Mystery Men Test 1

For my film i am going to use a mixture of POV filming...and set pieces.One of my set pieces involves the camera panning across the sofa where 4 masked men will be sitting...looking pretty much identical. My task today was to try and get a smooth shot. The film above is done just holding the camera and walking infront of the sofa. This is too wobbly for what I want so I have made a device to help get a smooth shot. This is shown above...it is a remote control car with a tripod taped onto it....this enables the camera to move smoothly and at the same level across the floor. The only problem now is that the device moves in a diagonal motion along the sofa...so i need a wooden track now to hold the camera in a straight line.

Ambitious Idea

So...I have two weeks left to produce a master piece. I have got my heart set on a film....although I want to incorporate my map idea as well. At the moment I see my project as a cupboard full of random ingredients - I need to rustle up a delicious meal using them. The film is going to be set predominantly in the garage and lounge of my house. The garage is going to represent the dark, trapped sensations of isolation explored in my pathway stage. The Lounge is going to represent interactions with others. For me the worry and anxiety that isolation creates is much relieved when being around others, however I still feel an element of isolation as I can never directly experience what other people feel, how do I know when I smile and when you smile we feel the same. I want to use masks, shadows, silhouettes, face paint etc in the lounge to represent the barrier between peoples physical and mental selves. I want the lounge to be crazy, tripy, circus like, Alice in wonderland, acid tripy,I want to get some really fun but bizarre footage of people...This is going to completely contrast with the lonely, dark footage of the garage. So - garage dark- I am going to try and put the Box from my pathway stage in there with someone inside, concrete, bricks, rough surfaces. The lounge is going to have soft materials, bright colours, lots of people, bizarre goings on. I want to use someone dressed up as a pink bunny with no face. I have this amazing vision in my head .... however it could turn out shit lets hope not. Today I am going to draw up some set piece ideas and do a few test shots.
Influences = 


Mattew Barney - The Cremaster Cycle

El Guincho - Bombay Video

The Panda from Its All gone Pete Tong

Plywood Post

Okay so this it my piece so far...this has taken about a month to make having done all the screen printing, planning and testing. Once the screen prints were done and the lines transferred from the questionnaires to the wood...I decided to explore the material further. After chatting with my teacher I decided to chisel out  the rooms which were locked...the wood representing those rooms is more textured

Back From Easter Holiday...

Since getting back to college from easter I have been working on my screen prints. They are for my piece 'An Investigation In To The Social Dynamics of a House Party.' I made the screens myself with a little help from the technician....I filmed this process which i will post on here soon. This took a whole day to do.
When the screens were ready to be used I tested printing on paper. I did 2 prints of each floor in green and two prints of each floor in red. The lines on each print did not come out identical some lines were darker than others, some lines had a few little gaps in them...however, there was enough information there for the viewer to recognise that the lines showed an architectural map. In fact I was very pleased with the way the lines turned out...I did not want a traditional architectural drawing(as in very precisie, perfect lines) as I do not find this visually exciting.
After doing some prints on paper I decided to my final prints on plywood. Next I found a sheet of wood with beautiful grain. I printed the downstairs plan on the left next to the upstairs plan on the right, below I left a space for me to put a plan of the front garden and a space for a key, so the whole piece is rather big about 1.5 meters by 3 meters. The ink used for the printing was a bluey, greay colour...its quite dark, i wanted the plan outline to stand out but not take over from the marks that were to be made inside it.

I feel though I am on target for the FMP ,however, it seems I have a few diverse ideas which could possibly be shown in the final exhibition - I need to decided which idea would best suit the show...

Pag The Lady is Not Dead

These photos were inspired by 'Pag - The Lady Is Dead' a music video shown below 

It was also inspired by Ally Standings photograph - 

Hand prints are like the shadows of where somebody has been touched. This work is about sexual interaction and how it leaves invisible 'marks' on people... The memories of sexual encounters. I did the photos with Ally Standing and Charlie Davies as models. We used the garage as a setting which I think worked well... I liked the brickwork, mattress and windows as backdrops as they gave the shoot an industrial feel. The bare mattress and bare brickwork also gave the shoot a trashy edge. Someone mentioned they resemble some of Terry Richardson's work.

Point Of View

I think it would be interesting to make a point of view film where the viewer feels although they are experiencing what the camera is showing. Kind of like a virtual reality, obviously this is only aimed at two senses - vision and sound. If I had all the time in the world I would try and make a virtual sensory experience, something that takes you into a totally different reality. Obviously we can never experience what it is like to be somebody else ...as out brains all manage and process information differently...however a piece of art that controls the sensory information a person receives would be interesting. I saw an interesting piece of video art in the High Society Exhibition in London back in the winter. It was a blurred film about the effects of cannabis...the audio was a mans voice saying a rather philosophical verse...however half way through him saying it another verse would layer over it leaving the listener confused and almost stoned! I cant for the life of me find out what this video was...if anyone has any idea please let me know, it was really inspiring. Above is a music video (Chase and Status n Plan B - Pieces) I thought relevant ...note when the girl has the video camera its almost like the viewer is at the party....I like this style....what a bitch thought :P

Screen Printing

Recently I have been concentrating on connections and integration between people. I have decided to produce a piece mapping out the movements and experiences of people at my birthday house party a few weeks ago. A drew out rough diagrams of the upstairs and downstairs of the house, I then measured the house and noted down all the measurements. This took me about an hour with some help. My friend then helped me draw out the diagrams using a programme on the computer called sketcher. I printed out the diagrams large so each floor of the house covered 8 pieces of A4 paper. I then got some A3 acetate, taped it together until it covered each print out of the diagram and traced over in in thick black felt tip. I was using the acetate to make a screen for printing. Unfortunately the way screens are made uses light....if the light can travel through the markings on the acetate the screen will not be successful for printing. The black lines I had traced were not dark enough so the screen which was produced did not work as well as I had hoped, I made a print using it but unfortunately the lines did not show in some places and were faint in others...although i didn't mind the different textures on the lines, I did need all the lines to show up for the map to be successful. I had to make the lines darker so I doubled up the acetate and drew over the second layer with dark felt tip pen too...I am still waiting for the results from this which should be ready after the easter holidays, hopefully the lines made from the screen printing will be bold enough for my piece. Some people have suggested that screen printing was not a wise choice for technical style drawings..however I think the printing method makes the technical drawings far more interesting because the lines are not all 100% perfect and precise and there are some imperfections. (Above is a photograph of the acetate I have been describing)