ACT Part 2: Verdi's Requiem @ ROH Purfleet: Another Sound Visualisation Challenge Begins!

High House Production Park, Purfleet

Following CGAA's successful participation in last year's ACT project, in which our students, staff and alumni collaborated to create an animation inspired by composer Darius Milhaud's 1923 ballet, La création du monde, we've been challenged by ACT once again to visualise classical music in new and speculative ways.  The piece in question is Giuseppe Verdi's mighty Requiem (1874), a musical setting of the Roman Catholic funeral mass.  Verdi's ninety minute Requiem is perhaps best known to most of us by the explosive Dies Irae or Day of Wrath:

On the evening of July 3rd and 4th at the Royal Opera House's High House Production Park at Purfleet, Verdi's Requiem will be performed live by an ensemble of 300 musicians - and beamed live via a screen into the Production Park's orchard.  Our mission is to devise an innovative way of visualising the music of the Requiem that will compliment and enrich this outdoor concert and bring new dimensions to Verdi's operatic masterpiece.

The Orchard

Work on this project began back in December 2013, when Pete Wallace of Butch Auntie fame travelled to Amiens, France with a very specific remit.  Pete's mission was to turn a live performance of Verdi's Requiem into raw data - not by recording the music itself, but rather by capturing the performance as experienced by its various participants.  Uninspiring as it may seem, the great long list of numbers below is a direct transcript of Verdi's Requiem, as generated from moment-to-moment by the gesticulations of the orchestra's conductor, Arie van Beek, who was wired up to Kinect technology for the duration of the performance.

Pete was similarly able to capture the Requiem via the activity of the lead cellist's arm and by the heart-rate of a member of the choir. In simple terms, Pete came back from Amiens with 'lightning in a bottle'; the vivacity and verve of Verdi-performed-live encompassed in a series of spread-sheets.

Our creative task now is to again let loose that vivacity, that verve - to translate these numerical expressions of music into something extraordinary.  It's early days, and the precise form our visualisations-of-Verdi may take on that July evening in the High House orchard are as yet unknown, but we think we'd like to manifest them physically.   Our thoughts - barely more than vague impressions at this stage - have turned to the kinetic sculptures of Alexander Calder and the fluid delicacy of tensile fabric structures:

What we do know is that we'll be using Maya, animation, and you - the CGAA community - to get us there. We know too that CGAA alumni Ethan Shilling is joining us for this project and will bring his considerable technical expertise and creativity to the mix.

Exactly what happens next is uncertain.  How exciting!  But what happens will happen here on the ACT blog, so watch this space for updates.  As of now, CGAA's Mission Verdi is go.

La création du monde @ Maison de la Culture d'Amiens. More photos.

More photos from the recent performance of Darius Milhaud's La création du monde at the Maison de la Culture in Amiens, France. Featuring visuals produced by students, staff and alumni from CG Arts and Animation at UCA Rochester.

  

CGAA @ Amiens @ UCA

Our recent trip to Amiens gets the official UCA write-up here.

La création du monde @ Maison de la Culture, Amiens, France - December 19th, 2013

Back in July, audiences at a classical concert were entranced by a sixteen minute animation that synched seamlessly with a live performance of Darius Milhaud's 1923 ballet, La création du monde.  The animation originated from a multi-participant collaboration in response to ACT- A Common Territory, a project funded by the European Union's Interreg IVA Channel Programme, which aims to engage the creative and cultural industries in the UK and France. Over a period of ten consecutive week days, the students, staff & alumni of BA (Hons) CG Arts & Animation were challenged to produce abstract digital paintings in synesthetic response to segments of Milhaud's ballet. The CGAA community were asked to listen to each musical extract and then respond to it visually through the creation of original digital paintings in Photoshop.  CGAA alumni Thomas Beg and Jordan Buckner then created the animation from the digital paintings using Autodesk Maya and After Effects.

The July concert was a great success and the animation lauded by the audience and project co-ordinators - so much so that we were invited to participate in a second performance of Milhaud's ballet - this time at the Maison de la Culture in Amiens, France.

A little after 9.30pm on December 19th, after a very long day of set-up and back-stage preparation, the house lights dimmed and the musicians of the Orchestre de Picardie began to play the first, melancholy notes of Milhaud's ballet.  Behind them, rear-projected onto the theatre's pristine twelve metre screen, our animation began to play too - with an audience of 600 people looking on. 

I'm including here the email I received from Rose Bardonnet Lowry - executive director of the Orchestre de Picardie and ACT co-ordinator:

"Didn't have a chance to congratulate and thank you, as well as Jordan and Tom, for the wonderful performance tonight! The audience loved it!!!  Listeners were quite stunned by the novelty of it all. We'll certainly have 2 more opportunities of performing the Milhaud piece with visualistion in 14-15, so I hope you will all be ready to come back to Picardie."

It looks to me as if our recent adventures in Amiens might be the first of many!  I think we can all be rather proud of ourselves, don't you?

La création du monde - the animation

ACT Collaboration Project - Darius Milhaud's La création du monde. from Thomas Beg on Vimeo.

ACT Collaboration Project - Darius Milhaud's La création du monde

A CG Arts and Animation/ACT/Interreg Live Commission
On Friday, July 12th at Grays Civic Hall, Essex, the Orchestre Symphonique de Bretagne performed a programme of music on the theme of 'rhythm'. The programme of music explored ideas of rhythm in classical music and in the celebrated jazz of the late Dave Brubeck. The director of the Orchestre Symphonique de Bretagne, Marc Feldman, challenged the CGAA community to work collaboratively to create an original work of animation designed to accompany his orchestra's performance of one particular example of early twentieth century music that blends classical and jazz rhythms to exciting effect. The animation was rear projected onto a large screen measuring 8.5m wide by 6.2m high, in front of which the Orchestre Symphonique de Bretagne performed live.
Over a period of ten consecutive week days, the students, staff & alumni of Ba Hons CG Arts & Animation were challenged to produce abstract digital paintings in synesthetic response to segments of the music to be performed by the Orchestre Symphonique de Bretagne. The CGAA community were asked to listen to a musical extract and then respond to it visually through the creation of original digital paintings in Photoshop. The animation was derived from these paintings and created using Autodesk Maya and After Effects.

ANIMATION STILLS

Act Revisited - Track 05 and 10

Rendering is complete for all tracks, but whilst I have the opportunity to touch up a few bits, I'd thought I'd upload the two tracks which have been through a lot of changes and discussion.

Track 05

So, this was a piece that needed energy and chaos. The explosive paintings from Phil Gomm provided a great cut in the middle of the piece and the key was to really make the energy and movement get almost out of control. I'll be re-rendering this piece because there are a few changes I've now made but any suggestions would be great.

Track 10

Track 10 was also a complete overhaul and now has an abstract landscape generated from a number of speed paintings. The ending has been tweaked so that it fades away bit by bit. This is very much a final flight following strange shapes across the landscape and will hopefully provide a dream like finale to the piece.

Act Revisited - Track 10 and 06

The final week is almost upon us and the rendering will begin soon. But before all that, it's a manic weekend of final changes, adjustments and corrections. The big change so far is a rework of Track 10. The last version was really lacking, and it just felt so unaware of it's base. So, I started fresh and it's already moving in a much more interesting direction.

Track 10

The key thing was to go back to the speed paintings and really think about what this piece was suggesting. The biggest problem is the lack of source material and notions. The music is very sparse, and thus the speed paintings vary wildly. From dark minimal images, to vivid explosions of colour. It all started with Joey Ku's and Dayle Sanders' images, both full of colour and life. These formed the base of the animation and helped build a strange landscape. The music really gives this impression of flying through a world as it slowly falls into silence. From these paintings, I started to build this abstract world and animate elements to emphasise this slow descent. It felt very enlightening and pleasing, despite it being the end of the piece, almost a surreal and dreamlike state of descent. So, this is the base, it hopefully provides a solid form to work from. The two areas I really want to get fixed this weekend are; to change the wavy coloured lines that act as transitions, and add in elements to help bring some excitements to certain parts. Phil Gomm's speed paintings suggest an almost firework display of explosion, which I think will add nicely to the subtle beats within the sequence.

Track 06

This sequence is another which is still in the works, but I'm uploading it with some changes so that I can get feedback about what could be added. It's definitely a piece which needs something extra, but I'm also wary about adding too much. The music for this part again has a strange wondering sensibility about it, and this is something I definitely want to keep. I've made changes to the end, partly because the previous spiral motif was a default stand in. This is going to require some further thought but for now it is definitely still open for adjustments.

All in all, things are moving towards completion. But this weekend is definitely the time to make changes and get things ready to render. The list below outlines what needs doing on my part.

Sequence 02 - Complete, slight adjustments need to be made before rendering.
Sequence 04 - Complete, again, final adjustments before rendering.
Sequence 05 - Incomplete, reassess and fix issues ready for render.
Sequence 06 - Complete, but additions to be made before rendering.
Sequence 10 - Incomplete - Addition elements and animation required before renders.

So, lots to do but if all goes well, rendering should begin for Monday morning.

Track 1 Update

I never quite explained my reasoning for taking the track in this direction compared to other sequences. It seems like a detour in some ways but I think the music develops so much later on that starting at this point feels perfectly natural. The music feels so slow and contemplative it's like wading through water and the opening track feels much more suited to being a proper 3D space to travel through. It's not super fast-paced jazz. It's slow, methodical and hypnotic. I've tried replicate this feeling through movement The audience will get sucked in.

I'd experimented with using Maya on the very first test for this project using Andriana's speed painting to generate the particles. This is the same particle experiment. Placing a moving camera into the scene, with all the joys of perspective and depth can bring, threw it completely open. A couple sacrifices from the original painting are going to be made because it's a re-imagining based on concept art, and not directly made through the painting like my other sequences. My goal with this sequence is to now just bring a bit more of the painting into the scene.

 

Act Revisited - Track 02

So, now that I've worked out what is working and what isn't, it's time to go back with a fresh mind and make these pieces fantastic. Track 10 is dead to me, the first draft was a default which lacked just about everything. Tomorrow I'll be re approaching that section and rethinking it from scratch. But today, I've made adjustments to Track 02. Some further adjustments are still to be made, but the notes I wish to hit are there at the moment. Some of the methodology and ideas are laid out below.

Track 02

(The youtube upload has pushed the sound slightly out of sync)

The way in which I work on this project is possibly different to how I original intended, but the approach nonetheless feels like an inherently correct one to me. I first start by looking through all of the speed paintings. I look for notions, colours, themes and ideas that seem consistent throughout the works. I then take the speed paintings that seem most connected to the music and put them all into After Effects. From these I grab elements and layers and start placing them onto a new composition. The consistent notions that are seen become the building blocks for my sections. So,using Track 02 as an example...

The two big themes which are apparent in a huge number of the speed paintings are spirals and explosions of some sort. Circular notions and paint strokes seem to highlight how the music moves. This was the key structure. So the base form of a spiral made complete sense. The music gives this impression of moving through or falling down. The spirals came primarily from Simon Holland, Ryan Leitao, Molly Bolder and Adam Webb's work. The whole piece is a build up. It slowly forms to an explosive moment where the sound erupts out at the audience. This is again, reflected in the artwork. Vikki Kerslake, Lucy Yelding and Emily Clarkson demonstrate this theme within their speed paintings. It feels like an opening moment, the demonstration of a theatre act or the like. So, the spiral transforms into an explosion and reveals this strange spinning world. Many of the elements from Ryan Leitao were used for this section, and even though brief, it is a section that works because of that build up. Suddenly this downward move feels apparent in the music. The notions from my own speed paintings, as well as Lydia Caplan's, were the inspiration for this. Almost as though rain is clearing the scene for the next sequence.

For the final sequences, I'll be reminding myself of this methodology and ensuring that each is thrilling in this sense of reaction. More updates on the other sequences tomorrow!

Track 1 v001

Track 1 is a little different as it's created in Maya, so it's got a real CG look to it. I felt that because the music  tempo is so slow using flat 2D would feel slightly undramatic, so I've emphasised 3D space. I've only been able to render the opening 12 seconds but it's enough to get the point across.

Act Drafts Complete

After an array of power cuts this morning, I've finally managed to upload the 5 draft sequences. From this stage, it's a solid week of refining all the parts that I don't like or simply aren't working. The sequence for track 10 is the roughest so far, but most of the others are very close to completion.

Track 02

Track 04

Track 05

Track 06

Track 10

It will be good to go back and look at each section in detail now that I've had some time away from them all. Crits and suggestions at this stage will be super helpful.

Track 3 Draft

Everyone do the 'Hale-Bop'! Maybe not, but you'll understand when you watch Track 3. Very much inspired by Fantasia and Emma Foster's painting has a lovely brush-stroke quality which I thought would be the perfect fit. One thing to note is haven't considered the transition colours at the beginning or end yet. I'll adjust that for the next update.

Drafts Track 7,8 and 9

Put the initial drafts into a sequence to see how it all plays out in order. Quite satisfying.

Track 7 v003

Another draft of of Track 7. Almost complete barring a few changes later on.

Track 05 Render v002

Here is an updated version of Track 05, it's been something I've been struggling with but this block out at least provides something to work on in detailed sections. I'm going to move on to my final track so that I know all will blocked out and take off some pressure concerning deadline etc. After is all done, it will be a case of revisiting each section and reworking the parts I don't like.

I've also quickly comped the three middle sections so that I can start to understand the transitions between.

Track 9 v005

Re-jigged Track 9 for the new aspect ratio. It's thrown up a couple problems I didn't notice. At some point before the final render i'll go in and fix those problems, along with the ones I want to make regardless.

Track 7 v002

Continuing with Track 7 using Joey Ku's rather seemingly American minimalist inspired painting. There's going to be a lot of big bold white space in the middle section which will definitely mix things up a little bit!

Track 7 v001

First 25 seconds of Track 7. I'm getting a cocktail umbrella feeling from this one so far...

Track 8 v005

After a bit of a slog, the draft for Track 8 is finished. Some of the transitions are a bit ropey but I really want to move on to another track rather than fiddle with this one and let minor issues drag on. The good news is that means I have nearly 5 minutes 95% done and the next tracks are much shorter and easier to manage.

Film Stills so far...

I've also been readjusting work for the new aspect ratio we are working at. Here are some stills of the sequences so far...