remarks at gafa » animation

interesting links>HOTEL an interactive story

admin — Fri, 16 Oct 2009 05:29:32 +0000

HOTEL is a 10-part animation that takes place in the anonymous space of an extraordinary and strange hotel. This hotel is the home base of Preconstruction, the company run by Dr. Doglin. Doglin is an unusual doctor conducting research into ‘freak accidents‘. In exchange for payment, volunteers agree to undergo tests that Dr. Doglinperforms on them. Hotel is a game in which seemingly nothing can be lost, but also nothing can be won.

HOTEL was made in 2004 by Dutch artist Han Hoogerbrugge. I believe it is a very good example of how an online story can become a totally immersive experience.

You can explore the hotel and the story online at:
http://www.hoteloscartangoecholima.com/splash.html

interesting links>YAH-interactive from Beijing

admin — Sun, 11 Oct 2009 12:15:47 +0000

YAH-Interactive is a design group in Beijing that specializes in both commercial and art projects, whereby interaction, animation and a lot of imagination is involved.

Checkout their weblog here: http://www.yahplus.cn/blog/onlycity在里昂/
and their main website here: http://anyah.cn/
and a experimental work here: http://yahlab.com/

They’ve just come back from France where, together with artist Liu Qiangyuan, they created an online project called: Only City
About their city of the Eye:
“Only city.org is a city constructed on Google Earth (…)by Yah Lab. They named the Only City “the City of the Eye” in Chinese which implied the capital city/the Forbidden City. Moreover, in Chinese culture the eye is the finishing touch an artist makes his work alive, It is the crucial action that gives life to anything. (…) Liu’s [Qiangyuan] real size woodcut figurines reside in the Only City and become a reflection as well as storyteller(…)”

Using Google Earth (which you could definitely call public space) they’ve created and environment where people from all over the world can connect. Woodcut characters made by Liu Qiangyuan, mix with the virtual world of games and online environments. Here are some screenshots of the site. Click on the thumbnails for larger version:

Visit the site here: - http://onlycity.org/

show and tell 25 09 09typo narratives

admin — Fri, 25 Sep 2009 05:32:55 +0000

Today I’ll be showing some examples of what I call typo narratives – stories told using typography.

YOUNG-HAE CHANG HEAVY INDUSTRIES – A Korean/American art duo living in Korea.
Using flash, they animate various texts, varying from light to philosophical and intellectual, and use music as a soundtrack. The texts are in many different languages including, english, french, korean, chinese, portuguese, german and many more. They use the same lettertypes, most animations are just in black and white. The rythym of the animation, and how it matches the soundtrack make for a compelling reading/watching and listening experience.

Secondly I’ll show Beautiful World a typo-film made in 2006 by Dutch graphic designer Mieke Gerritzen.

Beautiful World is a film to read or typography to look at. It contains texts only: quotes by well-known and less well-known thinkers who shaping an image of the world. This film is about globalization and seeks to show that the world is being dumbed down because practically everything has become linked to economic interests.

A film about a visual language of signs, codes and trends with the goal of deploying products, visions, statements, politics, subcultures and everything possible in the name of visible economic growth. Text and language are taken apart and the film becomes a visual machine for the meaning, manipulation and seduction of the word.

Recognition is the most succesful product of today. Beautiful World is a film about visual culture in which form and content are no longer presented separately and the boundaries of entertainment and high culture are unclear.