- I've chosen the Office Olympics sketch, for a number of reasons: a) I've worked in offices b) I've never been in a job where an environment specific game wasn't invented - for example, I once worked in a warehouse with a 9-hole golf course (plank of wood for a club and a roll of parcel tape as a ball) c) I'm intrigued by the potential to subvert the relationship between what's seen and heard d) the tragic pathos of the necessity to imagine such elaborate scenarios - in order to survive a day in work - to me, is fundamentally English humour. Bittersweet I think you'd call it - the best example I can remember was from my time a postman, where another, older postie was actually writing a pantomime, populated by characters from the delivery office - bosses as baddies, etc. He would occasionally produce a crumpled hand-written manuscript and earnestly recite scenes - which I found both endearingly inspirational and tragically pathetic, in equal measure. Essentially, it's that I consider imagination to be both the curse and the redemption of the office worker.
Therefore, this is the tone I have chosen to adopt.
A particular contextual influence is the British artist David Shrigley, whose work I have always appreciated. And someone who's work absolutely represents all the tragedy any pathos of modern living - in a funny, abstract, ridiculous way. Also, having looked again at the animation work from his illustrations, I think this minimal style (both in terms of complexity of image and movement) suits the dry, slightly geeky intellectual humour of the sketch. Below is my favourite: The Door.
CHARACTER DESIGN I want a simple visual style, with a grayscale colour pallete but with characters bolder than the background - as presented here, characters black with white detail.
After much deliberation I have decided that instead of producing a limited storyboard/moodboard & treatment, I'll get my office man to do an audition pitch to the BBC...
- In terms of Cardiff's practice, I am particularly interested in an intention of the video walks (although it could be said of the majority of Cardiff's work) that she describes as the "strange disjunction for the viewer about what is real". In essence, this disjunction arises from being presented with an apparently normal situation that the artist subverts, with varying degrees of extremity and theatricality. For example, the audio walks are mostly recorded directly in the exact same location as the participant is asked to walk, therefore the differences will be subtle, depending on the intensity of place, but nonetheless unsettling - traffic noise is traffic noise, but if it doesn't match what you see...
At this point I'm thinking about strands of influence from Cardiff: - Robotic automation (The Killing Machine) - Generation of sound through automation - Automation as communication of organic process (Pianorama) - Strange disjunction (see above)
My response will be a combination of these and a simple, more traditional, less abstracted narrative...
MECHANICAL INSTRUMENTATION - MUSICBOX
HAND-CRANK DEFYING CONTEXT | MODEL T FORD At this point I'm toying with the concept of creating a functioning Musicbox housed in an unusual way - bringing a mis-scaled Model T Ford to an unlikely setting in the present as an automated hand-cranked Musicbox...
MUZAKBOX An incredible object that plays unbearably inane music. I'll come back to this.
KINETICS Besides focusing on physical automated action, I'm also interested in the kinetic forces that instigate automation. Like labour and reward if you like; it takes effort to blow up a balloon or it takes effort to wind a music box, and the effort it takes to wind-up an old tin robot is massively disproportionate to the feats it then performs!
AUTOMATA
ATOMIC ERA TIN ROBOTS
COLD WAR -
GODZILLA -
MIGHTY ROBOT Taking all of these into consideration I began mind-mapping and developed the idea of a mighty robot who finds himself defunct, stripped of his power and forgotten.
SKETCHBOOK PAGES
MIGHTY ROBOT | DESIGN
MIGHTY ROBOT | STATIC
MIGHTY ROBOT | COMPOSITE As above, I intend to composite Mighty Robot into separately photographed and composited scenes. Bringing Mighty Robot into a stark, hyper-real, contemporary world.
- PART ONE // RESEARCH - Janet Cardiff (born 15/03/1957 in Brussels, Ontario) is a Canadian installation artist who works in collaboration with her partner George Bures Miller. Cardiff and Miller are internationally renowned for their immersive installations, involving film, objects and sound. Their elaborate environments draw the viewer into captivating fictional worlds. - Cardiff + Miller ........................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................... THE KILLING MACHINE | 2007 Partly inspired by Franz Kafka's 'In the Penal Colony' and partly by the American system of capital punishment as well as the current political situation, the piece is an ironic approach to killing and torture machines. A moving megaphone speaker encircles an electric dental chair. The chair is covered in pink fun fur with leather straps and spikes. In the installation are two robotic arms that hover and move- sometimes like a ballet, and sometimes attacking the invisible prisoner in the chair with pneumonic pistons. A disco ball turns above the mechanism reflecting an array of coloured lights while a guitar hit by a robotic wand wails and a wall of old TV’s turns on and off creating an eerie glow. In our culture right now there is a strange deliberate and indifferent approach to killing. I think that our interest in creating this piece comes from a response to that.more... ........................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................... PIANORAMA | 2005
An old fashioned upright piano sits in the middle of the space. There are two small loudspeakers on top of it. A mechanical device (which plays the piano), sits on top of the keys. Out of one loudspeaker comes Janet’s voice and out of the other comes George’s. These voices are discussing what type of music might be appropriate for what seems to be a film they are planning.
Pianorama audio excerpt ........................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................... PARADISE INSTITUTE | 2001
With this work, originally produced for the Canadian Pavilion at the Venice Biennale, Cardiff and Miller focus on the language and experience of cinema. Viewers approach a simple plywood pavilion, mount a set of stairs, and enter a lush, dimly lit interior complete with red carpet and two rows of velvet-covered seats. Once seated, they peer over the balcony onto a miniature replica of a grand old movie theatre created with hyper-perspective. This is the first in a series of illusions orchestrated by Cardiff and Miller. Viewers then put on the headphones provided and the projection begins.
At least two stories run simultaneously. There is the “visual film” and its accompanying soundtrack that unfolds before the viewers; layered over this is the “aural action” of a supposed audience. The film is a mix of genres: it is part noir, part thriller, part sci-fi, and part experimental. What is more particular about the installation is the personal binaural “surround sound” that every individual in the audience experiences through the headphones. The sense of isolation each might feel is broken by intrusions seemingly coming from inside the theatre. A cellphone belonging to a member of the audience rings. A close “female friend” whispers intimately in your ear: “Did you check the stove before we left?” Fiction and reality become intermingled as absorption in the film is suspended and other realities flow in.
........................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................... AUDIO WALKS - The format of the audio walks is similar to that of an audioguide. You are given a CD player or iPod and told to stand or sit in a particular spot and press play. On the CD you hear my voice giving directions, like “turn left here” or “go through this gateway”, layered on a background of sounds: the sound of my footsteps, traffic, birds, and miscellaneous sound effects that have been pre-recorded on the same site as they are being heard. This is the important part of the recording. The virtual recorded soundscape has to mimic the real physical one in order to create a new world as a seamless combination of the two. My voice gives directions but also relates thoughts and narrative elements, which instills in the listener a desire to continue and finish the walk.
All of my walks are recorded in binaural audio with multi-layers of sound effects, music, and voices (sometimes as many as 18 tracks) added to the main walking track to create a 3D sphere of sound. Binaural audio is a technique that uses miniature microphones placed in the ears of a person. The result is an incredibly lifelike 3D reproduction of sound. Played back on a headset, it is almost as if the recorded events were taking place live.
VIDEO WALKS - A video walk is similar to an audio walk but functions quite differently because of the visuals. With a video walk the participants receive a small digital video camera with headphones. The tape that they watch has been previously recorded on the site with a professional camera and binaural microphones following the route, which has been prepared with actors and props. Then there is an extensive editing process using the acted scenes, sound effects, and video effects to create a continuous motion. The audience follows this prerecorded film on the camera. The architecture in the video stays the same as the physical world, but the people and their actions change, so there is a strange disjunction for the viewer about what is real.
GHOST MACHINE | 2005 The theatre was built in 1907 by Oskar Kaufmann and is a beautiful, intimate, old-fashioned place, with a maze of staircases and backrooms that normally a theater audience wouldn’t be able to access. We decided to do a video walk using these spaces. One of the main elements of the story involved taking the participant up winding stairs and encountering a room covered in plastic as a parallel to a woman’s journey to visit a man in an apartment. As in most of the walks, the narrative is not clear but there are hints that the man is hiding in the theater attic. In one scene, he gets arrested by police in historical costumes. The final scene is on the stage where, when you turn and see a whole audience watching, you realize that all along you have been part of a play. more... ........................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................... EXTENDED CONTEXTUAL RESEARCH | BEYOND JANET CARDIFF - FELIX'S MACHINES | FELIX THORN A very good show at Gasworks gallery, south London. Ends 18.01.09 When connected to a computer, Felix’s Machines translate Thorn's compositions into mechanical actions performed by customised drums and piano parts and animated by solenoids, springs and motors. In this way, an electronic means of production is transposed into an acoustic output.
JENNIFER KOSHBIN | MUSIC BOOKS An artist who places music boxes in old books, with the simple instruction: Place ear to book, turn crank and listen. Gabriel - thanks for the "thought you might like..."
DALI | RAINY CADILLAC Insert a Euro and it rains inside the car! Classic Dali. ........................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................... - PART TWO // RESPONSE - SEE MIGHTY ROBOT ENTRY
Originally on my shortlist for the Type & Motion project, I felt that this piece would better suit character animation - which is the plan. 3D animation with entirely CG, sparse environments, thick with nightmarish atmosphere, a post-apocalyptic world where everyone has literally just vanished - leaving the small child completely alone - deserted streets, empty cafés, graveyards that stretch as far as the eye can see - entirely B+W or heavily desaturated, almost to the point of no colour. In essence, a fairly unabstracted illustration of the central character's morbid journey into the tragic unknown (whilst drawing on the long established conventions of children's stories in book form, animation and film).
CHARACTER DESIGN - My first thoughts on character are to create an unequivocally tragic and sympathetic small boy - clothed in some kind of fancy dress... I think this comes from a character in the Harmony Korine film Gummo, who ghosts unscathed, through the extremely brutal Ohio town of the films setting. He has an untouchable, ethereal, serene manner, an absolute contradiction to every other exaggerated, violent, inpulsive inhabitant.
Another reference from the darker recesses is the famous children's book (my personal favourite as a little boy) Where the Wild Things Are by Maurice Sendak, about the imaginary adventures of a young boy named Max, who is punished for "making mischief" by being sent to his room without supper. Max wears a distinctive wolf suit during his adventures and encounters various mythical creatures, the wild things.
Bearing these influences in mind I wanted to dress the little boy in a costume that somehow reflected his circumstances and environment, playing up the tragedy, but still retaining a sense of innocence and playfulness...
I was just in a charity shop on Clapham High Street and in a bargain bin by the counter was a child's halloween costume - a skeleton suit! Perfect - macabre but silly, innocent and playful!
SKETCH BOOK
STORYBOARDING After transcribing the audio I began plotting the visuals, in particular looking illustrating the most potent descriptive words (usually at the end of a line) and the on-screen timing.
Love Is the Devil: Study for a Portrait of Francis Bacon
Velasquez Pope Innocent X
Francis Bacon Pope
Still from Battleship Potemkin
From Mybridge's Animal Locomotion series
Mind-mapping & notes
My initial idea is to communicate the drama, pain, franetic passion and anguish that embodies Bacon's work using a rapid editing technique - but this proved difficult because of the languidness of both Bacon and David Sylvester...
FIRST ATTEMPT
As a result of this experiment I feel that this approach is unsuitable for this piece of audio. The languidness of the audio is too disparate from the visual style I think essentially represents Bacon's creative process... I think too that the incorporation of type on-screen is unnecessary and is not only a distraction but a hindrance. On reflection I think a remix of the audio is needed with the addition of a dramatic score, to which the visuals can be edited. So, sound first, then picture. The other visual theme that I'm mindful of is that of a crime scene - flash images in the dark exposing unimaginable horror, degradation and promiscuity. The only contextual reference I can think of is the title sequence of the original The Texas Chainsaw Massacre - see it here.
- DIGITAL DIALOGUES "...design a motion graphic sequence as a visual accompaniment to a piece of audio using typography. It is important to explore personal visual languages that are in synthesis with the context and meaning in the audio sample"
My process for this project involved first sourcing appropriate audio, with specific parameters and criteria: > audio with no definitive existing context/visuals > must be live - have spontaneity + energy > pace (either fast or contrastingly fluctuating) > simple and descriptive ........................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................... Here are a selection of the pieces I shortlisted:
SPEED AUCTIONEER
I was very interested in exploring exactly how this largely indeciferable dialogue could be communicated visually and how the subject of the auction could be a source of visual reference.
This is actually a scene from the Werner Herzog film Stroszek, but the auctioneer is a genuine auctioneer (not an actor). More bizarrely, (and something I didn't know when I selected it) this clip appears in the Anton Corbijn film Control with Ian Curtis watching Stroszek on television just before hanging himself... This is what I mean by being free of existing context - the overwhelmingly raw connotations attached to this audio far outweigh anything I could produce. And sometimes, as is my belief, what we know as motion graphics, should not be applied in certain contexts, either because it is simply not needed, or worse (unless handled with extreme sensitivity and skill) that it will trivialise its subject and cause offence. Tread carefully then...
I also discovered that the motion graphics house MK12 had already produced a visual response to a speed auctioneer. Not to say that this is the only way to represent the auction - I'll explore further and experiment with this in the future.
MK12 | AUCTIONHAUS
........................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................... AREA 51 | RADIO CALL-IN
A very interesting piece - truth, hoax or fiction? Particularly like the contrast between the calm, smooth, in control DJ and the frantic, fear fueled nervousness of the mystery caller. It'd be interesting also to explore the deeper contrasts between their a) environments (where is the caller calling from?) and b) circumstances (current and future)... A lot to delve into and the subject being an extremely rich source of imagery, this is something I'll definitely come back to... ........................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................... MY CHOSEN AUDIO SAMPLE > 1937 KENTUCKY DERBY
Through wanting to explore the relationship between how fast we decipher spoken language and how fast we read, I chose to illustrate/animate every word of dialogue. Or to establish this and disrupt the technique at chosen moments - replacing/ complimenting/subverting the written word with graphic language.
VISUAL STYLE In order to attempt synthesis of audio and visual language, I plan on adopting a consistent, simple, bold graphic aesthetic. With visual energy and vibrancy generated by an animated motion tracking camera that reveals the the text as it it heard, whilst navigating through 3D space on a linear journey. Due to the rapid oral delivery, I concluded that adopting a more complex visual style would only over saturate and overwhelm a viewer.
WHERE IS KENTUCKY?
NOMINATION | IT'S A BEAUTIFUL DAY Simple, bold, direct graphic language.
COLOUR PALETTE To support the bold, simple approach: Primary colours and Black only. Originally I was considering using only the red, white and blue of the Stars & Stripes, but I decided this was unnecessarily limiting and a bit too "on the nose".
FONT SELECTION | SHORTLIST I then began sourcing an appropriate font for use throughout. I felt that as in the audio only the voice of the commentator is heard, I need use only one font. Something that was bold enough to represent the oral delivery (caps, without question), but also robust and legible enough to be read quickly whilst in motion. Also one that subtly referenced the era and location.
After brief motion tests I decided on the fourth from top (Blackoak Std) - considering it an acceptable combination of the requirements: Bold, legible, with a hint of period Americana (without descending into pastiche or stereotype).
A nice poster circa 1937 * * I came across this after I'd selected the font - definitely pleased with the similarity between Blackoak Std and the block font used at the foot of this poster! NOTE TO SELF: Don't always rely solely on instinct and abstract recollection - thorough contextualisation at ALL times!
EADWEARD MUYBRIDGE | MOTION CAPTURE I chose to animate the Muybridge horse sequences as a visual reference to the era - even though the Muybridge images considerably pre-date 1937, the aesthetic quality is consistent with 1930s newsreel, and also as an aesthetic counter to the modern animation technique I will adopt. Also, significantly the horse motion sequences were the first that Muybridge attempted, the purpose being to settle the popularly-debated (and like a horse-race; heavily bet upon) question of the day: whether all four of a horse's hooves left the ground at the same time during a gallop - known at the time as "unsupported transit".
SUBTLE SUBVERSION | RE-INTERPRETATION | MULTIPLE MEANING Sporadic suggestions of alternative interpretations.
"HEADED BY" IAN CALLAGHAN For example, the commentary goes: "the field is headed by number one, War Admiral..." In terms of word association, my instant visualisation was that of a footballer heading a football - not a horse approaching the stalls... And not just any footballer either - but Ian Callaghan from the all conquering Liverpool team of the late 1970s...?
"WAR ADMIRAL" HORATIO NELSON Also something to have fun with are the horse's names. The most frequently mentioned in the commentary is the pre-race favourite and leader from the start: War Admiral.
CONTEXTUAL VISUAL RESEARCH
........................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................... GO ON, HAVE A GO!!! With (most of) the above as reference, I decided to jump in and have a go. Having never previously used my chosen technique of visualising every word, in time with the audio, experimentation was always going to play a part. Also, I decided not to stop and plot the motion tracking (as a chart, motion web or more traditional storyboard), as I'd prefer to take a spontaneous approach, responding to the energy of the audio very much in the moment, allowing it to influence the motion - in a way, similar to the delivery of commentary on a live horse-race: intensity and variation dictated by the race itself! ........................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................... SO - MY FIRST ATTEMPT - 40 SECONDS OF KENTUCKY DERBY | TYPE & MOTION
........................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................... ON REFLECTION - Contextual peer-group feedback didn't raise any suggestions for improvement or deconstructive observation - disappointing! Although I must concede that such a bold, simple approach, that responds to the audio largely literally, is difficult to analyse - it probably either succeeds or it fails. I'm happy with it and found the process extremely satisfying. Learnt a lot and enjoyed it!
