Quartz Composer

For our final project we used Quartz Composer for the visuals. Simply, the programme allowed us to relate our audio to an image (just white) displayed over time at different levels of intensity.

Our sea journey audio builds up through a storm into a crescendo, and we wanted to create an immersive experience of this sound for our week in the exhibition space. So, we made The Bank on Tontine St into a darkened space with a projection also starting off black, lighting up slowly at first, with flashes of light building up over time depending on the intensity of the audio. I think it worked pretty well.

We used iShowU to capture the visuals generated by Quartz Composer, then tied it to the audio in iMovie. It turns out iShowU was developed in NZ, not too far away from Wellington in fact.

Links:

http://developer.apple.com/graphicsimaging/quartz/quartzcomposer.html

http://www.shinywhitebox.com/ishowu-v1

Fluid Noise Generator

While working on the visual component of Dark Waters, I came across an application called Fluid Noise Generator http://majicjungle.com/fluidnoise.html (£6.99 in the App store).

I used it to make a variety of sea-like waves forms, trying to create the endless loop of a long journey, but didn't use them in the final piece. The clips seem lossy. There may be a way around this - I didn't spend a lot of time exploring the output options, but could be a useful tool to revisit some other time.

Rhythms of a Voyage

a song for a seafarer..... The Renderers

A Dream of the Sea

Pencarrow Heads

Entrance to Wellington Harbour view taken from Wahine Park looking towards Pencarrow Heads.

Baring Head Lighthouse from South Coast

By sea just around the corner from Pencarrow Lighthouse - but a 45min drive from Wellington City to the South Coast - this photo points towards Pencarrow and the Cook Strait. The wind force here is wild! and you don't swim here - but an incredible beach never-the-less. Up on the hill you can just pick out the Baring Head lighthouse.

Pencarrow Lighthouses

Old Pencarrow Lighthouse up top
Rimutaka Ranges in the background

South Coast to the east of Pencarrow Lighthouse

Wahine Park looking towards Cook Strait

Wahine Park is a memorial site of remembrance for the 51 people who lost their lives when the interisland ferry T.E.V. Wahine sank at the entrance to Wellington Harbour on April 10th 1968. The weather conditions were extremely stormy with very high seas and made entering the harbour extremely hazardous- this was a massive tragedy in contemporary sea crossings.
Wahine Park looks south towards the Cook Strait. Cook Strait is the stretch of water that separates the North and South Islands of Aotearoa/New Zealand.
The spectacular rocks you see lined along this beach make up most of the coastline along the entrance to the harbour . Wellington harbour itself has many just like these sitting just above the surface of the sea and thus any entrance into the harbour means very carefully navigating the narrow water way.

Pencarrow Lighthouse 10June 2011

Entrance to Wellington Harbour

Black water

Image experimentation.

Wellington, New Zealand

Our lighthouse site is in Wellington, New Zealand, the southern-most capital city in the world.

This is the view over the harbour entrance from the wind turbine up in Brooklyn. (Click on the image to see a larger version.)

Pencarrow Head lighthouse is on the opposite site of the harbour. The newer lighthouse at Baring Head is at the farthest point along the same stretch of coast. The main business district is on the left, on the side closest to us.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wellington