So when it came to the themes of reflections I looked at the ideas of memories in digital spaces, in recent times the idea of virtual reality has really taken off, but it's not quite prolific enough nor publicly available to make full works in a 360 degree virtual space. However panoramic camera technologies are something that interested me because it allows some of that wonder of a virtual space by almost looking through a movable window, it's not full immersion but it allows some of the ability to look around a fixed point in space. This does however mean I could focus on making explorable pictures as opposed to fully fledged 3d spaces, thus when looking around I found a piece of consumer technology that I could export panoramic pictures from and photoshop them to create these odd spaces; that being the Playstation Vita.
The Playstation vita has a mode that allows basic panoramic photographs to be taken at 1280x960 pixels, by taking several photographs from a program in the vita it automatically creates the panoramic space and uses gyro-meters to allow the person to track around with these, and thus I simply thought "How do I use this in unconventional ways to confuse it into making more obscure photographs?" Originally I simply used DSLRs and experimented with photoshop to create odd and obscure landscapes and mazes to represent how memory can be obscured and almost maze-like.
I will quickly say that in a 3d space this looks rather different, but what I did find was that in the first photograph people became confused and lost in the space due to the odd sunset landscapes. The second picture based on the idea of monotony interested people while the third picture just confused (arguably as intended but to a point of incomprehension". However in the idea of a reflection I had hidden a cuddly toy from my youth in the 3rd picture, and the initial confusion was stopped by the satisfaction of seeing something a little bit hidden. Combining the idea of an easily explorable but obscure space with an extra point one needs to look around for became my new objective:
This first picture was created by using the standard panoramic software of my room before I moved out, by obscuring and blurring it i attempted to create the idea of a memory being slowly lost. The Computer screen asks "Is it how you remember?", the hidden secret in this one.
I always wondered whether people would remember what I looked like as much without my hat that I usually wear, so I took it to the extreme and followed the camera on it's panoramic cycle holding my hat in front of it thus confusing the software making a 3d sphere out of hats, the hidden part of this is a picture of my face wearing the hat with the face scratched out.
This one was created by confusing the camera further, this time I induced an error in the panoramic cycle forcing it to re-calibrate it's position, while it was calibrating I ran to a different room and set up a shot, this happened 37 times meaning that this landscape is an obscured version of every part of my old house to represent memory blurring together. all screens and technology contains text on it so as the person looks around they see that the piece is every part of the house on a certain date.
This one was based on my internet history and that classic idea that someone is always watching you, the irony being that it's the computer, not a person, thus I took all my most used sites for a week and displaced them inside an eye with a smaller eye within the pupil. once started the small picture people see is the small eye looking at you, often unaware that the whole picture is in fact a larger eye forcing people to "see the bigger picture".
Finally I modified my previous shot on monotony, in the panoramic mode the person must look up and will see a message saying "it loops and it loops and it loops and....". Using this still conveys the idea of monotony but allows that extra satisfaction of finding the secret within.
Okay, so it's fair to say I've been trying to write this thing for a few days now, but honestly, a lot of the time I've no idea what to say, when I plan I just plan, when I film I just film, and the footprints that I leave behind tend to be the evidence that I was working there, I've never been one to show my workings, be it maths, science, performing arts, it's never been my style, is it an excuse, hell no, but it's almost 3am and 10 hours ago I retrieved the wonderful news that my granddad was as dead as a fucking doorstop; so fuck it, I'm gonna write it in my style now as a trail of thought, if you don't like that, hard luck, it's how I'm gonna do it and you just have to mark me down for it, so hoo-fucking-ra marines, this is how we made a film!
okay, so starting simply, inspirations: well it's a 3 part film, was always seen as 3 parts and was always imagined as 3 parts, if you want to know what those parts are look back to an earlier post, that explains it better than i will now in this state, any-who...
act 1, make it melancholic, so I based it on the animation aku no hana, a slow brooding drama from Japan, that despite being filmed around and outdoors, has a sense of pace and atmosphere that is as brooding and melancholic as it gets:
So challenge 1, make that....indoors, so more close-ups, more claustrophobia, and a different theme, in this case the blue flash of a pc, now I will admit that when filming with some lights and a shit-tonne of blue filters on the lights things were arguably a bit too low key for some, and part of the significance of the imagery is personal, and to some that is a problem, the whole use of coke cans everywhere is about binging during depression, and to some people this may not come across, and that is one thing I must first address:
The piece was always personal and sentimental, and I tend to feel that going into something with personal wants and feelings is frowned upon somewhat, y'know what, i get why, personal reasons and wants is no excuse for poor film-making and confusing plot, an inability to communicate a message is just poor conveyance and personal, selfish, indulgent films are of such a thing. the reason i say this is because it stops me from having to use the personal reasons excuse, if someone does not understand something in the film that is my fault as a film-maker, and not validated by the "i was being personal" card, so basically call me out on hypocrisy if you will, so that i may actually have some argument that i am unable to bullshit my way out of.
anyway part 2 and 3 is where we introduced the digital aspect, in terms of the effect my main source of inspiration came from a japanese (naturally) indie tv drama, Mirai Nikki Another World which follows similar themes of digitalism, although in a more literal sense than the metaphorical one employed in this work, however if you happen to see, for example....cubes floating around, it's fair to say that it may or may not be a slight homage to a show i adore:
Editing and pacing however was where the most debates were had, it's fair to say that the order of a lot of things switched around during post-production as we made it a priority to secure our effects first so that the film could be easily reordered to suit the needs of the group, that and because on certain parts the idea was to break the scenes to create a sense of catharsis. A personal inspiration in which we based certain scenes on (specifically a scene involving a loop of myself running towards a shadow) was the american trailer by funimation for mnemosyne, a rather insane horror show and while we definitely held back compared to the trailer, the original DNA of the midway editing has its roots in that trailer:
So the question really is "did I achieve my ambitions for the film?"; honestly, no, because it became more than my own original ideas the moment I had a team, the fact is that interpretation is an important part of any art, and to present these inspirations to the group shows different influences and details than i could find on my own, the ambitions and ideas evolved over time and I can only be proud of that. on set it's true that lighting and contrasts occasionally suffered due to a shortsighted focus to the compositions and the timings and an initially rigid shoot schedule; the film was arguably planned too much at points creating a rigidity in the shooting schedule and an occasional attitude of "it might be salvageable in the edit". An attitude that we initially wanted to avoid but with the clock ticking became an inevitability. However I can at least say I saw people come out there shell during this film and, any experimental side to the film became an interesting hurdle for all of us but one that allowed us a sense of odd vision. The reason i cited Child of Eden and End of Evangelion as influences was because they gave me a vision of a digital paradise gone wrong and a feeling of odd dread and tension through seeming randomness together. I wanted to emulate some of that spark they created within me the first time I saw them and, in the course of making this, I'd like to think I found some of that spark again.
Also if you're reading this I'm sure you have a lot to get through today, so here's a lovely song from end of evangelion to keep you going (and yes it's my favourite film):
The inspiration for this short film comes from a long distance relationship that I've been involved with before and personally, having recently been dumped and had a good week of minor depression about the whole thing made me question the strength of connections between people online. Online I have friends who I've come to care for, and few who I've come to love, yet despite seeing these people behind screens I've never actually met them, with many being in foreign countries and /or out of reach, and that's the thing, What is the 21st Century Relationship?
When questioning this the idea of World-building came to mind, with the recent boom of sandbox video games such as minecraft and Garry's mod and the cooperative gaming scene in general, intimacy and relationship through gameplay has become a legitimate concept. Couples online play games together, and can build worlds together, but this is merely a fantasy, a construct of the digital image, and inspired by "500 days of Summer" sometimes remembering why you were dumped seems unexpected because of personal bias, and that perhaps in a modern long distance relationship this world building aspect shields us from the reality of whether it is the couple being happy and laughing together, or just the game, world, and the sense of distance and mystery that actually keeps such a relationship in place?
The Blinking Blue Light on my PC during sleep mode was an odd symbol to me when I was dumped, it seemed to me like a metaphor for that bright digital moment followed by the darkness of reality, and personally the idea of slow blinking lights at night being the symbol for the real-world protagonist is 1 of 2 main stylistic choices I personally want to convey. The struggle and depression of reality with a near-emotionless man crushed from the end of what he saw as so beautiful is what needs to be conveyed, however I want this film to be one of no dialogue, instead his distance and wishes shown by ghostly figures of his ex-girlfriend fading into digitally-styled effects, this is reality, it is warped and biased and drab, however fantasy is something else entirely.
While the cinematography of Reality is akin to standard drama, the still-based cinematography of "La Jetee" to represent non-reality is what I want to be combined with the visual stylings of Tetsuya Mizuguchi's "Child of Eden" with the bright world being a mixture of the natural and digital ( http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-deyUrfoCu4#t=134 ) and to show this false connection between them, those moments of joy being strongly emphasized as something of non-reality, a world built on text messages and a show that typing "I love you" is far easier than honestly speaking it. However to flesh out this world I want to show some occasional images of violence between these 2, the difference being that in this case they are increasingly happy about the whole thing, the reason: it's a commentary on modern gaming culture as examined by Hito Steyerl in "The Wretched of the Screen" in which she discusses the disconnect between the digital and physical world and that moralities are ambiguous in digital function, therefore we can create large moral paradoxes, and note that anything can be considered wondrous in this world, no matter how moral.
The Final Act of this is what I call the convergence, by showing our protagonists obsession through projections and screens of the non-reality in his, Lighting becomes screen lights. Phones, Monitors, Televisions in places where they would never normally be become the main visual style. and allows him moments of euphoria followed by intense realization as he panics and the power goes out, leaving him in darkness for a while just staying and crying. The final shot being the power coming back on only to bring back that blinking blue light again, ready to continue his loop of reckless self-destruction.
Soundtrack-wise I personally want each act to be distinct, with reality having a soundtrack like "the Graduate" with it's melancholic Acoustics. non-reality is of course more digitized and electronic, and convergence is as suggested, a merging of the two styles.
Good, that's the idea on (virtual) paper, now to set-up storyboards and treatments and...well a lot of things actually. However this late change and choice of ideas stems from the relationship and that feeling of self-destruction, my passion for this project is as much selfish exploration as anything, I want it to be bittersweet and melancholic, a worried love letter to the days of my depression and a window into that life for others, above all though I want it to be sentimental, because I personally want to make a project I can feel proud of, let's hope the group feels the same way xD
