Month: March 2020

From my point of view – a story about a subjective way of seeing

From my point of view (dir. Monika Mas?o?) ia s story about a subjective way of seeing, empathy, perceptual and emotional disorders. It consists of two layers. The first one has an interactive character, resembling a computer game. It is an experience based on acting in a digitally generated world. We start it in the training room, we learn about the possibilities and limitations of the virtual world. We get tasks to do. The second layer is the story we discover by the way. The project is co-produced with the Visual Narratives Laboratory.

Both layers are interconnected. Immersant’s actions are a metaphor. His experiences are parallel to those of the voice that leads him. Immersion disorders resulting from unusual ways of controlling and perceiving the image are related to the feeling of emotional imbalance caused by mourning. This second layer reveals itself in the sound narration and the elements of the image, which seem to be pieces of the narrator’s memories. What happens to the viewer, what he or she experiences is similar to a disturbance in the perception of reality related to loss and stages of mourning.

The visual side of the image consists of a slowed-down black and white negative image associated with the world of the past, memories. It is both real and unreal. There are also generated objects and spaces that will enhance the impression of being in the training space and will be strongly associated with the interaction. Both recorded and generated materials will be achromatic. The film image will be used to show recorded scenes and texture 3D objects. Subsequent locations will be separated by a complete darkening of the image. The narrator’s voice will move and make the impression that sometimes it is addressed to us and sometimes it speaks to itself. The storytelling mode will be a mixture of ongoing events of a certain duration and course and elements of interaction that will influence the length of the experience.

The aim of the project is to create an artistic realization that will use the technology of virtual reality with its specific features of creation and reception. The artistic issue undertaken in the project will be, among others, the interpenetration of reality and fiction based on the immersion character of the technology used. The work is supposed to reveal the mechanisms of illusion and talk about existential and emotional disorders characteristic of the feeling of loss (e.g. reaction to an unexpected change of situation, inability to experience what one wants and what was possible a moment ago, the feeling of being lost, disagreement, searching for meaning).

An important aspect of the project will be the use of equipment allowing the recipient to move around and thus enabling the introduction of more complex interaction elements related to navigation by means of body movement. A key element of the project will be the experience of immersion sensation disorder.

Materials showing sketches of the three-dimensional environment
Materials showing sketches of the three-dimensional environment
Materials showing sketches of the three-dimensional environment
Materials showing sketches of the three-dimensional environment
Materials showing sketches of the three-dimensional environment

Memesis – an experimental VR experience on the border of game and movie

Memesis (dir. Marta Giec) is an experimental VR experience on the border of game and movie made in CGI. Project involves the creation of the first part, which would be approximately 7 minutes long and constitute a kind of “demo”, an invitation to a further story, combining a surreal vision with a horror film. The project is co-produced with the Visual Narratives Laboratory.

Memesis aim is to function in a double mode. On the one hand, as an adventure in the VR environment, in which the user has to move further into the world in order to move the action forward. On the other hand, it is supposed to be a realization of surprising clashes and cultural references. The convention of mystery and horror is loosely connected to the theme of the Holocaust through discrete symbolic and visual references. Memesis is supposed to be a new form of working through trauma and breaking with national myths and identity. The aforementioned horror will be enriched in the later parts of the memetic adventure with various references to the newest post-internet culture, such as memes or the shanzhai culture. Intertextual references and references to contemporary art and culture are to be a “bonus” treat for the conscious recipient.

The overriding goal of Memesis is to create an alternative, artificial reality in a 360° world, where the formal procedures characteristic for VR will fit the narration in such compatible way that they produce highly immersive experience in which the user will move in waves from a feeling of calm to horror and uncertainty. Additionally, the immersion will benefit from experimental treatments enhancing the VR experience, such as eye adaptation, video projection in the user immobilization mode (video plain), abstract textures created with analog video synthesizer and captured into  digital environment, as well as triggers.

The beginning of the adventure with Memesis is a desert submerged in darkness, containing a path that leads the user into an everchanging landscape. There are dead trees, dilapidated objects, ruins and most of all, an abandoned allotment with a garden. The immersion into the mysterious, empty world begins to give way to the feeling of dread when the user starts to hear moans and cries of pain. The sound comes from under his feet. The meme-faced mud suffers.

Better for the user to choose the path on which he doesn’t cause any suffering – then he’ll arrive to a wooden house with a sukkah. In its abandoned interior, not succumbing to fear and following the directions, he’ll meet a guide, the anthropomorphic Challah. She’ll guide him to the stove, where a surprise awaits the user as well an invitation to the second chapter of this surreal adventure.

Materials showing sketches of the three-dimensional environment
Materials showing sketches of the three-dimensional environment
Materials showing sketches of the three-dimensional environment

Self – a journey into the human psyche

How does a mentally ill feel? How does he perceive the world? Or maybe a division into people healthy and mentally ill doesn’t exist at all? For the makers the creation of film and photographic image has been accompanied by an attempt to understand and openness to the world of mental issues for years. When both of these worlds (film and the world of psychology) have the opportunity to meet and find understanding on an artistic level – ideas such as the SELF (dir. Patryk Jordanowicz, Tadeusz Chudy) project arise, to which the audience will be invited through the audiovisual medium of VR.

SELF, by definition, will be strong and sunk for the viewer in memory of immersion experience. And from experience, which is understood as experience, comes an understanding of otherness, while understanding creates tolerance. No other medium allows the viewer to participate in such a way through audiovisual means, but also above all in spatial terms – distance from the object, enclosure, open space, willingness to touch. Visual and sound stimuli of this project are just a path, a tool to generate emotions similar to those of people affected by mental illness. The creators want to callin the viewer a state of contemplation, melancholy and compassion. SELF addresses an extremely delicate topic, which is why we create it from the beginning with the participation of people dealing with mental health on a daily basis. VR technology is the most perfect way to transfer the viewer to the mind and body of a mentally ill person and is able to express all of assumptions most fully.

The SELF story concept is based on a mosaic structure. The presented stories are memories from different stages of the healing process of former patients, and their real-life silhouettes will be set in a minimalistic 3D environment. The retrospectives will materialize as voice-over commentaries, and the use of ambisonic sound will expose the properties of the category, which is cinematic VR.

Materials showing sketches of the three-dimensional environment
Materials showing sketches of the three-dimensional environment
Materials showing sketches of the three-dimensional environment
Materials showing sketches of the three-dimensional environment