EXPERIENCE 2- VIDEO WALK PROJECT by Clarita, Jake, Ling Ern and Sheryl
Our video walk project is inspired by the Third Paradise from Michelangelo Pistoletto. In our short story, we introduce an alien invasion into ADM where everyone in ADM has disappeared. Bob, the main lead, wakes up to an empty ADM and went on a search for all his friends, only to find out that…..
THE THIRD PARADISE SCRIPT (Clarita, Jake, Ling Ern, Sheryl)
The sound of a drill buzzes through the air. Bob wakes up in the IM classroom, lightheaded, and picks up his phone from the table. “Shit, I fell asleep! What time is it? Ugh, everyone left,” He looks around. The solder and the drill are on the table, still on. “Oh my god Jake u idiot can’t even turn off the 9 drills before you leave,” Bob mutters to himself, as he turns both off. Bob looks down to see Jake’s clothes, and everyone else’s around the room. “Wait, what the…” Bob gets up and accidentally kicks a half-eaten apple, next to a pile of clothing. “Weird.” All around him, laptops and projects were left as if there was some kind of emergency that made people leave them halfway. “God, I’m late for my next class,” Bob shrugs it off and heads out the class.
*Drill, white noise, door beeping sounds*
Bob exits the classroom and speedwalks along a hallowed hallway. Bob feels it’s weird that a Friday afternoon in his school is actually rather quiet. Bob slows down as he walks past a water cooler still refilling a bottle, overflowing onto a pile of clothes. He turns it off wordlessly and looks at the clothes on the floor. Bob arrives at his school lounge only to see laptops without users, again with piles of clothing and bags lying around. There are even unfinished lunch boxes with utensils on the table. He looks around curiously. “The fuck is going on…”
Door beeping sounds, water flowing, white noise, music playing from laptops, microwave sounds
Bob is starting to get wary as he takes the flight of stairs down to the same scene in the lounge, but now, in the basement. All around the green tables, there are belongings left hanging around, projects half done. Bob decides to inspect the area by heading into the locker corridors.
*White noise, faint sounds of the alien invasion documentary*
Bob enters the critique room when he heard sounds playing, thinking they will be someone. “Hello?” Alas, the scene was what seemed like an empty lecture that was going on half ways before everyone suddenly disappeared into midair. The sound coming from a laptop that was playing a documentary of the alien invasion.
Alien invasion documentary, white noise
Bob leaves the critique room and starts to pick up pace. He notices piles of clothing beside open lockers, seemingly actions that are half done. He observes a pile of clothing that looks familiar that’s soaked in coffee. “Heh, isn’t that… Oh god what the fuckkk where is everyone!” Bob starts to panicc “Hello?? HELLO??”
*White noise*
Bob starts to panic and attempts to leave the school to ask for help. All the doors can’t open, until he manages to finally get out through the last door next to the dungeon. “Hey, is anyone here? Help? Someone! HEYY!!!” He looks around anxiously and calls out for help. His brisk walks gradually become a hasty escape towards the route out of school. “What the fuck what the fuck what the fuck” Bob mutters. While on the stairs out, Bob hears a grand sound behind him. “ZEEEEIMMMIZEEEE!” He turns around and notices the symbol of the Third Paradise, an artwork carved by a famous artist, starting to glow. “Holy shi-” An incredibly bright light from the skies blinded Bob as he drops his phone. The phone lands in a pile of clothing, facing the third paradise. The glow vanishes.
White noise, outdoor sounds, sounds from the water stuff at the sunken plaza.
PROCESS:
After discussing the possible story line, we started planning the various possible routes to execute it in ADM including the props needed for the shoot.
On the day itself, we started laying all the props needed at the designated area as well as informing people in ADM along the way before the shoot to get them prepared. We also ran through several trials to grasp the right camera angle that we wanted.
SETTING UP OF PROPS:
IM ROOM: Prof LP’s clothes with a half bitten apple.
ADM LOUNGE: Open laptops, bags and clothes all around / Water Cooler with running water
BASEMENT 1 OUTSIDE PRODUCT DESIGN WORKSHOP: unfinished works and tools lying around
VENDING MACHINE: clothes on the floor in front of the vending machines and lifts
LOCKERS: Open lockers with belongings dropping out as well as clothes and shoes on the floor
EMPTY LECTURE THEATRE:
PROF LP trying out our video walk:
CHALLENGES:
As our shoot was done on a weekday afternoon and the route stretches from IM room to ADM lounge to the basement and all the way out of ADM, it was quite difficult to manage the crowd. Many reshoots occurred because random people appeared and walked into the shot. To better manage the issue, we split ourselves up into 2 groups: Art Direction and Logistics. We have 4 different roles: Director (following cinematographer), Cinematographer (holding camera), Front Flank (be about 10m head of cinematographer to manage crowd) and Back Flank (to manage props and inform crowd that they are good to go).
Through our trials, by putting ourselves into the perspectives of the viewers, we realised that we cannot pan the camera too widely nor move too quickly as it will be difficult for the viewers to catch up to the pace of the video walk. Moving too quickly will not only confuse the viewers but also disrupt the storyline we wanted to present. Hence, we made appropriate changes in the actual shoot and try to have pauses in between scenes or have a slower transition in location change.
Planning a long route, we are also concerned about the safety of the viewers, especially since we are incorporating 2 stairways into our route. Having that in mind, we intentionally steered the camera nearer to the railings.
GROUP REFLECTION:
In general, our group wanted to have a sense of anticipation and mystery for the video walk. I think we achieved that to some extent as we tried our best to minimise any human presence in our video together with the narration of the portrayed character. However, we felt that although we spent a lot of thought into setting up the scene with props such as clothes, laptops, bags, unfinished lunch boxes, empty water bottle refilling at the water cooler etc, perhaps we did not place enough focus on them. For instance, the overflowing at the water cooler. We attempted a subtle pause at the area but it may not be very obvious to the viewer. This may lead to them being overlooked. Maybe we could have done a shorter route so that we can focus on certain details a little bit more, creating a greater sense of a change of space for the viewer.
For areas of improvement, we felt that the crowd control can be better managed. Shooting on a weekday gave us the luxury of many other candid props, especially the scene outside the 3D product design rooms but the general crowd in ADM proved to be an issue which hindered our shooting process. Alternatively, we can better plan the time to shoot. For instance, shooting on a weekend will be slightly better than a weekday even though we need to bring more props into the scene ourselves.