Monday, September 17, 2012

In 1899, British photographer and inventor Edward Raymond Turner patented the first color moving picture process, but it was so complicated that it was never replicated. Following Turner's blueprints and instructions for the process, researchers at the National Media Museum digitally copied three frames of film taken from two rolls that were discovered in 2009. The three frames were reconstructed in Photoshop with red, green, and blue filters, similar to how they would have been using Turner's original equipment through the use of colored gels.
As explained in the National Media Museum's video, each frame of the original film had to be re-photographed three times with each colored filter (RGB) and compiled into the final product, which took about three years, thanks to federal and private funding. The footage was then unveiled to the media for the first time in 110 years — possibly for the first time ever.

This article was written by Shawn Schuster .


Monday, August 20, 2012

BMW Films presents The Hire - Beat the Devil (2002) by Tony Scott





The Hire is a series of short films made by BMW together with some of the worlds best directors.
Beat the Devil - starring Clive Owen, Gary Oldman, James Brown, Danny Trejo, Marilyn Manson and based on a concept by David Fincher. Featuring the BMW Z4. Directed by Tony Scott.





Friday, August 10, 2012

The Do It Yourself Animation Show (1974) (BBC) by Bob Godfrey (Featuring: Dick Williams, Terry Gilliam and Bruce Lacey)

Bob Godfrey's seminal series from 1974.
Featuring Dick Williams, Terry Gilliam and Bruce Lacey.



















Alvin Lucier in MUSIC WITH ROOTS IN THE AETHER (1976) directed by Robert Ashley - includes Music For Solo Performer (1965)


MUSIC WITH ROOTS IN THE AETHER (1976)
Video Portraits of Composers and their Music, this episode with Alvin Lucier
Produced and directed by Robert Ashley. Philip Makanna, Director and Camera;
Maggi Payne, Audio Recordist; Jerry Pearsall, Video Recordist and Technical Director

also includes: Music For Solo Performer (1965)
Electronic music pioneer Alvin Lucier amplifies his own brain waves.

Nicolas Collins electronics. 1965.

In the early seventies, Robert Ashley produced and directed a 14-hour television opera/documentary about the work and ideas of seven American composers, Music with Roots in the Aether, which premiered at the Festival d'Automne à Paris in 1976. It comprises seven films, each two hours long, most of which have a live performance preceded by an interview in a 'landscape'

Music with Roots in the Aether is a music-theater piece in color video. It is the final version of an idea that I had thought about and worked on for a few years: to make a very large collaborative piece with other composers whose music I like. The collaborative aspect of Music with Roots in the Aether is in the theater of the interviews, at least primarily, and I am indebted to all of the composers involved for their generosity in allowing me to portray them in this manner.
The piece turns out to be, in addition, a large-scale documentation of an important stylistic that came into American concert music in about 1960. These composers of the "post-serial" / "post-Cage" movement have all made international reputations for the originality of their work and for their contributions to this area of musical compositions.
The style of the video presentation comes from the need I felt to find a new way to show music being performed. The idea of the visual style of Music with Roots in the Aether is plain: to watch as closely as possible the action of the performers and to not "cut" the seen material in any way--that is, to not editorialize on the time domain of the music through arbitrary space-time substitutions.
The visual style for showing the music being made became the "theater" (the stage) for the interviews, and the portraits of the composers were designed to happen in that style."
— Robert Ashley





Friday, March 16, 2012

ATTN: NEW SITE

 Please visit my new tumblr site for more posts.

Friday, December 2, 2011

Halber Mensch (A.K.A.- 1/2 Mensch) (1986) by Sogo Ishii & Einstürzende Neubauten



"Halber Mensch" (aka "1/2 Mensch") is a 1986 film by Japanese director Sogo Ishii with German band Einstürzende Neubauten. It was originally released on VHS, and re-released on DVD in 2005. The film's title comes from the album of the same name.

Einstürzende Neubauten were in their creative prime when punk film pioneer
Sohgo Ishii shot this 58-minute document in Tokyo during the band's world
tour in 1985.

Set mostly in a condemned factory/junkpile (the former Nakamatsu Ironworks),
the film features a tormental troupe of butoh dancers, fire, FM Einheit repairing
his shoe, micro photography, industrial textures, live footage from their Korakuen
Hall arena shows, one of their guerilla street actions, lots of beautiful destruction
and amazing music.

It's extremely, lyrically visual, perhaps because Ishii didn't feel the need to
hang everything on some skimpy plot this time and could just let his camera do the talking.

[01]. Armenia
[02]. Sehnsucht
[03]. Letztes biest
[04]. Abfackeln
[05]. Zerstorte Zelle
[06]. Halber Mensch
[07]. Z.N.S.
[08]. Die Zeichnungen des Patienten
[09]. Der Tod ist ein Dandy
[10]. Schaben



Monday, November 28, 2011

Savage Messiah (1972) by Ken Russell



Savage Messiah is a 1972 British biographical film of the life of French sculptor Henri Gaudier-Brzeska, made by Russ-Arts and distributed by MGM. It was directed and produced by Ken Russell with Harry Benn as associate producer, from a screenplay by Christopher Logue, based on the book Savage Messiah by H.S. Ede. Much of the content of Ede's book came from letters sent between Henri Gaudier-Brzeska and his lover Sophie Brzeska. The music score was by Michael Garrett (though music by Claude Debussy and Alexander Scriabin was also used), and the cinematography by Dick Bush. The sets were designed by Derek Jarman.

Starring: Dorothy Tutin, Scott Antony, Helen Mirren, Lindsay Kemp, Peter Vaughan and Michael Gough.

References: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Savage_Messiah