If the space between musical notes is just as important to consider as the notes themselves, how do video artists take this onboard? Cuts of black or blank video is one approach, masked shapes that leave portions of screens ‘blank’ are another, and use of transparent screens is another – when video plays it can be seen on this screen, when it isnt played, the space behind screen is still visible. Have been exploring this with Artificial Eye‘s Video Mirror Units, images projected onto motorised mirrors that allow image to be sent anywhere in room ( or outdoors ). Hanging the thin ‘tulle’ fabric across a space in many places, leaves the space free and allows images to travel around and ‘collect’ nicely at various locations… seemingly hanging in space on the thin material. ( see flickr photos ).
In a similar vein, a recent celebrated fashion show used similar fabric to give a kind of holographic overlay on the catwalkers. Gorillaz did this to great effect at the MTV awards a few years ago, enabling a live performance by seemingly 3D cartoon characters in real-space. Musion from the Uk were behind that which apparently involves hi res LED screens set into the floor, which are then reflected in a very thin transparent material above it called ‘eyeliner foil’ which captures light very well.
See also : Peppers Ghost – “an illusionary technique used in theatre and in some magic tricks. Using a plate glass and special lighting techniques, it can make objects seem to appear or disappear, or make one object seem to “morph” into another.” ( good explanatory images too via wikipedia)
More Things You Can’t See
– Video underwater. ( Without decent instructions for building your own underwater cam corder holder. )
– Public Outdoor Advertising in Sao Paulo. Imagine – a whole city that bans visual advertising outdoors! Delicious photo collection of now-skeletal billboards.
– Official use of this empty building in the Melbourne CBD. The Unofficial Use though, is pixel-delicious. ‘Empty Show’ video featuring huge amount of visual work by melbourne street artists inside a great space.
– Fees to download the VJ Loops, or 30 page VJ / ‘Painting with Light’ manual uploaded by Perth’s dynamic pixel duo : http://VJzoo.com
Visual Software Bits
http://ustream.tv – Noticed people using this for the iphone launch… am sure there’s better uses for it to come – “a platform that provides live interactive video for everyone. Anyone with a camera and an Internet connection can use Ustream to broadcast to a global audience.”
– Nice photoshop color palette matching tip – use the tool to combine the palettes of stylish paintings with the palettes of photos taken, to give colours a boost.
– Final Cut studio 2 comes bundled with an application dedicated to colour correcting and enhancement, stylising for video. ( tutorial )
VidVox Noise
Amongst the relentless pixel-chatter at the vidvox.net forums, can be found links to the VDMX 5 beta, which is smokin along nicely, the VDMX museum and a guide to integrating Quartz Composer patches into VDMX. Quartz Composer comes bundled with all Tiger OS X operating systems, but has to be installed from the developers pack to allow making your own visual toys. However, even within installation, the quartz files produced will run on any OSX Tiger system within quicktime, or application using quicktime. Harnessing this, the vidvox QC wiki has over 30 example FX and patches free for use. QC patches can be used as clips, FX or a Font Synth in VDMX 5 ( meaning text triggered in VDMX will be sent through the QC patch, then back to VDMX for outputting ). Sample QC effect ? Implementation of the classic ‘Stargate’ slit-scan effect. ( Now with vertical and horizontal modes, Flip, Freeze, manual Scan, Rate and Angle controls. )