(5.2.5) - Four by Six

Depth of Motion / Installation

This acts as a follow up from a previous post - the follow up task from 5.2.3 - in which i (by chance) outlined the general plan of what my 4/6 project will sound like, so please give it a look over again!:

4.4 Return - Interactive ‘Where Was I..?’

Last year, as part of our 4.4 module, specifically the second task - video, i created a pseudo adaptation of my zine - ‘Where Was I..?’ - a strange and mysterious look into the unnatural repetition that can be found all around us, but with the specific focus

leedsdotgraphicsThomas Gormley

Project Overview

Since that post however, i have given the idea more thought and thought of more details for the functioning of the project, basically taking it from a concept to a coherent plan. Below is a checklist / overview of the installation which breaks the concept down into - hopefully - easy to understand phrases:

• Installation - based on an installation by original inspiration artist Drezzdon
• Situated in a larger room 4 walls with centralized doors on each wall
  • black walls on the outside / white walls on the inside
  • 1 video projected on each wall
  • real doorways sit in the same place as the projected doorways - makes it feel immersive for when people enter or exit the room
• each video is a still / not so still of a 'where was i' doorway
• user interactivity: scan a qr code before entry
  • on their phones, users select a direction to move the projection in - north east south or west
  • the most voted direction is the direction the room moves in
    • eg. if north is selected, the north wall transitions, camera moves through the selected doorway - the door opens up and we move north. east south and west become a standard - blurred movement lines to show the transition
    • (instead of movement lines it could be a resident evil style doorway transition for - in this case - south, and side door entries for - in this case - east and west)
    • voted movement occurs once a minute
  • each of the 4 doors are fitted with electromagnetic locks, during a movement phase, the door we are moving through gets locked, so that no - one walks through it and breaks the immersion during the movement phase. The other three doors are open during the movement phase - for user freedom
  • every 5 minutes (5 movement phases) user submitted phrases will also be displayed at random during the minute that we are sat still.
    • These phrases will be entered in the same place that user vote on the movement direction
    • they will be displayed alongside pre created shape animations - based on the ones i created based on the ones drezzdon used
• there will be a pre-created map for behind the scenes, the map will be composed of squares on a grid of anywhere between 20x20 to 100x100
  • each square on the grid represents one instance of 4 projected doorways
  • the 4 doorways are mapped to each grid square, so depending on what square the room is in, depends on the doorways shown
  • the aim of having such a large grid is to be able to hide things within it
    • 5 'secrets' will be scattered throughout the map
    • when a location that holds a secret is found a few things will happen
      • the room dims
      • the movement phases / timer stops for 2 minutes
      • the secret appears - one of five coloured 'things' that will bounce around the room walls
      • a 'sparkling' song will play
      • the users phone will recognize that they are in a secret room, and record the fact that the user located the secret
      • the secret will disappear
      • the movement phase will resume
      • the secret returns to the secret room, once the users have left the secret room
    • finding all the 5 secrets will grant the users a prize! i don't know what the prize is yet, but it'll be something physical that the user can claim from outside of the walled room

• ambient music, similar to what i used in my own video and that that drezzdon uses in his videos will be used at the venue.
  • the audio would need to be like 2 hours long - or a selection of songs that tots up to being a 2 hour playlist
  • the music would swell during a movement phase, either being distorted or simply louder as to further add to the mysterious nature of the installation and the video
  • an alternate music track would play when a secret is found
• within the room itself:
  • it is likely that users may spend at least an hour there trying to find all the secrets
  • due to this, a selection of seating should be made available - beanbags would be the preference for maximum comfort - but cushioned benches would be fine too
  • the projectors will be sat on the roof, so that people cant attack them
  • as stated, the walls would likely be white, as that would allow the projection to work
• outside the room:
  • 4 black walls in a square
  • each wall has red printed text with standard messages of similar to what drezzdon uses in their videos
    • sets the scene before entering the room itself
    • above the doors are red and green lights, green is standard, red light for when the door is locked
  • seating around the outer walls of the room
  • stand for merchandise / prize collection somewhere near the walls
  • free poster / memorabilia stand also

This section wasn't going to be this long at all, but the ideas kept coming, and this works as a checklist for my project at the same time as being its outline.

Visual Evidence

With the project that i bought for my girlfriend, we projected the existing video onto her slanted wall ceiling to feel what the general vibe would be. Imagine a still of this on 4 walls.

Technical Requirements

• LOTS of time
  • time needed to create a lot of transition templates
• Coding
  • coding would be required to create an internal grid to situate the room in
  • similar code would be needed to call up the next sequence, situate it beneath the current sequence, then transition from current to new
    • all whilst setting the other 3 walls into transition mode
• Software wise
  • after effects to create more transitions between doorways, in the same manner as the original video
    • also the video editing to make the doors actually open this time, due to this making the process easier overall
  • same as the coding - a custom program to keep track of and load up the correct videos in the sequence
• SPACE
  • the actual space to be able to show the event
  • plus 4 good projects to hang from the space's ceiling to allow for the whole concept of the event to work.

Conclusion: this would be really hard for me to be able to accomplish by myself,
I'd need a really dedicated team. With what time i had left before the deadline, and giving focus to other elements of the module I simply don't have the time to invest into working on this more. I've made two posts already, however i simply don't have the knowledge or time to finish off this concept in more detail. I don't know what software more than custom programs id need, there might be a software that perfectly works in my favour, i just don't have the time to find out sadly. All i have to share this time is the concept - not the outcome.