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imomus
Well, I'm back in Berlin, and for the next week or so I'm working on two design-related articles, one about a Japanese fashion company, the other about VJing. By "VJ" I don't mean the person who presents the videos on MTV (do they even have videos on MTV these days?) but the person who designs and "performs" graphics projected during the presentation of music in a nightclub or concert hall. And I'd like your help. Here's a little questionnaire which I'd love you to answer in the Comments section. Include an e mail address if you like, so that I can write to you.1. You're not a VJ yourself, but you have a favorite VJ or a peak experience in a dark place involving the combination of visuals and music. Tell me about it!
2. You are a VJ yourself. Tell me about your work! Do you have a website?
3. What experience do you have of VJ hardware and software? Name names! Tell me your good and bad experiences with various packages. Have you customized your software or hardware?
4. What's your live set-up? Do you mix live feed from cameras in the club (or arena, if you're that big!) with pre-recorded graphic loops? Do you doodle on top of found Super 8? How do you work?
5. Is your work a collaboration, and if so, who does what? Do you consider the bands you work with clients or collaborators?
6. Tell me about being a designer who works in real time, there in the club, responding to unpredictable events. Is it, well, like playing an endless sax solo or something? Isn't that a tough thing to do, to "design" right there in public, in real time?
7. How would you like to see VJing develop in the future? Are there amazing new capabilities you'd like to see built into software? (Personally, I'd like to see "the scent organ" from Brave New World implemented.)
8. Question for the audience. Do you actually watch what's on the screen behind the band? Where does it take you, if anywhere? Is less more, or is more more?
9. Um, a question about Marshall McLuhan might fit here. Marshall McLuhan and lava lamps and Pink Floyd and the gesamtkunswerk and living in a gloopy web of electronic goo... Have all the arts come together? Is it a big meltdown or a big letdown? Should we all go and read a good book instead?
10. Is there anything I didn't ask you and should have? Oh, okay: "But is it art?"
(The picture is of Japanese design geniuses Delaware playing live at Club Milk, Ebisu, June 2001, which gives me another chance to link to their lovely song Graphic Designin' in the Rain.)
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(no subject)
Date: 2005-07-21 03:58 am (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2005-07-21 04:10 am (UTC)I have done a small amount of VJ work, but similar to that, work as a Lighting Designer (http://www.lucaskrech.com/). The parties I have lit requires working live in real time, as does, to a lesser extent, my theatre work. The play keeps moving forwards and you must continue to work the design as the production evolves. Working live in any medium is about playing with and reacting to the audience. If everyone in the room is not, at some level, a collaborator, the end product is not as successful. The best work comes out of a collaborative environment where everyone gives and everyone takes and the lines between mediums dissolve in a larger whole.
(no subject)
Date: 2005-07-21 04:10 am (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2005-07-21 04:20 am (UTC)OH.
Nevermind, then. Carry on...
(no subject)
Date: 2005-07-21 04:28 am (UTC)q&a
Date: 2005-07-21 04:32 am (UTC)2. [skipping this one]
3. jitter (from the max/msp folks) is pretty damn good. NATO is still very good, if not a little cryptic...
4. [skip]
5. [skip]
6. [skip]
7. i'd like to see things develop somewhere between what scriabin (with his sound/color 'affliction') wanted and what eno describes on p.383 of his diary in 'role and game-playing' section entry #3 "you are a member of an early-21st-century 'art and language' band..."
8. [skip]
9. all the arts have all come together (in the same space) but they are ignoring each other because the level of tech. literacy required for a total gestalt vibe is way over the head of most.
10. something to add? just a twist on a line from a song...'hey, VJ! keep playing that image, all night! on and on and on...'
r.
http://glitchslaptko.blogspot.com/
(no subject)
Date: 2005-07-21 05:19 am (UTC)Marxy
don't believe the hype!
Date: 2005-07-21 05:35 am (UTC)http://www.cycling74.com/products/mspinky.html
best,
r.
don't believe that URL!
Date: 2005-07-21 05:38 am (UTC)http://www.mspinky.com/cgi-local/SoftCart.100.exe/online-store/scstore/shophome.html?E+scstore
and again, i should mention that the hardware/software package costs an amazing $99 as compared to that 4 grand that david was talking about with the other thing...talk about conspicuous consumption!!!
(no subject)
Date: 2005-07-21 05:44 am (UTC)I have a question, although unrelated to the topic. I was wondering if American Patchwork had any Canadian distribution? I've been going nuts trying to find the Super Madrigal Brothers' albums over here but they seem to be available only in the U.S. If the label doesn't, would you consider Canadian Distribution?
Take Care
Peak experience in the dark
Date: 2005-07-21 06:15 am (UTC)Of course, that was Fred Quimby's Tom and jerry, not the pallid Hannah Barbera rubbish. Which reminds me of another more interactive primitive video jockey experience as a student - "The Freds". This took place at the men-only students' union, once a week at lunchtime: Mr Quimby's Tom and Jerry was projected on a large screen in the debating hall, to the delight of a packed audience. Then flashes of porn would cut in (two projectors - far out, man!) eventually taking over and running as unbroken filth. The real entertainment was the heckling: male, brutish and very, very, very funny. Momus, many of your readers are not brutish, or even entirely male, and might be uneasy with the intoxicating mob rush of giddy humour, but please don't tell me it's bad. Used to get the same sort of thing on the North Sea oil rigs, in the communal cinemas, until the insidious advent of TVs, videos, and DVD players in individual cabins. Our pleasures are solitary, furtive and crepuscular now (I know where you got that line by the way - Petersen, Mountfort and Hollom - Birds of Britain and Europe: any prizes if one of your gang tells you which species?) Must stop rambling and get to work....
vj
Date: 2005-07-21 06:33 am (UTC)interesting, but why now, 2005?
soft wise, 'motion dive', japanese ware. it's probably the most user friendly prog, much like a non linear editor, keyboard-synth relationship. max is alright, but most max visuals tend to look alike.
vj gigs... pizzicato five 1994(?) irving plaza, cornelius s.o.b.s(?), le tigre irving plaza (2004), some scanner show at the cooler (maybe), under the brooklyn bridge dumbo (5 years ago), robert whitman installations (2003, Dia Chelsea), black dice (volume williamsburg 2003, almost forgot...godspeed you black emperor 16mm film loops (2000?) bowery ballroom
i guess some of these were not improvised live. the ken ishii type eye candy stuff forgotten. vjing seems a bit irrelavant now...why are you asking?
and to answer your last question, yes, it's a mess. i'd rather look into the clean light of a film projector.
Re: vj
Date: 2005-07-21 06:35 am (UTC)also, forgot out morrissey/smiths... one photo does the trick
(no subject)
Date: 2005-07-21 07:23 am (UTC)I remember going to one of their shows and gazing at/being entranced by their noise constructions and their video collage of bees and power structures.
Private psychedelic reel
Date: 2005-07-21 07:47 am (UTC)lulla-live
Date: 2005-07-21 08:52 am (UTC)This is Shawn (from Lullatone). How are you?
We usually project visuals during our live performances. So about your questions...
1. Eric (e*rock) presents some funny visuals when he plays. www.audiodregs.com . Also, Lozi (http://homepage.mac.com/lozi/) controls his visuals with a sewing machine that he converted into a midi controller.
2. And our website is www.lullatone.com . You can see a short sample of one of our animations there. We make classic stop motion animations (not flash or any kind of abstract max msp electronica visuals). Also we sometimes make video loops by making some spools covered with a loop of images that we rotate on top a turntable and then capture with a video camera that is plugged into a monitor. (This this make sense? It is a little difficult to explain.) I like this because it is a really lo-tech and charming way to go about it.
3. To make our stop motion animations we use a program called istopmotion http://www.istopmotion.com/ . It is really simple, which means it is really good.
4. Usually we just prepare a video before the performance to fit our live set and give a DVD of it to the club or theater where we are playing. We can't control the visuals in real time because we are both so busy with the various insruments and humming and singing and dancing and so on involved in playing the melodies.
5. Yes, our work is a collaboration. Yoshimi (Lullatone's singer) cuts the characters out of origami paper and I usually direct the stories. Also, we make the melodies and the images which is really important for us so we can really drop the audience into a total environment of the aesthetic sense we want to create. I don't think we could ever work with an outside VJ (unless he or she were simply triggering images we had already produced).
6. n/a But, at every single show we have played we have got such great comments from the audience about our visuals. I think because the stories are sometimes funny and the images are really cute and simple.
7. I don't know. I hope visuals will become more interesting than screen savers
8-10. I don't have any strong ideas here, sorry.
Oh, also, one of our animations is going to be shown at a gallery there in Berlin soon. I wll let you know the details later if you are interested.
best wishes,
Shawn
(no subject)
Date: 2005-07-21 08:52 am (UTC)http://www.scopac.org/
(no subject)
Date: 2005-07-21 09:32 am (UTC)vjing - personnal history
Date: 2005-07-21 10:06 am (UTC)I was initially inspired after seeing some bands make their stage a more exciting place, I was later informed by club and party decor.
I started by using still slides to replace standard stage lighting for a
band i played in. The band played messy quirky synth punk.
The images used were from underground comics like R. Crumb's "zap".
I then started using super 8 films and loops.
Initially shooting my own short ambient lighting experiments,
I then moved into making my own stop motion, featuring logos etc.
I then adopted some of Len Lye's painting and scratching techniques,
which extended into my kitchen (bleach, and curry).
The loops lloked a lot better, and i could even make custom loops on the night of an event. I tried moving to 16 mm, but was getting frustrated by the unreliable nature of the vintage equipment (most found in skips/bins and recycled) which was notorious for eating the brittle films.
Since then I have worked either with dual video tape decks to vj into a digital projector, or a collection of preprepared 'compilation tapes'.
Recently I have started using 'Resolume' software for PC, which allows me to use pre made footage from my super 8, and video collection, as well as allowing for the use of live camera feed (catch people dancing to the beat - capture - loop!) and flash animation too. It also features some basic built in generative algorithms that are like twaekable/playable screen savers.
This set up is run into my friends old Sony Video mixer, for primitive synthesis effects, with extra DVD or VHS channels running into it as back-up in case the computer crashes.
I have worked with other lighting and laser artists in my time, having covered events featuring all sorts, from Keith Rowe (AMM) to Four Tet,
and I have been invited to work collaboratively with other digital vj's at a local club.
I think that as with musicians working together, depending on the attitudes brought together: collaboration can be a good or bad thing. Generally a promoter will know the act that they are plugging and choose a suitable vj.
I usually try to have a chat with the band/dj/artist before the show and ask about their preferences. (fast/slow, colour/B+W, playful/sinister)
One of the best audio-visual events i experienced was the Flaming Lips at Glastonbury 2000. It was a very fine event, from what I've heard it may have a little in common with the Cornelius AV shows.
I've read forums on the role of vj - some customers like them to stay in the background (bubblegum for the eyes?) and others want them blazing in their retinas.
I like the idea of a bit of light you can turn to, or turn away from.
A light show that works with th music can be a great thing, but sometimes it's nice to hide in dark corners of clubs (to chatter, commit sins, or sleep) without constant bulb action.
A designer friend (currently on holiday or I'd ask more) told me of a film made about a family that make visuals together, like three generations, the oldest being tye dyed survivors of the original wave of psychedelic practicioners from 60's Britain. (was it a CH4 "four-mations" special?)
Isn't there an odd three piece USA band called the 'the ______ family slide players' or something, that use slide projectors for their band?
You have a few decades worth of activities to research. I'm sure you've already been fed all the NY Plastic Exploding Inevitable stories already, what is this questionaire for? Is Momus making a vj show?
(dodgy stereo - barrys electric workshop - Belfast - N.Ireland)
(no subject)
Date: 2005-07-21 10:15 am (UTC)http://www.tmema.org/mis/
and more about it here:
http://hct.ece.ubc.ca/nime/2005/proc/nime2005_115.pdf
Optronica
Date: 2005-07-21 10:22 am (UTC)http://www.optronica.org/index2.html
(no subject)
Date: 2005-07-21 11:04 am (UTC)Re: Optronica
Date: 2005-07-21 11:09 am (UTC)Thanks for these brilliant responses, everyone! The article is for the Adobe website, by the way.
(no subject)
Date: 2005-07-21 11:16 am (UTC)you can see my stuff at www.totalawesomeness.tk
3 i use arkaos because it's the software that allows my humble pc laptop to make best use of RAM and doesn't slow down with any clip
5 i'd like the clubs to be more collaborative, but mostly they don't really care, unless they want to impose their vision on you, which sometimes they go great lenghts to do (having a promoter staying over all night until we had finished the flyer the way he wanted it, then having to redo it because it looked crap). bands are better, i've worked closely with a couple of bands and it was great, but it doesn't happen often due to time/budget/whatever
6 it's sometimes really difficult to match your stuff with what happens there...like if you have some psychedelic trancey stuff and you end up in a rock n roll club (like, that kind of thing happens all the time actually) and you have to go ahead and play for 6 hours even though it's absolutely impossible to make it fit together. i spent a while trying to make an archive of animations that would fit every mood & music style, but during the process i lost all coherence and my energies became dilluted.
9 i kind of want to go back to painting in caves actually.
feels more like a big letdown to me. all this doesn't add anything. It's not like the world has turned upside down and the gods come down mounting dinosaurs to cook gigantic pizzas and build the Abstract Continent in the middle of the pacific ocean. Which would be the logical evolution to me. i'm rambling now. sounding very negative today ain't i.
VJ
Date: 2005-07-21 11:16 am (UTC)3. i use custom flash interface that karl from milky elephant made for mumbleboy. it's probably too specialized for the average person, but it's made to fit our style perfectly.
4. mixing and layering hundreds of flash loops made by myself and mumbleboy. you saw a bit of this when you DJed that show with us in Berlin a couple years ago!
5. it's very interactive, in that i always respond to the music when i mix visuals. it's also a collaboration with mumbleboy in that we share flash files for mixing.
6. i don't really design in realtime as much as compose and collage with pre-made flash files. it's very elastic. kinya has been doing this really cool thing where he sets up a camera and mixes people's drawings with his VJ set. he did the other month at an AIGA after party a couple months ago when i was in NY and it went over really well.
7. i don't see many people push the medium very hard, but i'm picky.
8. it depends on the music. i saw beck play the other night and appreciated how retrained the VJ was, it added rather than distracted from the band. when i play a laptop show i want as much visual stimulus as possible to make up for the fact that i'm a boring laptop dude who sings occasionally.
9. some nights read, some nights watch a show. percentage wise there's as many bad books as bad shows i would say. or bad movies for that matter. the good ones are rare, so always nice to find ones that inspire.
10. yes dear, its as much art as you make it. i wish you could have seen the shadow puppet visuals that went on behind you the last show you played in portland. it was really fun and appropriate, and i haven't seen them do it since!