VJ-workshop på Konstfack

Förra måndagen höll jag i en VJ-workshop i Svarta Havet på Konstfack. Deltagarna var precis som jag själv, blivande Konst- och Medialärare som nu studerar 5:e och sista året.

Vi började med att se några filmer från DVDn som följer med boken “VJ: audio-visual art + VJ culture” [Laurence King 2006].

Därefter följde en genomgång av grundläggande funktioner och möjligheter i Modul8 2.5.

Temat var formless – precis som i vår ordinarie kurs, utifrån teorier av fransmannen George Bataille (1897-1962), som var filosof och författare. Han var 1929-1930 redaktör för tidskriften “Documents” som blandade konst, arkeologi, etnografi och populärkultur på ett sådant sätt att koventionella idéer om det så kallade primitiva och det så kallade ideala omkullvältes. Bataille motsatte sig den akademiska världen och dess idé om ett system med en allomfattande ordning och mätbarhet.

Detta gör formless intressant att ha som utgångspunkt under en VJ-workshop i en akademisk kontext. Kanske man kortfattat kan säga att begreppett formless handlar om att ifrågasätta vad som egentligen är “hög konst”, om nu något alls kan vara det i vårt efter-postmodernismen-samhälle…?

Formless har 1996 av Rosalind Krauss och Yves Alain-Bois delats in i fyra kategorier: låga material, horisontalitet, puls och entropi. Live visuals/VJ-ing förhåller sig ofta till alla fyra, precis som man också kan relatera live visuals/VJ-ing till samma områden som det skrevs om i Documents.

Hur som helst, det är alltid spännande att sätta verktyg i händerna på någon som aldrig använt dem. Vi använde mobilkameror för att filma råmaterial, gjorde några korrigeringar i Final Cut och blandade upp med live feed från en DV-kamera. Mot slutet av dagen blev det en hel del aha- och wowupplevelser, vilket glädjer mig mycket!

Självklart visade jag även vjunion.se och kan redan nu tipsa om att öppna workshops kommer anordnas så småningom. Håll koll på bloggen för info.

Tack till Martin Söderblom för foto och den spontana genomgången av Resolume 2.4.

Stay sharp!

VJ Union VJ jam 2008

It’s time for this year’s edition of the VJ jam that will be hosted by the Swedish VJ Union in co-operation with Pixelvärk and Berns.

The event takes place friday october 17 11pm – 4am at the club 2.35:1 at Berns.

Participating VJs/VJ crews:
BeteRum (Brazil), Dejakru, Fetish23, I <3 AG Studios, Instructions, Kirves, La Noche, Morrsken, Refekation, Sim On Wall, Startsladd, Vidiots, visuals by nino s

The DJs are:
DJ Jethro, Håkan Lidbo, Adrian Lux & Oscar Wedrén (half of Le Choix).
Also be sure to check out Pixelvärk’s other events on saturday and sunday.

The Party screen

All ways are good except the bad ones. I was at a friend’s birthday party the other night and he had made a simple and funny backprojection solution. The party was held at an office and in one of the smaller rooms they had a big glass window facing the big big main room. On the glass window they had taped two paper table cloths and projected video from within the little room with a normal office projector. The quality was quite okay with exception from the visible line in the middle where the table cloth had been taped together.

The union takes a sneak peak at Dejakru

We cruised down to Stockholm Zoo’s party at Berns last friday to check out Richie Hawtin and his über digital techno set (he runs two laptops, a Allen & Heath-mixer and some midi madness). Dejakru were doing the visuals. With the help from Tobe Joelsson and his cellphone camera we succeeded in documenting a few clips. It’s grateful to be able to project onto such a huge screen. Go Dejakru!

[blip.tv ?posts_id=1357616&dest=-1]

News from the VJ Theory project

Ana and Brendan from VJ Theory asked us to spread this through our network. The book that is printed on the print-on-demand service Lulu costs only $13.70 and is available for downlowd for $5.44. You can also read the text for free at VJ Theory’s homepage.

+ Updates from VJ Theory project ++

VJ Theory.net intends to develop a community actively discussing and reflecting on philosophy and theory related with Vjing, performed media and realtime interaction.

1- VJAM THEORY

At last the book VJam Theory: Collective Writings on Realtime Visual Performance is ready and available for purchase. For those of you who don’t know, the book is the outcome of our third experiment in collective theoretical writing, VJam Theory. You will find on the website the necessary information to buy the book online: http://www.vjtheory.net/realtime_books/vjam_theory.htm
The original transcript will continue to be available at VJ Theory website for free: http://www.vjtheory.net/vjamtheory.html

2- UPCOMING PUBLICATIONS ON THE WEBSITE

VJ Theory will be publishing new texts online on a monthly basis, through a period between October 2008 and March 2009. At the end of this period, realtime books will publish a print version of these texts (as many people have requested). We are also attempting to make the site less Anglo-Americocentric. We will be publishing non English versions of the texts (whenever possible), in order to make the site multilingual. Should you have a text that you would like us to publish please get in touch. If anyone would like to translate some work we would also like to hear from you.
Our email address: vjtheory@yahoo.co.uk

3- MAILING LIST

We are also establishing a mailing list. Instructions on subscribing are available on the first page of VJ Theory web site (http://www.vjtheory.net).
In this way you will be kept up to date on new work appearing online, events and discussions on and off line.
As usual, should you have any suggestions for projects or essays you would like us to publish then please do not hesitate to get in touch.

Best Regards,
Ana and Brendan

Muti-touch controller from Stanton

Stanton will soon be releasing the SCS.3d, a muti-touch MIDI controller at the wallet frienly price of $299. It would be nice to see what this control could do for a VJ. We will see if we can can get our hands on a SCS.3d for testing.

There is a good report at Future Music (I really recommend to subscribe to their news letter if you want to get the latest news about new midi controllers), so it feels unnecessary to write more here. There is also more info at Stanton.

There are more products within the same SCS range: The midi dj mixer SCS.1m and the player SCS.1d which are also looking delicious. For people making music, the SCS.1m also has a built in FireWire sound card. But what makes me happy as a VJ is that both units seems to have 4 endless encoders. But I don’t believe it until I see it with my own eyes.

Updates from iTouch Midi

Yesterday iTouch Midi released some updates in their range of midi applications for the iPod and iPod Touch. They have improved the xy-pad app and changed the name to iTM Pad and they have also released a new app called iTM Tilt that is using the gyro.

I tried iTM Tilt together with Modul8 but I thought it resulted in jerky motions. iTM Pad, on the other hand, works perfectly. It has preset functions where you can set different start points. It has a spring function that will let the object return to the start point when you stop dragging it around. Finally, there are tree function keys that also sends MIDI to your computer. They are good for switching graphics in your VJ software.

The iPhone as midi controller

It has started pop up some interesting midi applications for the iPhone and iPod Touch now. iTM MidiLab from iTouchMidi is the most interesting one for the time being. If you buy the program form iTunes App Store and downloads the software to your computer (Mac), you will get access to the following:

  • Midi button matrix (4×4 and 8×8)
  • Midi keyboard (C-2 -> C8) with pitch bend
  • XY pad (that sends CC 18 & 19)

iTouchMidi also has an application coming up called iTM Tilt that that uses the iPhone’s gyro but it seems to still be in a beta.

Mini Midi Maxi


Before summer Futuremusic dropped some interesting news that Korg will release their new Nano series around christmas. The Nano series is three midi controllers in mini format. Who hasn’t longed for something smaller to lug around? The price is estimated to a low $100. The only disadvantages I can imagine are that they are too light weight and will move around and that you can’t connect several Nano products to each other so you will need one free usb port per Nano unit. I’m also wishing for that there are endless encoders on the nanoKONTROL unit, but that might be pushing it…

  • nanoKEY: 25-key touch sensitive keyboard.
  • nanoPADS: 12 “drum pads” and a xy-pad.
  • nanoKONTROL: 9 faders, 9 knobs, 18 buttons

All info on Korg’s web site.

If you want to do the opposite and maximize your midi controller you should go for a real midi organ, check this out!