The conference Film as a Method in the Life Sciences: Interdisciplinary Encounters focuses on the use of film as a research method within the life sciences. Film enables the registration and measurement of movement, growth, and transformation — phenomena that reveal their structure only over time. As a dynamic analytical tool, it allows for the observation of processes, the study of form and function, and the comparison of temporal patterns in living systems.

At the same time, the filmic method opens a field of interpretation. The act of framing, sequencing, and temporal composition shapes how knowledge is produced and how meaning is formed. The conference invites contributions that explore the methodological, aesthetic, cultural, and philosophical dimensions of film in scientific practice — its potential to generate insight, build understanding, and connect empirical observation with the construction of meaning.

The conference aims to create a platform for encounters between researchers who use film within the life sciences and scholars who analyse scientific imaging from the perspective of visual and cultural studies. We welcome contributions from biology, ecology, forestry, medicine, and other fields in which film serves as a tool of observation and analysis, as well as from anthropology, visual culture studies, and film and media studies. By bringing these perspectives together, the event seeks to foster dialogue across disciplinary boundaries and to reflect on the diverse ways in which film operates as both a scientific instrument and a cultural form.

The conference will be held under the honorary patronage of prof. dr hab. Michał Jerzy Zasada, Rector of WULS (SGGW), and dr. hab. Roman Wójcik, prof. WULS (SGGW), Director of the Institute of Forest Sciences, WULS (SGGW)