Daito Manabe + Nosaj Thing: Eclipse/Blue
"We first got the chance to ascend into Nosaj Thing's sonic dreamworld at our The Creators Project: New York 2011, where he performed alongside some fittingly fantastical installations like Zigelbaum + Coelho's Six-Forty by Four-Eighty and Team Dis-Kinect's motion-mimicking puppet. Engaged in a subtle dance with his MPD32, Nosaj wove together a pounding, wistful set before projected visuals. As surreal as that live experience was, its visual component is nothing compared to what technology artist Daito Manabe has accomplished for Nosaj Thing's 'Eclipse/Blue.'
With support from The Creators Project, and collaborating with Perfume choreographer MIKIKO, Manabe created a dynamic virtual environment to serve as the backdrop for two dancers whose movements across the stage are amplified by the graphics behind them, making each action feel larger and more emotive."
(The Creators Project)
CONTRIBUTOR
Simon PerkinsSHARE
Sky Arts Futures Fund: competitive arts funding to make it happen
Applications open on 25th September and close on 19th December 2012.
"Sky Arts also seeks to connect with culture on the ground, supporting and investing in the arts from leading organisations to emerging artists in the UK and Ireland through the Sky Arts Ignition Series. The Futures Fund is part of the Sky Arts Ignition Series and offers five artists each year £30,000 plus mentoring to help you develop your creative practice. ...
Whether you want to direct a piece of theatre, choreograph a new dance piece, write a play, record an album, create a sculpture, a live art performance or produce, Sky Arts will give you the time and money to make it happen.They'll also pair you with a mentor from Sky and the arts to help you develop your networks, skills and knowledge in the arts and the commercial sector.
We invite you to submit an application in one of five categories; Theatre, Writing and Performance; Music; Visual Art; Dance; Creative Producer."
(IdeasTap Ltd. UK)
CONTRIBUTOR
Simon PerkinsSHARE
Animating Four-Legged Beasts
"Animating animals is usually fun, but can often be complicated and technical. Figuring out what to do with all those legs can really trip up an animator. We can animate human-shaped characters a lot easier than multi-legged beasts because we have an intuitive knowledge of the way bipeds move.
It is easy for an animator to act out a motion when the character moves like us; feeling the action 'in the body' helps us understand how to animate it. So what happens when the character is a quadruped and you don't have that intuitive feel at your disposal? How do you make that movement believable? Suitable reference and a sophisticated media player is the place to start.
Luckily for the animation community, there is a wealth of reference material that can help. I'll walk you through my process for animating quadruped locomotion and share classic references that will help you deconstruct the fundamentals of the four gaits: walk, run, trot and gallop. I'll also share an example of my own 3D walk animation and offer technical tips for creating believable quadruped locomotion cycles."
(Cathy Feraday Miller, Gamasutra)
Fig.1 Richard Williams, uploaded by "animan1999" on 25 Aug 2009, YouTube.
Fig.2 Richard Williams, uploaded by "animan1999" on 1 Sep 2009, YouTube.
CONTRIBUTOR
Simon PerkinsSHARE
Stroke: an individual struggles against a dehumanised mass
"Christine Jeffs made her directing debut with this lush, high end (35mm film, Dolby sound) short film. Dorothy (Fiona Samuel), a lone swimmer, luxuriates in tranquil bliss at a deserted pool - only to have her solitude rudely interrupted by a squad of swimmers. A wordless, strikingly choreographed conflict ensues as Dorothy attempts to assert herself against the dehumanised aggression of the swimmers. Stroke was invited to international festivals including Cannes and Sundance; and Jeffs went on to direct feature films Rain and Sunshine Cleaning."
(NZ On Screen)
Fig.1 Christine Jeffs (1994), "Stroke" (short film excerpt) Aotearoa New Zealand, 35mm 8 minutes.
CONTRIBUTOR
Simon PerkinsSHARE
William Forsythe: choreography as a reflection of social spheres
"In his installation performances such as Human Writes or Heterotopia, to which Forsythe has dedicated an increasing amount of his time in recent years, choreography becomes a social practice. Forsythe's installations are controlled test arrangements in which all the participants can observe themselves, their bodies and their movements together. When a performance like Human Writes deals in substance with the difficulties surrounding universal human rights, it becomes clear where the potential of dance and movement can lie. After all, it's not abstract universal laws alone that guarantee our co-existence. It is much more our physical actions, our daily movements that create and shape the community. Herein lies the political meaning of Forsythe's notion of dance. He creates spaces where he places people in a new, unknown relationship to themselves so that they reflect differently on their (social) spheres and in so doing explore their own potential scope for action."
(Gerald Siegmund, May 2008, Goethe-Institut)
Fig.3 Dominik Mentzos, "Human Writes", performance-Installation by William Forsythe and Kendall Thomas [http://www.theforsythecompany.com/pressphotos/humanwrites/].
CONTRIBUTOR
Simon PerkinsSHARE
