Final Video

Appropriation Project

Here’s my appropriation project. I had to take down my old post because the video was flagged, but I finally uploaded it to Vimeo, so here it is!

Site Specific Proposal

Artist Statement:

The goal of the project is to create an immersive environment for the audience to consume. It will be lifelike so that players feel as though they are in another place completely. There will be multiple environments that are created in the single location. Users will also have personal projections that will enhance the game play.

Project Description:

For my project, I want to create a projection based laser tag arena. The arena will be made of solid white materials. Every aspect of the arena will be made unique by projection. Players will be able to choose the type of setting they want to play in. They can choose from locations such as rainforest, desert, war battlegrounds, cityscapes, etc. When they choose a projected landscape, they will see that landscape projected into the white room and onto all of the objects in the room. There will still be solid objects in the room to climb or hide behind.

In addition to projected screens, users will have the option of being equipped with VRD (Virtual Retinal Display) technology to project video onto a person’s eyeball. Players will be equipped with a VRD device that mounts to their head and will be able to see streaming video when they are connected to a WiFi connection.

Any team involved will have a central command system. One or more of the players from a team will sit inside a control room and observe the game. They will be able send streaming video and audio to players on their team. This will enable them to send maps or other projections to their teammates in the arena.

This will make the game of laser tag more of a competitive sport that takes planning and strategy. People will be able to play in leagues with teams of the same size.

This site-specific piece would be permanent with room to add more iterations (locations) in the future for players to choose from. The audience is anyone who wanted to play in the facility. Assuming I had the building with the white interior, I would need a large number of high quality projectors that could read projected video without overheating for up to 12 hours a day. I would also need approximately 40 VRD devices to equip players with. The type and amount of projectors would depend highly on the space. I anticipate $500 or more per projector. The VRD devices can be purchased for $5,200 per unit.

Installation Video

http://www.kickstarter.com/projects/samuelschimek/microclimates-installation-art-exhibition/widget/video.html

Saatchi Gallery Installation

Site Specific

Here are a few site specific pieces:

http://www.thegraycircle.com/undercurrents.htm

Music Videos

Performance Project

My performance piece is of me reciting the poem “Where the Sidewalk Ends,” by Shel Silverstein. I’m not incredibly shy in front of the camera, so I performed pretty openly. My biggest challenges in this program were definitely the technical aspects. My personal camera shoots very high-quality HD and I filled up my memory card and froze my computer. I also had a few challenges compressing it down far enough that it wouldn’t take an eternity to upload to vimeo.

I chose to do it in black and white to keep the audience from focusing too much on the background and not seeing me performing. I chose the poem because it’s relatable with short lines that were easy to recite.

Narrative Videos

Here are a few narrative videos I found while trying to play catch-up.

This video was created by the same fellow who brought us the internet phenomena “When Lynch Met Lucas”. This whole movie was shot on an iPhone.

I’m incredibly intrigued by this photo – content and technical wise.

This film has intrigued me ever since I first heard about it. In 2009, the creator of it showed the film at the Starz center here on campus and I went and saw it. The actual film is really short but has a really interesting story line and visuals. I highly encourage everyone go and check it out.

Animated GIFs

Here are the animated GIFs I made!

Videos

So, I kind of failed at finding two videos I love. I actually found a ton. It’s not easy to limit them down, but here they are.

First and foremost is a video I saw while in high school that really opened my eyes to the possibilities of art and perspective. It’s called “More” and was made in 1998 by Mark Osborn. It’s a claymation film, which is a type of stop animation.

I’m a really really big sucker for animation films so I have a few of those as well. Some of these are a little creepy, but cool anyway.

Sorry about the weirdness of those, once again. I think video has a strange way of bringing out the many sides of humanity and makes room for even those darker sides.

As far as performance videos go, I have a few that I adore, but most are full-length films, which don’t really serve the purpose of this class, but I’m putting them here in case anyone is interested at all. I have many more that I love, but these ones include interesting performances, artistic scenery and masterful editing/cinematography. I love how each of these films uses the content of the story to help dictate the editing and mood of the technical film.

Here’s a little music video, that’s directed by Spike Jonze, and features Christopher Walken in it. I am mostly intrigued with Walken’s sweet moves.

Fatboy Slim

Anyway. That’s a wrap!