animate!

Exposure title card: This image is of an orange/brown rust-covered steel beam. In Photoshop I removed the colour from the central zone of the image and overlaid the titles and credit text. (Also see credit cards below).

click on image for full size still

Colour plates: This shot opens the film and introduces the vibrant colours of the coated plates at the site. It was taken as a 35mm still, the negative I processed myself, which I pushed to over-cook the colours. This was scanned to PC, printed up and re-filmed on my 35mm rostrum.

click on image for full size still

Blue bucket: This shot was originally filmed as a series of zoom/wipes toward the bucket. However at the editing stage of the film it became obvious that this was too grand and a slightly unnecessary gesture at this point in the film, so it became a simple jump cut.

click on image for full size still

Wide of site: To get this shot I raised my stills camera up an approximately 25ft pole, to be able to have a view looking down on the site as something of a whole.

click on image for full size still

Line on yellow plates: This shot is one of a number in the film where I mixed scratching marks made directly on to unprocessed celluloid and scanned on to my PC, with stills images of the site. In this case the scratch was a longish wavy line, scanned in reverse (dark scratch on light background) & laid over images of the line on the series of yellow plates. The next step was to rub out, on PC using a software package called AURA, the points where the scratches extended beyond the plates.

click on image for full size still

Clouds on plates: This image mixes time-lapse segments of passing cloud with a particular still of the site. This site image was shot using a ‘shift and tilt’ lens which sets the film focus plane at an angle to the actual film plane. This essentially gives a mix of soft and sharp points of focus across the image.

click on image for full size still

Slippage: This tracking sequence was constructed at the site on my Nikon stills camera using a number of 36exp. 35mm rolls. These rolls of film were hand-processed at different temperatures, dilutions and timings – giving a varied mix of under/over exposure and high/low contrast & saturation levels. The results were scanned, mixed and printed up for shooting on my rostrum.

click on image for full size still

Cracks in the sun: This and the sequences in the next two stills again mix celluloid scratches ‘fitted’ onto the plate surfaces in the images.

click on image for full size still

Etching 7 spring

click on image for full size still

Light splurge

click on image for full size still

XXX a: This and the next two images
are from an evolving sequence toward the end of the film. A number of a particular type of plate have been merged into each other using simple dissolves – but in ‘framed’ areas of the image. These images all contain the strong feature of (actual) overlaid scratched crosses. Theses are used at the site to kick-start the processes of deterioration, but for me they suggest small signatures – little identity stamps.

click on image for full size still

XXX b

click on image for full size still

XXX c

click on image for full size still

Dexion glow: This image was taken about twenty minutes after sunrise, when the light of the sun is at its most acute angle. The strength and direction of the warm light has really pushed & emphasized the residual colours of the old & not so old metal construction.

click on image for full size still

End credits background: see first caption

click on image for full size still

End credits: a film by PC

click on image for full size still

End credits: an animate! production

click on image for full size still