Joakim Faxvaag is a Norwegian lighting designer and visualist. He’s been traveling with Phoenix for the past year while constantly evolving the visual aspects of their shows. Joakim is using (among other things) the excellent modular video app VDMX — the same software that I use for visuals during the Tycho shows. To see what he’s been able to do with it is inspiring to say the least.
He lists his setup as follows: “custom quartz patches, 15000 ansi front projector, 6 x dl.2s, 6 x mac 700s, 10 x mac 2000s, 6 x atomics, mac pro running vdmx, kineme artdmx + grandma fullsize ++”. You can see some more examples at Joakim’s site.
One of the best beat records i’ve heard this year is this Free The Robots LP, it has the freshness of freedom in the studio and no pressure of having to be hype or head nodding just a great collection of tracks.
Tobacco has teamed up with Beck a couple of times on the new album Maniac Meat, the record reminds me of the first time I saw a Garbage Pail Kid card, it was harsh yet I couldn’t have enough. UPDATE: Needed to take this down, sorry guys, i’ll have it up again around the release date
Before I post something from the new Delorean record I wanted to share this remix they did of Glasser, it touches on how a slow Cocorosie song would start off and its well worth sticking around for the firework going off breakdown that transitions back into the song, very clever.
Looping noise pop trio Growing has a new record coming out called Pumps!, its for fans of F*ck Buttons yet this is a bit more Black Dice like in my mind with it being more tense and dirty.
Pitchfork debuted Phantogram‘s Mouthful of Diamonds video which the couple are in a pretty nice cabin out in the woods and many odd things go down, I won’t spoil the fun.
You do not want to know how long I spent trying to rig a vertical stop motion set up this week. Duct tape was flying around everywhere, lights were falling and shattering from above, and I had to take at least one ‘cool down before I break something’ walk. Surprisingly, Google was unhelpful in providing useful solutions — though this may have had something to do with a confusion in terms (is it aerial stop motion? vertical? 90 degrees?) I never quite know what to classify it as.
Anyway, I’ve written this brief process post about how I set up everything. It worked great for me, but I do not intend this to be a “this is HOW you do it” type article. Classify this as a go-to “bootleg” option if you don’t have access to one of those crazy $10,000 rigs that lets you fly above your subject etc. If you are looking for a relatively easy and inexpensive way to complete this type of project, this is one way to do it. I’ll walk through the supplies and exactly what I did that worked best for me. At the end of the day, it’s actually pretty darn easy — but it’s always nice to get a peak at a successful process just in case you’re spinning your wheels. There probably is a better way to do this, but I couldn’t find one. (And do excuse the slightly blurry photograph above…unfortunately the camera that has the external flash capability was the one being photographed…)
And in case you have no idea what I’m talking about, this video is a GREAT example of this type of stop motion done extremely well.
Aisle One posted earlier on this incredible Wim Crouwel Archive. The Het Geheugen van Nederland has generously archived over 500 of the Dutch master’s works. Break out your printers, you could probably get some decent prints out of some of these. I have his book but a lot of these are completely new to me.
I didn’t realize the other day, when I mentioned Spike Jonze’s “I’m Here”, that the actual film had already been released. The trailer was exciting enough for me I guess. Now you can view the entire 30min film on the website. They limit the amount of viewers per day, so make sure to take a look when you can. I haven’t seen it fill up recently, but you never know. Props for a smooth web interface too — feels like a video game without being frustratingly slow or clumsy like most Flash pages.
The film itself is great; the opening sequence is especially well done. The music works really well with the visuals throughout, and of course the whole thing stars robots. They are remarkably expressive, what for being robots and all. I really like the combination of animation and lo-fi costumes; it works really well for this, just like WTWTA. The story is a nice one, a little sad/mopey, but I enjoyed it overall. I found myself more attracted to the uniqueness of the whole project rather than any specific aspect of the plot.
My favorite part is when the bearded guy in the car yells “You’re a ROBOT!!” into the main characters head. Awesome. Check it out here.
Over the past year I’ve been going through the process of scaling some of my posters for large format (e.g. the Knitting print: Old | New). Most of these were originally designed for 12×18″ format so they had to be re-created from scratch. It’s been a painstaking process at times, but it has also allowed me a chance to approach some of the designs from a fresh perspective. Something about stripping a design down to nothing and building it back up again gives you a clearer view of the essential nature of the piece allowing for more objectivity when making design decisions.
The latest print to be scaled up is the poster for the Terrabyte music festival (pictured above — view original). As you can see, I’ve made some changes and cleaned a few things up. I’ll be posting a process piece detailing the various earlier versions of the print and the transition from small to large format next week. The print is currently available as a giclee from the ISO50 Shop.
On a side note, if you’re partial to any of the older designs in the small formats now would be the time to grab some, they will not be reprinted. They can be viewed in the prints section at the shop.
I’m not going to try and explain how good is Hammock music video is, you should just check it out yourself, what great treatment and ideas behind each shot, David Altobelli should just go and do a movie now.
On the music player front Off The Sky reworks Rob Theakston’s cleverly named album I Am Waiting for You to Stop Being Mad at Me, a piece that touches on slow yet busy low level music that reminds me of walks on cold fall afternoons on very jagged terrian, you can download it FREE here.
Black Tambourine throws their hat in as who will put out the best post rock track in 2010 and with Pack You Up they have a very good chance in my book. Look for them and Soft Moon to make it to well versed goth kids mixtapes this year once they tire out the tempo of The Xx.
