Create Digital Motion » electronica

Audiovisual Inspiration: Agriculture Gone Electronica, in TRACTOR

TRACTOR from tsaworks_martin Böttger on Vimeo.

Composer/electronic musician Bruno Dias sends us his latest collaboration, with visualist Martin Bottger. It was a distance collaboration – so just the kind of thing you could be working on with musicians and visualists you know. Bruno writes:

We never had the opportunity to meet face-to-face and this work was carried along the last couples months with Martin working on the visual side in Maya and then After Effects in Berlin and me developing the sound narrative that would then drive the visuals one here in London. I worked on sound using as main tools Ableton Live and its sampler, NI Reaktor, NI Absynth and Logic/Pro Tools for post-production.

This is just the sort of thing you could do pre-rendered in this way, then adapt for real-time use, just as musicians routinely do a “studio” version and then rework it for live.(You might even export OBJ models from Maya and pull them into an environment like Processing, Jitter, or vvvv, if you have the savvy – or use a VJ app to remix, if that’s more your speed.) So, Martin and Bruno, you can take that as a subtle hint for your next step, coming from a real-time evangelist.

I love the description of the, um, fourth-dimensional tractor (maybe it’s my childhood in Louisville, Kentucky spent visiting the huge annual farm equipment show – seriously):

Weekend Inspiration: Kraak and Smaak Flipbooks and Other superelectricvideo Visual Goodies

By Peter Kirn

Yes, speaking of the visual power of flipbooks, Ivan points out that Kraak and Smaak have just made a big splash with an ingenious new music video making surrealist plays with space. It uses copious, cleverly-placed flipbooks throughout. Now you have two challenges: one, to go out and make and film flipbooks, and two, to make it somehow not this but cool in some other way. (Hmmm… perhaps live flipbook VJing?)

It’s all real and real-time and, minus some subtle animation overlaid obviously at one point, it’s all flipbooks. The work is the creation of superelectricvideo, a director, motion graphic designer, video artist, illustrator, and general maker of cool things to look at based in the Netherlands. It’s worth reading his whole, oddly poetic bio, which matches some of the dry whimsy of his films:

Typographic AV: Inspiration from Beeple

By momo the monster

Delving into Audiovisual performance, it’s easy to get overwhelming. Mashing up commercials, music videos, sampled footage and more can quickly lead to eyeball meltdown.

Here, then - Mike Winkelmann (as Beeple) takes simple and distinct typographic elements, synced to a minimal lo-fi tech soundtrack to create AV that is masterfully compelling and straightforward.

Beeple - Century Gothic from momo_the_monster on Vimeo.

Mr. Winkelmann continues to produce and release as Beeple - he’s created new more fanciful works since his first appearance on CDM. See his whole library at Beeple.com.

Also, he’s got screenings of IV.7(annoyingly small mix) coming up at Ann Arbor Film Festival (March 25-30), as well as the Wisconsin Film Festival (April 3-6th).

From an Age Before CG: Justice Video Recalls Vintage HBO Motion Graphics

By Peter Kirn

Digital tech is fantastic — but I’m equally inspired by the real-for-real attitude that extended into the early digital age. Now that the French duo Justice have done a send up of a ridiculous number of early “motion graphics” (well, before they were really called that), I think there’s plenty of opportunity to get ideas for our digital world. Motioners, I have a challenge — well, two challenges, in fact:

1. How many retro animation spot references can you spot in this video? (The flying HBO logo being a personal favorite of mine — ah, that day when we first discovered premium cable. It was like entering the future. And you could tape stuff, too, like Fraggle Rock or whatever.)

2. Got any insight into how some of these original videos were produced? Computer graphics found their way into ad spots as early as the 1970s, even via the gang who would go on to found Pixar. But, of course, many productions continued to use traditional animation techniques well into the 1980s — heck, even Tron did a lot of optical work and even cel animation.

Justice - DVNO [NEW]
by PeteRock

The inimitable Joel Johnson at Boing Boing Gadgets points to this video, and reader Reed Savory points out that the HBO logo was all models and traditional animation:

Video: Music Video Pays Homage to Futuristic ’80s Television Bumpers [bb gadgets]

Here’s how they created “HBO Starship”, ca. 1983:

They don’t talk a whole lot about the actual letters, but you have to give HBO credit for making what has to be the most ridiculous — and strangely compelling — station ident ever. For me, the movies were always kind of a let-down after that — perhaps an early childhood sign that I’d get bitten by the visualist bug.

Sunday Glitchimation: Synaesthetic Music Videos from Beeple

By Jaymis

Beeple contains a suite of intricately animated, synaesthetic IDM styled music videos. Lofi, crunchy beats, good times from Mike Winkelmann.

Check out IV.4 or Century Gothic for a taste. If they’re to your liking grab the 20 minute IV.2 or have a look at DoneBestDone for more Winkelmann collaborations.

Screenshot wallpaper from Century Gothic by Beeple

Want to recommend a site? The contact form is your friend.

Next Week: Piano Meets Electronics, Video, Game Boy

By Peter Kirn

Sorry for the light news day, but I’ll be back next week with lots more coverage, shifting from game systems to how to use game hardware in your own music, more on interactive musical clothing, and other goodies! In the meantime, here’s my next project: -PK

How does a musician go from classical pianist to Game Boy musician? Ask composer / sound designer / sound engineer Haeyoung Kim, who makes 8-bit music under the name bubblyfish. Check out Haeyoung’s site for lots of articles on her and Game Boy music-making in general, as reported by everyone from MTV to MSNBC.

Here in New York, Haeyoung and I, among other composers, will be reimagining pianistic possibilities at a concert by downtown pianist Kathleen Supove, Tuesday through Thursday at 7pm at The Flea in TriBeCa. Piano duet with Game Boy? Check. Electronics generated live from the piano? Check. Video projections on the surface of the piano and live VJing? Check. Even Schroeder would be proud.

For those of you in NY, drop me a line if you’re going to stop by; for everyone else, I’ll be back with some tips learned from the tech in this show.