05.06.2008
3:43 pm
So I spent a few hours last night playing around in Cinema4D and getting used to the interface, working with the tools, modelling etc. Also spent a number of hours trying to figure out reflections and playing around with C4D’s Mo-Graph module which is pretty fantastically dope. I forgot to render out some of my different scenes as I was playing around except for this last one. 
05.01.2008
3:20 am
An illustration experiment I created for the Emily Carr viewbook.
05.01.2008
2:39 am
Pardon the Dylan reference, I’m not actually going to shun all of my old work, in fact I’m going to promote it. I was digging through my archives as I was getting ready to put this site live and I found a ton of my old digital photo manipulations from quite a few years ago when I was first teaching myself photoshop. No, I don’t own most of the original photos seen in the images, but I thought it was interesting to see where I was and where I am now (and I’m sorry to anyone whose images I might’ve ripped off, I’ve learned my lesson since!).
But, and I know I’m dating myself here, digging through these images totally took me back a few years. It took me down memory lane when I still talked with Sigurd (I still owe this Flatcat alias to him) and he turned me onto the Lockjaw boys, .nu domains were free (Kiiroi!), Prate, Harsh, Token/MSchmidt, GMunk, Chapter3, and Idiocase were re-defining the web and everyone wanted to be Soopa Famous. It seems so long ago… and I feel really old all of a sudden…
Anyway, take heed that everything posted below is 5-8 years old and enjoy.
05.01.2008
2:04 am
Another Foundation Media Arts project. We had to create a “self-less self portrait”, maximum two minutes in length. I drove around Vancouver in my Golf while my friend Lexi videotaped. I then took the footage into Premiere and pieced together a clip two minutes in length which I then took over to After Effects. In After Effects I added the type, and added some filters, duplications and blending modes to create the overall aesthetic for the piece. The sound was recorded using a Zoom H4 Recorder just down the street from my apartment in one take (yes, the ambulance coincidently came by as I was recording… I guess that’s one of the benefits to living near a hospital). I’ve gotta say, I was quite impressed with the sound quality of the H4 after using it for this and my audio project.
Additionally, this was the first time I’d ever actually touched Adobe Premiere and After Effects. I found both, with the help of some video tutorials, extremely easy to pickup and get working with. Obviously I have only had a very elementary experience with them thus far, but I’m definitely looking forward to spending some more time experimenting and playing around with them in the future.
Self-less Self Portrait from flatcat on Vimeo.
05.01.2008
12:16 am
Emily Carr also put on the first ever Foundation video competition to promote the year end Foundation Show.
I never actually got around to finishing my video, there was just too much stuff going on and too many deadlines to finish it in time. Plus, I wasn’t particularly happy with the footage I had shot, so I’ve decided to save the concept for another day or another project, which I don’t think it will be too hard to find something to apply it to. I did, however, finish off the end credit sequence and was quite happy with how it turned out as it was one of my first major forays into After Effects outside of my self-less self portrait (which was mostly just using blending modes…). I can see that I definitely will enjoy getting into After Effects a lot more in the future. The glitchy text effects were created using Video Co-Pilot’s Twitch
ECIAD Title Sequence from flatcat on Vimeo.
04.30.2008
11:15 pm
My second foray into audio was for my Emily Carr Foundation Media Arts class. We were assigned a project to create a 2-minute “experimental” audio piece (re: no music). Utilizing Zoom’s H4 Recorder, we were instructed to record some sounds. We then had to bring these sounds into Audacity to compile and create our final audio piece. Additionally, we were not allowed to utilize anymore than three sounds.
I recorded myself saying part of a passage from the beginning of Tool’s Third Eye, which is actually part of a skit by comedian Bill Hicks. This recording was then layered multiple times upon itself and each instance heavily modified using Audacity’s editing tools and effects to create an extremely atmospheric and psychedelic piece. There’s some pretty heavy bass near the end when it’s reaching it’s climax, so CONSIDER YOURSELF WARNED: watch your volume/subs.
File Link: Imploding Existence
04.30.2008
10:34 pm
An old audio project from my time at Guru Digital Arts College. One of the few projects from that time that still holds up fairly well. If I remember correctly, the title comes from my walk/bus-ride to school that day which was extremely foggy. This was made in Acid Pro, I believe, utilizing the sound libraries that come with the program. It should also probably be noted that I had no sound program experience before this and I think the Acid Pro segment of the course consisted of two full day classes (if that…) including the creation of our final project…
File: Morning Mist
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