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workshops, Amsterdam 09 2004, results





basic information : final results




From A to B final result

Despite the very short time (max 250 minutes), 11 groups did manage to finish stop-and-go typographic animations. At least 100 digital pictures, shown directly after each other. And there we go. First the content had to be defined, which varies from movie to movie.
Click on the small thumbnails to see the films.



movie
playing



Technical details: a cardful of digital camera photos (low resolution) were transfered to ImageReady CS (Import > Folder as frames), a delay for each frame was set and finally the movie was generated (Export > Original Document > QuickTime Movie).



43 comments so far: read comments , please do comment
aschwin -- Wednesday, September 22 2004, 03:23 pm
Verry creative!!!!

megan+o -- Wednesday, September 22 2004, 09:58 pm
It is apparent that this was a playful open-ended proposition with very few limitations, but can you really call these animations'typographic'? The framework is drawn around maleable materials, found objects, patterns, optical discoveries, and sleight of hand tricks, versus an insistence on a crafted typographic message in the service of an idea. Nonetheless all here convey lightness, which we all need at the start of a school year. I will show these in my lecture next week, thanks!

Ryan Vise -- Thursday, September 30 2004, 07:50 pm
Fun films with visual pun's. Nice work.

H. M. EMery-WalEN -- Thursday, September 30 2004, 10:27 pm
Explosively weird. I like what you Do SAy Make THink.

Melissa LaRae Smith -- Friday, October 1 2004, 02:25 am
The peculiarness of salad having sound but no lettuce, Words with music unrelated to their pronunciation, Letters as breathing dying moments,not just the dust on records... These are like edible messages we must first deface to be able to ingest. Some of these would seem to me the same tasting without the letters.

Melissa LaRae Smith, Multimedia Survey -- Friday, October 1 2004, 02:26 am
The peculiarness of salad having sound but no lettuce, Words with music unrelated to their pronunciation, Letters as breathing dying moments,not just the dust on records... These are like edible messages we must first deface to be able to ingest. Some of these would seem to me the same tasting without the letters.

mArIa AviLa mULtiMEdia SuRVey -- Friday, October 1 2004, 09:03 pm
I was amazed in how you can find different ways to make letters. Not only with a pencil and paper, but with all kinds of materials. I like it a lot, very creative.

B Hester ARTD 250 -- Saturday, October 2 2004, 01:03 am
These works are very unique examples of the purpose of letters and words, to tell stories, share ideas, and create visual images on our minds.

Paul Westover, UO Multimedia -- Sunday, October 3 2004, 12:38 am
Some of these are very fun and creative...very interesting how the typography is invigorated through the use of time and space, rather than having a static representation.

C. Domogalla -- Sunday, October 3 2004, 08:42 pm
I am especially impressed with the video repressenting digital text on the cell phone (also very amusing that they made them seem like cars on a highway). It leads one to think about just how much text has floated along with technology in its use in e-mail, IM, and Text Messaging. Very well done.

Jennifer Stocks, UO multimedia -- Sunday, October 3 2004, 09:14 pm
It's amazing to think that by placing a book or scissors on the table in a particular way that we are all able to find the same meaning of its form.

Corey Duffy UO multimedia survey -- Sunday, October 3 2004, 10:16 pm
Watching the different group examples was very interesting and each was unique not only in their materials but the sound effects and background music.

L. Eggers- UO multimedia -- Sunday, October 3 2004, 10:32 pm
This Project definitely gave rise to the imagination; it is interesting to see how different groups interpreted the assignment in different ways. I love the film that spelled out café and ‘koffee’ with all sorts of letters and actual coffee. The films are so quick I have to watch them a few times to catch what is going on. There is definately a ton of work put into these very short films. They were lots of fun!

Jaein J. Yoo -- Sunday, October 3 2004, 10:49 pm
I saw some of these works in the class on Thursday they were very nice works. Different ways to presenting letters were very creative and interresting. I liked the one with using face to express the form of letters. I am trying to see those movies again, but I am having trouble opening them.

nerraw wehttam -- Sunday, October 3 2004, 10:53 pm
For the most part, the movies that have no visual people aparent are more powerful to me. Since the task was given with such freedom of interpretation it was pleasant to view each groups open representation to freedom as well.

Lynn Dean, multimedia -- Sunday, October 3 2004, 11:05 pm
It is interesting to see how everyday objects can be turned into letter and word formation.

Becca J Lubas -- Sunday, October 3 2004, 11:22 pm
I've always figured that a handful of creatively inclined people in one place at one time with a camera is bound to result in something... colorful. You have proved my highly scientific hypothesis true with flying...letters.

Tyler Krehbiel ARTD 250 -- Sunday, October 3 2004, 11:41 pm
I found the films to be very fascinating. The simplicity of the materials caused for more in depth thought on my part as to how I look at everyday objects. By simply manipulating an object(s) so many visions can be seen, but the groups that made these, generally had one in common. I enjoy that I can watch them multiple times and catch small tidbits each time that makes me rethink what I saw before, but yet still know the reasoning behind the piece. I enjoyed these very much. Thank you.

Jessica Bradford, UofO student, multimedia survey -- Sunday, October 3 2004, 11:46 pm
I really liked the way these films utilized a variety of media, from something as sterile as office supplies to something as tactile as paint and paper to create a feeling or mood using typography. My favorite was the one with office supplies used to create the word CITY which I though was rather clever.

Ben Davis ARTD 250 -- Monday, October 4 2004, 12:12 am
Lots of ambiguity and hidden meanings here. While many of these videos at face value look like short film clips from kids' shows on PBS, further study reveals many interesting ideas and metaphors. To really get the most out of the videos one should view them a couple of times, maybe concentrating on different aspects every time? Great work.

Darylynn Cole ARTD 250 -- Monday, October 4 2004, 12:31 am
Each Movie presented is very fun and unique. The timing of the music with the animations adds life to the jumpiness of still photograpy. A favorite is the play on words with live and evil, I like the dead quality of the person, how she seems without life with her lack of eye movement and she is wearing black, yet there are living flowers in the background. Another favorite is the words as cars in the intersection. The music makes it quick and fun to watch the words crash into a huge word pile-up, then get carried away like they would in life.

Anna Portnoy -- Monday, October 4 2004, 02:05 am
I know very little about typography, but with your videos and sketches that explain basics about typography are not only aesthetically pleasing but informative. :)

Robot Da-more way out west in hippie ville USA (eugene) -- Monday, October 4 2004, 03:13 am
I think it is interesting to see people coming together over a visual language system, here is why… Way back at the end of prehistory, people started writing things down, instead of only creating oral stories that required people to group together and listen to the story. When humans started writing things down, gathering the stories and providing visual copies it allowed people to understand information in any place they went, no matter the language spoken. Some argue that this created a change in the human psyche, a trend that made us feel alone and isolated both mentally and maybe even physically. So in this case, it is very interesting that people are getting together over type. I think that some groups needed some ideas to go in the direction of since a few of the products stuck mainly to animation or font. I like the face group because it showed the arbitrariness of type anyway. I mean all a type does is allow a reader to understand an idea, what they were dealing with seemed to be a type font with clear characters that could be used to express a very clear story or group of ideas but in a different “type language.” Keep on trucken’

Andrew Natt, ARTD250 -- Monday, October 4 2004, 04:01 am
I really loved the idea of using new ways to express the idea of type and the structure of letters. It really expands my thinking to look at everyday objects and think about them in terms of letters.

Whitney Harper--UO Multimedia -- Monday, October 4 2004, 04:29 am
It is interesting how many directions can be taken from the same starting point. The stop-animation style of the films adds a quality of lightheardtedness and the inclusion of music excites the images on the screen. Though the letters are used to create messages, here they are used more as artistic elements, and the films speak for themselves. These are fun projects! thank you!

Kevin Woodfill ARTD 250 -- Monday, October 4 2004, 05:34 am
These are very interesting projects. It shows that there are no limitations to what can be done with type, are just art in general. However, the projects seemed to be less about typography and more about photographic effects. But, the projects were creative, entertaining, and aesthetically pleasing, which is what I think makes these pieces, and all other artistic pieces good.

sonja crafts -- Monday, October 4 2004, 06:04 am
I found these typograpic animations very exciting and fun. I loved the use of materials, very creative work!

Preston Johnson -- Monday, October 4 2004, 06:07 am
These were awesome! I've never seen anything like this before and i found myself looking on the net for more. The creativity and imagination that went into these projects was astounding.

jacob bond -- Monday, October 4 2004, 06:23 am
Very interesting videos. An innovative and interesting way to explore type. They look like a lot of fun to create, I'd love to attend one of your workshops. Underware should come visit The University of Oregon!!! You have much to teach us all!

Chandler Savage, UO Multimedia -- Monday, October 4 2004, 06:35 am
The videos were both well thought out and well executed. Many of the projects instilled in me a sense of chaos and randomness of letters and words, which-I believe-is representative of how chaotic and random languages are. Think about it, why do we represent "art" with an "a," "r," and a "t"? Why not "der"? I kind of like "der" better...hmmm...Anyway, great work...I hope maybe we can do a similar project in our Multimedia Survey class, maybe for our final project?

VSamarron -- Monday, October 4 2004, 06:51 am
I like how the animations made the typography come to life. With or without music inspiring images were found

Aubrey Ganz ARTD 250 -- Monday, October 4 2004, 09:49 am
I really enjoyed all of the projects. I especially liked the one with the traffic letters. It was a great idea to include car models in the letters, and the collision was very entertaining. I loved how chaotic and energetic it was. I also liked how the road wasn't perfectly symmetrical. I can't believe these projects only took 250 minutes. The groups definitely knew what they were doing.

Benjamin Geck -- Monday, October 4 2004, 06:23 pm
I think this workshop showed that typography and communication do not have to be clearly defined symbols and structures to be effective. In several of the videos, a clear message was created, even with type only hinted at or just on the edge of perception. In other videos, type is cleared defined, but the message can only be taken in when looking at the whole experience of the video. The text becomes meaningless without the content around it. Personally, I've always like listening in on conversations when I'm at a restaurant or in a crowd. I think these videos capture that style of listening well, where sentences, phrases, and other bits and pieces filter through the overall murmur and form messages and ideas themselves even though the original conversations they're coming from may not be related to those messages. Again, it seems that our interpretation of the type is the communication, instead of the type itself.

Adam from u of o -- Monday, October 4 2004, 07:49 pm
I like how individual meanings can be taken away through the use of the alphabet in many different forms.

Kailey C Freeman ARTD250 -- Monday, October 4 2004, 08:12 pm
First let me say that I find the fact that these films could be produced frame by frame in so little time with the majority of them turning out quite well amazing. I didn’t find all of the films to be typographical in nature yet I enjoyed them nonetheless. The cell-phone-as-car piece was fun and creative but unless you count the text at the very end on the cell phone screens (What did it say?) it wasn’t typographical at all, it may have had social implications though, speaking of our fast paced lives, the increased use of electronic means of communication with typography itself taking a backseat to speed and ease of communication. As far as actual typography goes I loved the “font” created by the coffee in the “koffie” film it captured for me not only the essence of the was coffee looks but also its taste smell and the feeling of a cozy café. I thought that the “shit city” film showed exceptional craftsmanship while using typographical means to do so. The only thing in that film that was unclear to me was what the initial objects that spell “city” have to do with the piece. It seemed rather as though they were chosen to create the negative space for the word “city to appear (and then be over come by shit) merely for convenience. Did anyone else see a message in the rubber bands and scissors? Overall I thought they were fun. I was impressed at what the groups were able to do with their time and resources and at what variety there was between the films.

Amy Burke ARTD 250 -- Monday, October 4 2004, 08:15 pm
I really enjoyed watching this workshop. It offers a different way of interpreting language. Why didn't language evolve into a system where we speak by changing our mouths with our hands? At the end of that particular video, their sign said, if I made it out right, "Do you speak Chinese?" This is a really good example of the differences in type of communication - it's very arbitrary. Why do we have letters and they have characters? I also loved the highway of symbols. The various words, pie signs, and numbers were indicative of many languages that we use. I interpreted the crash of the word "MAN" into the wall as us hitting a wall and opening new barriers, much like we do all the time in math, science, and spoken language. The movies are quite creative and I would love to have Underware come to our class in little rural Eugene, OR..

Collin Stark-Benz -- Tuesday, October 5 2004, 10:26 am
because i believe i would have looked at the perameters differently (thus, i would imagine different outcome), i will answer the question you did not ask: yes, it is indeed fun to play.

Aaron "Sully" Sullivan - UofO -- Wednesday, October 6 2004, 02:28 am
I really enjoyed all of these movies, and you guys did a great job with the time you had. Though I don't like to pick favorites, I definately had one. I loved the clutter in the city video, I find it amazing that it was done in such a short time and to be above and beyond most of the other projects. I loved everything about it and it made my day watching it. Thats all... you guys rock! Aaron

hava -- Wednesday, October 6 2004, 08:44 pm
I love the ideas, and that you guys are out there doing this. Come to Eugene OR, we want to play too!

Eri Noda - UO Multimedia -- Thursday, October 7 2004, 01:18 am
These videos were very unique and imaginative. I especially enjoyed the "city" clip. I was so surprised how it suddenly popped up so uniquely. Very cool.

Yen-Ting Kuo -- Thursday, October 7 2004, 07:15 am
Those are amazing! Some ideas that are really surprised me. Keep going guys! wait to see all yours fantastic works!

Yen-Ting Kuo , UO multimedia survey 250 -- Thursday, October 7 2004, 07:16 am
Forgot to add my class name :p

Bas -- Friday, October 8 2004, 01:04 pm
To put things into proportions a bit: I consider the social aspect of this specific one-day event way more important than the typographic aspect.




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