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This is a very low resolution version of Discovery, Familiarisation, Recognition, DFR.
This is a high resolution frame shot from the animation itself.
While studying at the Australian Center for Arts and Technology (ACAT, now the Center for New Media Arts, CNMA) the animation course required us to produce three works, the first was an introduction to 2D animation, no sound. Below is the very first animation I produced, I added the sound later, to make it a little more interesting.
TV Death
In our second work we were still using 2D but this time with sound. This was my first attempt at music visualisation. This work introduces my direction in visualisation, that of representing the notational aspects of music in a traditional way, high notes high on the stave, low notes low on the stave, each individual voice represented, you get the picture....
An Erroneous Diatonic Diatribe
My Final work was in 3D using the animation software, Houdini. This work was originally called reticulating bilge pump. It was named at about 4am in the morning after many months of very late nights. A few days later I was hauled over the coals and persuaded to take myself seriously. I couldn't think of a suitable title, which is why it doesn't have one in the video itself. This animation was chosen from amongst many international entries to be screened in the digital section of the 1999 Sydney International Film Festival. Unfortunately my father, after having seen the animation said he though it looked like two fillings in search of a tooth, after which I can't take any of my work seriously anymore, hence the current title, which has stuck.....
Filling Lost
In this work I started to included harmonic content which can be seen as vibrating rings inside the discs. This involved doing fourier transforms to tease out the spectral energies of the component harmonics. I coudn't include any more than three harmonics as this was a too labour intensive way of presenting harmonic information.
There are questions of narrative involved here as well. Ultimately there was not supposed to be any meaning, it was just music visualised. The backdrop was one purely to provide an isolated visual context for the visualisation to take place. The construction around which the voices fly was needed to provided a foundation from which to develop a sense of up and down, high pitch, low pitch. Interestingly enough, as I was compelled to assign meaning to my work by my supervisors for the benefit of an audience, the story of two aural beings existing in a lonely isolated world emerged. The lower line represents the voice of the conservative, unwilling to explore or change, tied down to tradition, resentful and obstructive of efforts to break free of the old and stale. The upper line is the voice of the free spirit, desiring to spread its wings, break free to fly away and explore. The music and the images do reflect the conflict in this story, the break for freedom, the chase, the capture, resignation. But ultimately it is up to the viewing audience to interpret what they will. There was never supposed to be a story......