Ok, here it is…… the moment you’ve all been waiting for…… Ren’s review of 1024 at the Elektra last weekend.
Well, the gang at Epoxy does it again ! only the skill and dedication at epoxy combined with the exposure offered by the Elektra festival could bring together some of the leading authorities in the mograph industry.
Here’s a small critique as well as a description of the guests present that day:
(please excuse me for not remembering the names of some of the presenters J )
The event started off with a presentation of a software created “in house” by the gang over at UVA over in London. Since they do a lot of event driven work, they have created a piece of software to enable them to visualize in real-time 3d space the event and coordination of video screens. This impressive software enables them to see, mix and add effects to the different video streams in real-time. Overall (even though the speaker was a little hung over from the previous night’s live performance) this was a interesting look into a different approach to motion work.
Next up was a slightly shy and emotionless speaker Etienne Auger from the French studio “incandescence”. He started off by showing us some of their more experimental clips; I think they where from a vj’ing session. Although the style and animation on these pieces was nothing to write home about, the fact that all of it was scripted within after effects was very interesting. They also presented a website they have produced for a Japanese fashion designer. This site was really very interesting, well worth a look ! I think we all wish that we could have such open minded clients !!!
After this we were introduced to a young talent from here who, I think, splits his time between Montréal and Paris. Frederic Bourque is his name and he leads the studio “ambidextre”. He started of by showing us some of this commercial work including the AMC piece he collaborated on with Shilo. These were pretty unimpressive although very well executed. Then, he gave us a sneak preview of two projects him and his studio were working on. These were really worth it ! Some very original work; look out for theses guys in the future!
D-Fuse from London was up next, presenting some of their vj’ing work and a DVD project done in collaboration with Beck. Overall interesting work although the very geometric and clod style of the design is not really my "cup of tea" and I’m not exactly sure I understood everything they explained with regards to they’re DVD project he had some really interesting points of view to give during the question period about design, inspiration and process.
Right after this we had the very exceptional privilege of listening to epoxy’s resident humble genius George Fok. Although most Montrealers know George’s impressive portfolio inside and out some of the attending audience might not have seen all of his work witch is why he started off by showing some of the vodkice commercials of witch he was the original creator (animation, design and music). After this, he showed us a videoclip he made specifically for the show to one of his new songs that will be coming out on the next “future sounds of Montréal” cd (if I’m not mistaken). Very cool video especially considering it was completely done (shooting and all) in about 4 days before the show.
The next studio needed no real introduction, and I think a lot of the people present were there to see them, MK12 !! I was very impressed by their humble presentation. I must say that their philosophies regarding design and work ethics were the ones that most closely matched my own and it was nice to see that others work in a similar way. We were privileged to be some of the first to be able to see a few (10 or so) minutes of their much awaited, not so short movie “The history of America”. This clip, as well as the exclusive sneak preview of a upcoming music video, displayed clearly why mk12 has and continues to be amongst the leaders in the mograph industry.
Special effects guru Kevin Tod Haug was up next. You might not have heard of him before but you most probably have seen some of sfx work in the cell, fight club and panic room just to name few. I don’t think I need to comment on his impeccable work check out his portfolio, it speaks for it’s self. Very cool to have a world leader in sfx come to speak to us here in Montréal !
Last but oh not least was the rather eccentric Doc Baily. If you had never seen him before (like me) you’ll be hard pressed to forget about him anytime soon ! He has created a piece of software witch enables him to paint with photons (check out his website cause i don’t think I can really explain the process). This enabled him to create, amongst other things, the planet in the movie Solaris. Can’t say I’m a big fan of the look but the output, the process and especially the man were very interesting.
Well that’s about it…… check out the
http://www.elektra1024.ca/ website for more details about the festival and the individual guest speakers.
…. I hope that there will more of these events in the future because I think they are a important part of our little community. Again, many thanks to the dream team over at epoxy for making this possible!
Ren
Edited by renlogik, 19 May 2005 - 12:04 AM.
