The exploration of a triadic model of contest-complementation-conformance over innovative musical and visual forms of expression

The relationship between music, moving images and colour is one that has long
\nexerted a fascination over artists, practitioners and theorists. It is a compelling topic
\nnow because this question very directly illuminates ideas in the area of digital music
\nand performance as laptop performance gives opportunities for real time work with
\nvisuals and sound.
\nIn this project I explored this rich field by creating six works (including two
\ncompositions and four experimentations), closely related to each other, which
\ndramatised tensions between the natural and industrialized world through different
\naudio, visual and musical treatments, but always beginning with the same source
\nvisual material.
\nMy processes were informed by the insights of three theorists, and finding ways of
\napplying and interpreting them in performance contexts. The three theorists whose
\nideas most concerned me were Michel Chion (France, 1947), Raymond Murray
\nSchafer (Canada, 1933) and Nicholas Cook (Greece, 1950).
\nTo explain the relationship between music and visuals in my project, I utilized
\nNicholas Cook’s triadic model of contest, conformance and complementation, as
\ndescribed in his book Analysing Musical Multimedia (Oxford University Press, 2000).
\n
\nThe works created for this project displayed at least one strongly differentiated
\nmusical component in each of the pieces. For the visuals I decided to use (1) my own
\nfootage from natural landscapes and (2) footage from cityscapes to create a sharp
\nvisual juxtaposition. For the processing of the natural images, I made reference to
\nStan Brakhage’s experimental film ‘The Dead’ (1960 – 11 minutes, 16 millimeters).
\nIt’s a deathly, evocative walk through a cemetery through the non-attached, deviating
\ncamera of Brakhage, accompanied with a wide range of film effects such as
\nsuperimpositions, solarized film fragments and overexposures (loss of highlight
\ndetail). In “The Dead”, the images are tightly crossfaded (layered), a technique which
\nprevents the viewer from focusing on a specific image yet still being in context of the
\nfilm content. In addition, material objects can be located in The Dead. Statues are
\ndominant in it, and Brakhage’s sloping angles, solarization, and superimpositions with
\nthe noble mausoleums illustrate them as evil spirits that haunt these large tombs rather
\nthan supervising them in protection.
\n
\nWhat I have learned from Brakhage’s work is that experimenting with film techniques
\nsuch as image superimposition, color inversion, and overexposures over a series of
\nvisuals which are related to each other thematologically, and applying these
\ntechniques on the film in an appropriate way, leads to a more poetic representation of
\nthe visuals where the film’s context is not a result of the primitive visual material but
\nof the way the visual techniques are applied. In other words, the meaning of the film
\nis not defined by its primitive content but by the techniques applied. This eases the
\nfilmmaker to focus on different aspects of the film. For instance Brakhage in his film
\n“The Dead” made use of the techniques mentioned above (image superimposition,
\ncolor inversion, and overexposures) to depict the world from the viewpoint of a spirit.
\nIn addition, he combined these techniques with camera swerving so as to imitate the
\nmovement of the spirit itself.
\n
\nLearning from this, I crossfaded water images with color-inverted mountain images in
\nthe natural video sections, creating a similar effect that Brakhage creates in “The
\nDead” with the use of his layering techniques. Thus, I indicated my artistic decision of
\nthe presence of harmony in nature with the use of color inversion, color correction and image superimposition versus the intense footage from urban centers where I kept
\nthe imagery unprocessed and in black and white.
\nAny stretched sound used in this project was created with “Hypermammuth
\nPaulstretch”; a software applying time-stretching algorithm on any .wav, .ogg or .mp3
\nsound input.
\nPaulstretch is freeware software that I got from the website:
\nhttp://hypermammut.sourceforge.net/paulstretch/
\nPaul Nasca was the developer of this software. His webpage is:
\nhttp://www.paulnasca.com
\nAs it is clearly described in his website: http://www.paulnasca.com/open-sourceprojects#
\nTOC-Paul-s-Extreme-Sound-Stretch, this program produces high quality
\nsounds without the presence of any ‘artefacts’ even if the original source sound
\nundergoes extreme stretching. This is the reason why I decided to use this software.
\nThe output stretched sound is very clear and depending on the original source, the
\nprocessed sound either retains some characteristics of the original or it has a
\ncompletely different texture. This can lead to the production of a wide variety of
\nprocessed sound effects that I was very interested in exploring in my project.

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