This video very neatly explains the history of text in film

Considering we spend our lives immersed in tech, it’s pretty weird that filmmakers have found it so difficult to convincingly represent text messages on screen without breaking the action. There have however been a couple of breakthroughs in recent years, most notably thanks to shows like Sherlock and House of Cards.

This video, the latest in a series called Every Frame a Painting by Tony Zhou, takes a look at how that change has come about. The real change, he reckons, hasn’t been in the available technology, but the way directors think about design.

Now we’ve got text messages cracked though, we still need to figure out how best to represent the web and the internet as a whole.

A Brief Look at Texting and the Internet in Film from Tony Zhou on Vimeo.