This recent cold snap reminded me of these photographs I had yet to share taken in Ireland this past Christmas. The sun was setting and the fog was rolling in from the ether, causing my camera to struggle to focus on anything in particular, softening the gaze as if the clouds fell that day.
Although a dumping of snow or ice is yet to grace the landscapes of Ireland, I was treated to another phenomenon – freezing fog. I’ve never experienced fog like it – completely enveloping all the eye could see in a matter of minutes, swirling around the fields and transforming objects and buildings into milky soft nothingness, as my camera struggled to capture anything in detail it felt as though I was living in an oil painting.
A second set of images for this weeks kick about on Red’s Kingdom inspired by the Soundsuits of Nick Cave. This film and the coloured dancing orbs comprised of nothing more then some sequins thrown into a large wok and at times shook about for a bit of moment, It’s always enjoyable figuring out what you can get away in the most analogue way possible.
This weeks kick about on Red’s Kingdom is the glorious dancing soundsuits of Nick Cave. I knew that I wanted to make a film, I wanted it to be loud and primal and I wanted to use some sort of fabric or elements that could makeup the intricate soundsuits of Nick Cave’s creations. I decided to chuck a bag of shiny sequins of various shapes into a large wok and film it! Bringing down the shutter speed of my camera and aperture while defocusing so that the tacky butterflies, hearts and stars become nothing but dancing spherical orbs lit ablaze with a tiny but powerful led light. It was one of those moments were everything fell into place so nicely. The edit was a dream and thoroughly enjoyable.
Before you embark and get lost among Roosters Rest Woods, where a lot of photography has been taken such as here, here and here, you first have to climb the picturesque trail that wraps its way up a steep hill. The hill overlooking the neighbouring fields and farms like patchwork not visible in these photos. On the decline, before the tunnel of trees you are greeted with the curious bleating of sheep as they watch in amusement as I jump over fences and gates to disappear amongst the sitka spruces. It was a typical rainy day in Ireland when these photos were taken, not the fun kind of rain that it is a joy to watch where it bounces off everything but the misty kind where it clings to your clothes and saturates everything, and on this day – my camera lens. Although I do like this kind of mist as it adds to the effect of diffusing the scenery, blurring the boundaries of distance and softening the silhouettes of those pesky sheep.
When I seen the prompt for Kick About #40 over on reds Kingdom I wanted to see if it was possible to make an animation using the same analogue technique of scraping patterns into black painted glass and using the magic of long exposure to produce a time-lapse of images to see the growth of each burst of light. It was possible – however my original efforts were undesirable and left things a bit muddled. Instead I tried to opt for something simpler by taking photos of each glass setup in pin prick focus and another in a diluted blur to then sandwich both the images next to each other so that a burst of light pops with a simple hard cut in the edit.
I wanted to mimic the life force of a firework display and have the festivities start off slow to gradually bubble to a climax before the the lights fade and the sound of people are no longer completely drowned out. Truth be told I made things harder for myself by shooting each image in 4K and was left scratching my head as to why it was originally painfully slow to edit this short film, by changing the resolution of each image to something my laptop could handle and reimporting, it was a complete joy to edit further. It was the kick in the arse I needed to get on with things and to remember the joy of seeing a short film through its end, lets make it on time for the next one.
Some more explorations with colour and light, using the same paired down kit of a sheet of black painted glass with scribbles dots and whirls scraped onto its surface and propped against a light source. The magic of long exposure photography turning them into ornate stained glass. I’m not quite done delving into this exhilarating technique just yet so expect more to come.
Some more experiments with fizzing stars, flying comets and glowy milky-ways created in response to the Kick About #40! Using the same analogue technique of painting a sheet of glass black, sketching into that glass and propping a light source behind – who knew something so simple could provide oodles of entertainment!?
Gentle Giant 