Saturday 26 November 2011

ZEE

Imagine that you're in a room and it's filled with dry ice, you can't see further than about 30cm in front of you (at the best of times). Now there are coloured strobe lights all around you and music. It all feels as if it's happening right in front of your face...and you've got no control over any of it. You can't properly imagine this until you've experienced it for yourself. Well this is exactly what ZEE was like.

ZEE is an "immersive audiovisual" experience at FACT and is part of the Abandon Normal Devices exhibition. It's been created by an Austrian artist called Kurt Hentschlager who's spent a lifetime creating artworks that push the viewer into a state of sensory overload. "The core visual impression of ZEE is of a psychedelic architecture of pure light, an abstract luminescent landscape enveloping the visitor. Time appears to stand still."



Even though I was told what ZEE was beforehand by someone who'd already been to the exhibition, it didn't prepare me for what was about to happen, I had no idea what I'd really let myself in for. It's difficult to explain ZEE to someone who's not been in there and everyone has a different experience when they go in.

You're in a room full of people but you feel as though you're alone in there. You even feel like someone is walking past you when actually there's no-one there. It's a really strange sensation in there and I don't really know what to make of it, I'm not sure if I'd actually want to go in there again.

Tuesday 1 November 2011

ENVY Post-Production

Today there was a talk on in the LSS by Mat Appleton from ENVY Post-Production. ENVY are a post-production house where editors can hire out rooms in order to cut together their programmes and have all the in-house support that they may need from ENVY.

I found this talk really interesting as editing is an area which I'd like to go into so it gave me an insight into what goes on in a post-production house as this wasn't something that I was really aware of before. There's a lot more to a post-production house than you'd ever think. Mat also gave us tips on how to do a CV for applying for a job or work experience in the media industry as this is what can make you stand out from everyone else.

During the talk, Mat told us about an editing competition that is open to students only and this is something that I'd really like to get involved in. This would be a really good opportunity for me as this is an area of the industry that I'm particularly interested in and would give me something extra to put on my CV and in my media portfolio.