Sources:
https://www.theguardian.com/artanddesign/2017/mar/03/gustav-metzger-obituary https://youtu.be/5ioYs20rnL8
auto-destructive art stands witness to society’s capacity to engineer its own downfall through development of the weaponry of mass destruction, the action of the capitalist system and damage to natural ecologies.
Dominic Harris https://vimeo.com/372602525
living artworks
Catharsis
An exhibition I visited today at Serpentine Gallery Kensington Gardens, Catharsis is an immersive simulation using a 3D simulator on Unreal Engine to create a digital landscape. The installation is set outdoors, at the back of the gallery where it seamlessly camouflages into the wildlife of the gardens. Made by Jakob Kudsk Steensen, who based the work off his own love for nature, re-creating his experiences surrounded by forests, the exhibition uses 3D textures which he gathered from a variety of these forests in North America to create a huge landscape, merging the forests together. Paired with audio from Matt McCorkle, Catharsis is said to immerse the viewer in a tranquil state but unfortunately, I did not realise personal headphones we're needed to listen to the installation live. While at the gallery I learned that Catjaris is a sequel to Steensen's The Deep Listener (2019), an extraordinary app that takes users on a journey around the gardens, incorporating AI to build up a story of creatures found into London using technology from Google Arts and Culture. The smoothness between transitions in this piece helps create such a natural atmosphere between the viewer and the screen, truely immersing them into the space of the forest. I myself watched the full.playthrough of Catharsis 3 times in total because I couldn't take my eyes off its beauty in accuracy and realism, created through the lighting and shadow techniques used within the three-dimensional film, maintaining a tranquil and calming environment bringing the viewer into the natural environment.
Catharsis is part of the #ConnectBTS movement - a global art project that introduces the audience of Korean pop stars BTS to the artist's passion for art and design through 5 exhibitions consisting of work from 22 artists.
Catharsis Livestream: https://www.serpentinegalleries.org/exhibitions-events/jakob-kudsk-steensen-catharsis
Inspiration - 3D rendering
After being inspired by the techniques Jakob used to approach his work, I began looking into bah blah and came across a program I recently found out about due to its increase in trend and popularity amongst young designers, including those on our course - Cinema 4D. This is a software suite developed by the MAXON Computer GmbH in Germany that allows its users to create beautifully polished rendered animations in a stable and understandable interface.
Smoke experiment by Gleb Kuznetsov
A digital experience designer for Milkinside, an agency based in Silicon Valley San Franciso specify in the future of design and technology, Gleb Kuznetsov creates streamline simulations through his 3D render practice and AR work. The piece above first caught my eye due to the soft gradient colours palette of blues, greens and purples that has recently become a favourite amount, traditional graphic designers. The animation features no audio but flawlessly moves an explosion of liquid lava-lamp shape forms using changes of colour to highlight the movement in directions, making the viewer maintain eye contact with the focal point of the piece being the bizarre abstract focal point of the screen. Possibly moving a bit too fast to be considered relaxing, this short 5-second clip shows what can be achievable in such a small space of time and therefore 30 seconds can be seen instead as a large timescale for me to work with, especially since my outcome will be played on loop for as long as I would like. Kuznetsov's work here communicates a sense of curiosity since this was considered an experiment of smoke and therefore set out to make it happen to improve his own skills, therefore highlighting jow important experimentation is within n the creative industry because ideas and outcomes don't always go the way you planned. His work here is for sure effective because had I not seen it while scrolling through the Dribble.com explore section, I never would've come across his sense of art direction and fashionable, clean and futuristic, almost robot-like, style - something that would be suitable in a medical settig=ng due to the fresh identity of colour tones and sharp precision he used throughout all his work, looking almost like it had been produced in a lab
Liquid art motion design for AI product by Gleb Kuznetsov
An example of a lopped video that I can continuously watch but it is easy to tell where the video starts and ends after watching it over and over a couple of times - something I should avoid when developing my own work. Its speed is what makes it relaxing and it's connecting to water creates a crossover between the natural and digital worlds.
Animation has become one of my passions in terms of consuming its content and looking up to the hours of work designers put in to create realistic pleasing results and is part of the reason why I choose Time & Movement as my second platform. I was also considering studying Animation as a degree itself, only to find out through experimentation in college that my patience level was quite low (hopefully that will change!). One of my big dreams would be to work on children's and family animation films for companies such as Pixar or Walk Disney studios because I am blown away by the detail and improvement with each and every movie they release. Despite my appreciation, I have yet to work with professional rendering software and this brief may give me the perfect opportunity to increase my broad amount of skills and find out whether this practice is really my passion.
I recently found out about the free Cinema 4D student version as my flatmate, currently studying on the MA GCD course at CSM, told me while teaching her HTML and CSS and therefore we both downloaded a copy, making plans to learn the basics of the software together before summer since unfortunately, the student pack is only available during term time.
https://dribbble.com/mangamegs/buckets/1869383-Ambient-Films
Waiting Places
Since my goal is to create an ambient film that communicates a feeling of calmness towards my viewers then I have opted to choose a place that may be anxiety-provoking. So far I am set on using a hair salon/hairdressers as my waiting place because even though it may not be obvious to some people, many of us have fear getting pampered, quite ironically really.
To check it wasn't just me who felt this anxious feeling I went onto Instagram and Twitter where I asked my followers if they felt the same and to my surprise they did, as there is a clear majority of those who also feel the same way.
Patients took part in my 24-hour poll The age range of most of my followers varies from 18-24
with 94% of my total 2800 followers on Instagram being female
=
From these results, I may decide to use hairdressers as a place to showcase my film either while they are waiting for their appointment to begin or during their appointment time, as a distraction from getting there hair done and have to socialise with fellow customers or hairdressers.
Cinema
I visited the Vue Cinema in Islington while I was there waiting for my coursemate to arrive (she was late! but we didn't miss the start of the film) and therefore observed the people waiting around me.
Because I visited during a Wednesday afternoon there were not many people up the stairs from the entrance to the cinema, but I did witness a group of what seemed to be new team members getting a tour and instructions from an already existing employee, who was talking rather sternly towards their new teammates who were each holding clipboards with worried faces.
There were no seats in the refreshments area and therefore decided to buy myself an extremely overprices hotdog. There was only one other person in front of me so while I waited for my turn, and for my hotdog to be made, I watched the screens above move between images of popcorn and Tango ice blast, conveniently not advertising their prices until you had made your own order and received the receipt. The reason for absence seating may have been a strategy to get customers to move into the screenings ready for advertisement viewing and to move people out of the way. The refreshment area also included toilets and a pick & mix section, again something to do while you wait...a business tactic to get people to spend more money. The ticket machines were also displayed on this floor, which to my surprise did not include a normal ticketing booth as all tickets had to bought online - possibly to reduce waiting.
Once in the screen itself, rather packed but that is due to this cinema's tiny scale possibly seating 70-100 people at most, were the advertisements. This got me thinking about how video is such a convenient source of keeping people entertained while they wait, people watch movies on planes and trains to pass time in the same way - to make it go faster and enjoy it. The advertisements in the cinema lasted about 30 minutes in total and it was only the last section of advertisements that were relevent to the film itself.
Experimentations
After being inspired by Gleb Kuznetsov, here is my first Cinema 4D animation experiment:
I created the background scene on illustrator where I imported it into Photoshop to experiment with an art piece I was working on before scrapping this idea completely and taking it into Cinema 4D where I tried to create a number of balls bursting/spread out from each other. The main problem I faced was to do with exploring my animation because the green ball was not visible in my original file, instead of that was the placement I created to contain the other circles inside. Therefore I should experiment with exporting my video throughout the process of making it in case any similar situations occur.
MA Fashion Show
On Valentine's Day I stayed behind at CSM to watch the MA Fashion Show, part of the 2020 London Fashion Week featuring an AR collobraive film with Three UK. There were multiple showings of films, presumably put on by Three, throughout the fashion show that ironically enough I enjoyed watching more than the models and clothes themselves.
The majority of the films created an eerie yet calming atmosphere to buildup the audience's anticipation. With my own project I would also like to produce a relaxing atmosphere but I should avoid suspense as this may make my own target audience more anxious.
The film above is one of my favourites, not only because of the beautiful transition between pinks and purples used to suggest nighttime and an element of spiritually in a spooky forest, bt because of the gorgeous effect it creates on the audience themselves as they all 'woo' in its presence due to its aesthetic value. The slow movement of panning around this forest produces a calming mood due to the film's content - there is no action, only scenic places shown and therefore creates an almost uneventful film that may not seem as exciting to those who enjoy it (art). This single clip is part of a range of landscape scenes put together using a series of translations within the film to create a depth of field allowing the viewers to see into the landscape through the forest as the composition panned forwards, making the viewer really feel like they were there.
Premiere Pro
In order to improve my editing skills, I had a go at creating a short film which allowed me to experiment with colour correction and transitions. I had fun learning the software by myself as it allowed me to experiment with effects and even led me to create my own film in a style similar to VHS.
Making my own film in this program allowed me to explore the workspace in my own time as I have just begun to find an interest in cinematography. However, learning in-depth knowledge about this project is not entirely necessary if I am to continue working with 3D rendering using Cinema 4D - a program I am last advanced in and need further practice in.
Using Premiere I created my own merge of two trailers from the artists LOONA for their new album named "#(hashtag)". The audio used throughout the film has been taken from their trailers and music videos as I wanted to use their own music after all. My film also has a hidden storyline between the protagonist, Heejin who has black hair and the girl, with silver/blonde hair.
I also attended an induction during my last platform E&E but unfortunately, this was very unhelpful because instead of showing us the hidden elements, keyboard shortcuts and tips, we were instead taught about what a text box was....extremely basic for graphic designers who are used to working with laptops, computers and plenty other digital devices as we are all in the modern age, we are young and carry smartphones.
100 Word Rationale
While thinking of types of waiting places for where my film would be suitable, I approached the idea of using a hair salon as my dedicated waiting place. This is because personally I find them to be quite anxiety inducing and therefore my outcome could be used to calm customers down either before or during the appointment. I ran a poll on Instagram and Twitter asking my followers whether they feel the same and to my surprise they did, as there is a clear majority of those who also feel the same way, suggesting an ironic element to the world of pampering.
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