation
VISION+ Mobile PhotoAwards 2021 and VISION+ Short Short FilmAwards 2021 presented diversity and inclusion. In terms of smartphone photography, the comprehensively upgraded competition format and jury line-up of VISION+ Mobile PhotoAwards 2021 inspired the creators to expand their creation dimensions. It therefore pushed the smartphone photography experience to a broader realm outside of the norm.
At the press conference, Quan Xiao, Portrait Photographer and Jury of VISION+ Mobile PhotoAwards 2021, explained the evaluation criteria of this session on behalf of the jury group, “The newly added ‘News-Events’ and ‘Documentary Project’ categories not only presented many photos with news features and humanistic care, but conveyed the deeper and wider humanistic spirit of the VISION+ Project. Currently, the aesthetic paradigm specific to smartphone photography is taking shape. We are very excited to take part in and exert influence on the current change of imaging culture together with vivo VISION+, and witness the features of the times depicted by more than 380,000 photos.”
The other five jury members also expressed their overall observations on the works collected in this session. Michael George, Photo Consultant, National Geographic, commented, “In this year’s VISION+ Mobile PhotoAwards, I have seen the new possibilities for mobile photography. It presents a unique perspective of motion pictures and builds up the perception on the diversity of this era, whether it’s the artistic expression or simply recording moments of daily life.” Documentary Photographer Martin Parr remarked, “The smartphone gives you a sense of anonymity whereby you can shoot much closer, and you effortlessly fit into the landscape.” Documentary Photographer Jonas Bendiksen was touched by the everyday reality that exuded from these works, “To me, it’s so important to preserve these small moments of the intimacy of family life and our own history.” Laura Serani, Photography Curator, Les Rencontres d’Arles, mentioned, “The value, ‘Create Together’, inspires people to file their everyday life into a huge archive.” Bertram Hoenlinger, ZEISS Expert for Photography, also recognized the value of VISION+ Mobile PhotoAwards, “The feedback from an international mobile phone photo competition like this also helps ZEISS and vivo a lot to understand mobile photographers better.”
In terms of short short films, there were a large number of extraordinary works solicited by VISION+ Short Short FilmAwards 2021, which focus on everyday life through avant-garde forms. “The 3,160 short short films received in this session further highlighted the new trend – portable photography devices and methods, distinctive perspectives, and more experimental creative approaches,” Wen SONG, Founder of FIRST IFF, said in his speech. “The ratio of short short films shot with smartphones increased by 148% in comparison to the last session. This fact demonstrates that the smartphone is seen as a lightweight tool for creativity that supports pushing the boundary of narratives. Currently, images have become an all-new visual-audio language that is used considerably more commonly. We hope the professional Short Short Film category can promote the practice and enhancement of the visual-audio language nationwide.”
As a sideline event, the Creator Forum was held during the press conference. Zhiyuan Xu (Writer and Special Guest of 2021 vivo VISION+ Project), Kiva Liu (Director of Short Short Film of the Year), Derrick Zhang (Category Winner of Open Group – Portrait of VISION+ Mobile PhotoAwards 2021), and Yiran An (Landscape Photographer and Imaging Expert of vivo) were invited to have in-depth discussions on topics based on their own creation experience and comprehension, such as “how images become a universal language” and “how smartphones reshape the relations between creation and viewing”.
Empowering more people to enjoy free creation in the new mobile imaging era
With the rapid evolution of technologies, professional mobile imaging has greatly lowered the barrier of image creation by ‘ordinary’ people, making creation convenient, efficient, and intimate anytime, anywhere. To encourage more smartphone users to join in in imaging creation, vivo always attaches great importance to the real needs of users. vivo is dedicated to building the finest human-centric professional photography system to provide users with an exceptional integrated imaging experience. With the VISION+ Project as an exchange platform, vivo strives to make the creation spirit and expression of everyday life fully respected and encouraged while performing its responsibility as a technology brand.
In the future, vivo will continue to collaborate with outstanding industrial partners like ZEISS to create ultimate human-centric professional photography products and push the boundary of human-centric creation practice. Our goal is to empower more people to experience the “Joy of Humanity” through mobile imaging creation. Next year, VISION+ will set out again with the next generation product developed in partnership with ZEISS, inviting creators worldwide to discover the beauty of life with imaging.