Boil - Video art

It has been a long time since I shared one of my video projects. Well, I'm back and have a story to tell. This one is from 2005 and was an unusual project, even for me. I forgot to post about it in it's normal chronology because I mislaid the files. Luckily I found them again multiplexed the audio and remastered the video for your viewing pleasure.

This has not been shared before except for one extraordinary performance, on a winters night in Tallinn, Estonia.

I had been asked by my friend Kirke if I would be interested in creating a video to accompany a new collection of music works by a group of Avant-garde orchestral musicians in Estonia. They would perform it in a cinema and wanted something to bring the screen to life as they played. It sounded like a bit of a lark so, I said Okey dokey.

My first question was could I hear the music to see what I was to be inspired by? Unfortunately, none of the musicians had finished their pieces yet. I have worked on several music videos before and this seemed a bit odd and not the normal modus operandi. I set up a call with the composers and I asked them for something, anything to help me get an idea of what all this was to be about. They said the piece was called Boil and then threw out words like clocks, freezing, boiling, wet, melting, city. All very non-descript but I started to see something. Elements that I could string together into some sort of narrative so that at least I could get some shots together. I would be flying blind, not knowing where or when the music would suggest these elements but at least we were forming some sort of language although, possibly telling very different stories.

I was told the performance should take an hour. So. if I had enough visuals to fill that time everything would be OK on the night. I wasn't so sure.

Going full avant grade

I had been introduced to some interesting musical projects in Estonia through my friend Kirke. Her father was the famous musician Raimo Kangro. When I would visit I would always see some sort of obscure performance by family friends. I loved it, to be introduced to things which were so far removed from what I was used to. Although, at times head scratching it was all very creative and inspirational. I was very excited to be asked to be part of it in my own small way so I set to work, sketching out ideas.

I wanted to include the elements they mentioned but also have something to bring a human element into the mix and have a narrative that would help me at least have a start, middle and end.

Clocks

I shot as much as I could in Ireland. All the clock shots were made on my desk and kitchen. My brother Ross had a grandfather clock which he had made and I got him to get me some video of that also. I had many different cameras to play with but the vast majority of these shots were taken with a very small CCD security camera that I bought in China. It could focus ultra close and I could fit it into tiny spaces without getting in the way of my lights. It was a lot of fun.

I wanted to start the video close and still, then slowly zoom out and build on movement. There were actually several sub-themes I was playing with: texture, movement , time and temperature. All brought from one extreme to the other. Each element was brought on a journey, trying to give it a story arc.

I will admit that what I was trying to do is difficult to put into words but hopefully, you will get what I mean if you watch the video.

Nature

After the clocks, I videoed nature. Again, with some shots made in Ireland. The more I did at home the more ideas I got for what I would do when I went on location to Estonia. I spent around a week in Tallinn and the countryside around it trying to explore my ideas. It was a very enjoyable experience, letting the camera become my eyes. It was freeform video trying to capture the essence of the frozen landscape.

The human touch

My last element to capture was the human body. I had a wonderful model called Mac who really got into the idea and was willing to experiment and push herself to the limits.

We began with the most difficult shots involving ice. These were filmed at a food packing factory. I was given access to a freezer and some blocks of ice. It was cold but at least I was able to keep my clothes on. My wonderful model impressed me so much that she was willing to interact with the ice with her naked body. I wanted the contrast between skin and ice and throughout the shoot the figure slowly thaws and came to life.

As an artist in her own right, Mac was willing to make this vision a reality. There were three of us there that day. Mac, Kirke and myself. Kirke helped me with art direction and I was happy to have a chaperone for the model. We shared a bottle of hard alcohol to give us central heating and by the end, we were all quite tipsy. I gave as much control as I could to Mac. Telling her what images I wanted to capture and then allowed her to give me what she could in 1-minute instalments to make that happen. Then she would be warmed up in blankets by a heater until she was ready for the next. It blew me away how she suffered for my art.

I kept rolling hoping to capture as much as I could for the edit. We used big halogen lamps for lighting they also helped speed along the process of melting and took some of the chill out of the air.

Blue movie

For the next scenes with Mac I shoot in the living room of her house. I set up a blue screen (Blue fabric) on the wall and had two cameras filming from different angles. I wanted a blue background so that I could composite the shots together with other images that I had already filmed. We experimented with lots of ideas, close-ups and large movement shots. it was much more comfortable for Mac in this environment and she gave me all the time I needed to bring the ideas together.

I had come up with the final scene of her riping through the frozen forest into the green landscape but had no idea how to realise it. Then, a crazy idea came to me. Why couldn't I use a blue screen and a green screen together in one scene?

We placed a green cloth behind the blue and then drew her silhouette and cut it out in many different pieces that she could easily peel away to reveal the green. I could then use a plugin to isolate the different colours as a matte. I have never seen this done before and It worked a treat.

My cameras and lighting were not great. This was all filmed in standard definition which was the best I could get in those days. I was concerned that when I blew it up to a cinema screen everything would look rubbish but as I said it was the best I could do with the lack of budget and lack of technology. Some say that the best camera is the one you have on you.

In the can

I finally had many many tapes of footage and now came the fun part of putting it all together. I had a week of editing back in Ireland and then would fly to Estonia on the day of the premier.

Editing can be a solitary exercise and this was definitely the case here. I locked myself away with cups of coffee and eye drops working every hour of the day for a week, Experimenting, cutting and recutting. Not having the music to hand made it very strange. I had no idea of the tempo or what the music sounded like at all. So I put everything together on a wing and a prayer.

Finally, I was done. I had some sort of story arc which was understandable to me at least. How it would be perceived was in the eye of the beholder. I liked the way it was abstract, leaving some creativity to the viewer. The quality was what it was, I did the best I could with the equipment and time that I had.

On the big screen

The cinema was an old arthouse style building with one screen. I was shown to the projection room with its big 35mm protector. It also had a video projector and a bank of electronics. I had Dvd of the movie and popped it in ready to go. Nobody had seen anything of what I was going to show and to be honest they didn't seem that interested. Maybe it was that they just trusted that I knew what I was doing. I really didn't, this was experiment in every meaning of the word.

The musicians set up under the screen and I put a test pattern in the screen just to make sure something was going to happen when I pressed play. I could see through a little window everything as the cinema filled up. I was glad that I had somewhere to hide if everything went pear-shaped.

All the introductions were done in Estonian and I waited until the lights went down and the tuning was finished to press play. I had nervous sweats wondering would my video even work on this equipment and would the visuals be completely out of context with the music.

The opening sounds were not very musical, Played on the strings inside a piano. Like the ticking of a clock. Perfect, the visuals were as right as they could be. After a few minutes I started to relax. There were many sounds being produced on stage that matched perfectly. Like everything was made to be.

Sitting there in my little dark room with a beam of light projecting my several weeks of work I had time to take it all in. I have a live orchestra playing to one of my films just like in the early days of cinema. This was an amazing experience.

To see the tiny things I had shot in my bedroom and wandered through the landscape to capture projected on such a big screen was awe-inspiring. The nude body with goose pimples enlarged to such a scale sent shivers down my own spine. I was having a great time. The music was like it was written especially for it. Very minimalist and the whole package came across as art.

I had no idea how the audience was reacting as I only saw the back of their heads. I could see hands coming up to rub their goaty beards or loosen their polo-neck sweaters but that is all.

Near the end I had to do a bit of Vjaying as the video was running out and the music was continuing. I had to loop the video end sequence so I would not be left with dead air.
In the end, I was very happy with how things went and the response from the audience was all that I hoped for.

The final track of sounds took me and the audience by surprise. I was glad my video had run out by then also as I don't think it would have made much sense.

The end of the beginning

I was very happy with how the video came across and that what I made added to the experience. I doubt anymore became of this performance and it has just sat on a hard drive unwatched ever since. I am happy to give it a second viewing. I know it won't be everyone's cup of tea but for me, it gave me a great taste of what is possible with this kind of video music collaboration and I hope to do more someday. For now, though, it was just a one-off adventure.