1000th post! ‘The Search Engine’ at the SAT, Montreal

_MG_7195_sebastien_roy640_MG_6695_sebastien_roy640DJ Food-photo Susan Moss-57Ju_Graphee Foodmg_6632_sebastien_roymg_6717_sebastien_roymg_6765_sebastien_roymg_6847_sebastien_roymg_6871_sebastien_roymg_6961_sebastien_roymg_7007_sebastien_roymg_7010_sebastien_roymg_7195_sebastien_roy640mg_7400_sebastien_roymg_7416_sebastien_roymg_7591_sebastien_roymg_7596_sebastien_roymg_7603_sebastien_roymg_7688_sebastien_roymg_7718_sebastien_roymg_7741_sebastien_roymg_7759_sebastien_roy

As it always does, the day of the show came and went in a blur. By 7pm on July 19th we actually had everything in place, there was no last minute rushing around or ‘that will have to do’ decisions. The only thing I was worried about was doing a short introduction in front of the assembled press, I’ve never been comfortable being center stage, even less when speaking through a mic. By the time the first show kicked off there was little to do but sit down and play, or even lie down and shift sound around as much or as little as it needed for the 50 minute show.

I should have done this years ago, I get to lie down with the audience and just play with the sound, no one is looking at me up on a stage, they’re concentrating on the dome and I can watch it too whereas most projections are usually behind me when I DJ.

Sébastien Roy – the SAT‘s photographer – took an amazing set of photos that really capture the scale as well as working well with the low light levels (see above and below galleries).

_MG_7195_sebastien_roy640_MG_6695_sebastien_roy640DJ Food-photo Susan Moss-57Ju_Graphee Foodmg_6632_sebastien_roymg_6717_sebastien_roymg_6765_sebastien_roymg_6847_sebastien_roymg_6871_sebastien_roymg_6961_sebastien_roymg_7007_sebastien_roymg_7010_sebastien_roymg_7195_sebastien_roy640mg_7400_sebastien_roymg_7416_sebastien_roymg_7591_sebastien_roymg_7596_sebastien_roymg_7603_sebastien_roymg_7688_sebastien_roymg_7718_sebastien_roymg_7741_sebastien_roymg_7759_sebastien_roy

Sam from Vinyl Junkies made this video clip compilation. That’s his 6 year old daughter at one point at her first ever gig, she loved it. I also did an interview with him the day after about the shows which will be online soon.

[youtube width=”640″ height=”390″]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QIP1mAHZdOw&feature=youtu.be[/youtube]

Thursday, post show comment: Thanks so much to everyone who came out last night, it was such a thrill to finally see it up on the dome. So happy to be hosted by the SAT in one of my favourite cities in the world, everyone who helped on this has been amazing, especially Olivier Rhéaume who helped me mix the sound all week. Looking forward to coming back for the Friday night crowd. Tickets have been selling so well that a Saturday show was announced too.

Here’s a review (in french) by Olash Bacon and a nicely put together set of pictures by Jü|Graphee

Friday, post show comment: Just back, another two down, we tweaked the sound during the day and it’s now sounding a lot better, less top end in places, the spoken word stuff cuts through a lot better too. One more show for Saturday at 8pm, tickets still left but selling fast, a lot who came tonight couldn’t get in and bought for tomorrow instead. I met so many cool people tonight and the posters are selling really well too.

[singlepic id=4017 w=640 h=480 float=left]

Also, more fantastic photos: this time by Susan Moss

_MG_7195_sebastien_roy640_MG_6695_sebastien_roy640DJ Food-photo Susan Moss-57Ju_Graphee Foodmg_6632_sebastien_roymg_6717_sebastien_roymg_6765_sebastien_roymg_6847_sebastien_roymg_6871_sebastien_roymg_6961_sebastien_roymg_7007_sebastien_roymg_7010_sebastien_roymg_7195_sebastien_roy640mg_7400_sebastien_roymg_7416_sebastien_roymg_7591_sebastien_roymg_7596_sebastien_roymg_7603_sebastien_roymg_7688_sebastien_roymg_7718_sebastien_roymg_7741_sebastien_roymg_7759_sebastien_roy

I should take this opportunity to thank everyone who helped me, especially people who supplied some of the footage and gave invaluable advice before I even got to Montreal. Jan Zehn and Stefan Berke from Germany for their CymaSonics sequences, very happy to have their input. Paul Bourke, something of a legend in dome projection, and the sequences he sent, very generously at the last minute. Thomas English for the Red Epic footage, again donated very kindly. Phil Mayer and Ben Stern at Fulldome UK for advice and who will be staging the next version of this show in Leicester this coming November. Also Mario Di Maggio from Thinktank‘s Digital Planetarium in Birmingham for a special preview show which opened my eyes to several possibilities.

At the SAT it’s thanks to LP, Dominic (it was a boy!), Olivier, Guillaume and Alex that it all went smoothly. Evelyn at Evenko for helping stage it, Jeff Waye and Danna Takako Hawley at Ninja Tune N. America for setting it up and doing all the nitty gritty stuff. Finally a big man hug to Pat Hamou (that’s him below) who initially suggested it, helped out and designed the poster to boot – thanks all. I hope to make it back soon with a better show, each one is a learning process and there’s still work to do and plenty more domes to visit.

Posted in DJ Food, Event, Film. | 4 Comments |

Setting up at the SATosphere

Some of this content appeared on the Facebook page for the event as this was the most direct way to explain what was happening to the people who were going, so apologies for any repetition.

Pre-gig article by Lucinda Catchlove for CBC Music on what it’s about and what I intend to do.

Now some background on the process of getting it to the screen:

July 9th: Currently rendering footage from both After Effects and Final Cut Pro as well as preparing images in Photoshop. To show films ‘full dome’ (ie covering the whole surface of a dome) you need to have an image between 3000 and 4000 pixels square. Only Red cameras can shoot over the 4k image size but this is only on the long side, and the raw footage for one frame this size is 36MB. As a result most full dome films are animations and I’m attempting to make a 50 minute sequence to go with my mix of the album.

July 12th: Another late night, nearly ready to put the whole thing into the final arrangement. Most of the animation is done in After Effects but AE isn’t too great for synching visuals and sound together, especially a 50 minute sequence. So image sequences are loaded into Final Cut Pro for an easier handle on editing to a timeline although low res versions are made because of the huge file sizes needed for a dome and not a regular projection screen.

Once everything is in it’s correct place an XML file of the session is exported BACK to AE so that a plug in that simulates a 3D dome environment can be added in various different ways to sections. More on that later, that’s the really tricky part where you go from thinking in 2D to 3D and start placing things in space…

Trying to render FX on 2700×2700 pixel footage from a R3D Epic camera inside a 3600×3600 pixel video sequence. “Computer says no…”

July 9th: Animating images is largely done in After Effects then rendered to Image sequences of huge jpegs at 30 fps (frames per second). That’s 30 jpegs per second x how ever many seconds in a sequence. I’m making a 50 minute + show: 30 x 60 x 50 = over 90,000 images. Here’s one below…

I’ve already broken the whole soundtrack down into ‘stems’ (each instrument or part isolated onto a separate track) and this has been sent to the SAT where they are busy making ‘sound maps’ for each song in the mix. With over 150 speakers inside the dome we can place each sound from each track wherever we want. Even better, once the show has begun I should be able to move sounds around the dome manually as it plays using a program on an iPad.

So if you wonder what I’m doing if you come along, I’m not surfing the web or checking email, I’ll be moving sounds around to mess your head up. The song I’m most excited about for this is ‘A Trick Of The Ear’ – this track was actually written with the intention of each part panning around a sphere. Besides various polyrhythms working in tandem throughout the track, I wanted it to feel like you were inside a gyroscope when you listened to it. Hopefully we’ll get somewhere near that next week.

Friday 13th: Last day putting the finishing touches where I can before bouncing it all over to After Effects and applying the full dome plug in to certain sections. Off to Belgium today for a gig too so going to leave stuff rendering no doubt but some will have to be done at the SAT next week.

Monday 16th: Well, I’m in Montreal, about to head down to the SAT and plug everything in, still need to do work on parts today before we push the ‘render’ button. Had to pull an all-nighter Saturday in order to make sure everything copied over to 3 external hard drives. Today should be a pivotal day in getting this from my machines into the SAT. For anyone thinking of getting into dome projection in the future, I’d say… think very carefully. But if you’re determined you’ll need a very fast machine / graphics card, huge amounts of hard disc space and lots of time on your hands…

It’s 9.40pm and I’m still at the SAT, today has been trying to say the least. The Mac to PC file exchange got off to a flying start when trying to copy 300GB to their servers was going to take 9 hours. Luckily they have a Mac Drive program now which enables them to read drives formatted in HFS+ (Mac read/writable) and we needed the time to finish fine tuning the show.

Dominic, who is helping me with all the visual side is about to be a new dad, I mean imminently, not any day, but any hour or minute. He was giving me tips by mobile whilst at the hospital :) The initial render time direct from my drive for the 50 minute piece was over 30 hours so we’ve stop that and are now copying the files needed to the server for a multi-machine render tomorrow. Here’s a shot of the mini dome that they have in their computer lab and the bar and terrace on the second floor outside the dome.

On the audio side we have 164 separate tracks to sort out and bounce to a manageable amount before ‘spatializing’ them into different parts of the dome for each song. This will create song maps unique to each track and enable me to move certain parts around at will. For everyone back in the UK, the sun was out this morning and I’m in shorts and a T-shirt. But lo and behold, what happened this afternoon? It pissed down, exactly like London, I couldn’t quite believe it.

Oh yeah, I forgot to say, at one point the master drive I’d bought as back up with EVERYTHING on it wouldn’t show up on my laptop after being pulled out of the SAT server. ‘The drive could not be found, would you like to reinitialise it?’ Luckily Disc Utilities saved the day.

Tuesday 17th: Day 2 in Montreal: Woke up to rain at 5.45am – WTF? I’m beginning to think I brought the bad weather with me from the UK. Monday was full on, got home around midnight with ‘homework’ on the audio to do. Couldn’t face it so got up super early this morning to get a few hours in before heading out.

Dominic was here (still no baby arrived) and set the visuals up on 6 machines to render, he thinks it will be done by tomorrow morning when it then has to be re-rendered for the various projectors in the dome. Making sound maps and spatializing all the tracks this afternoon hopefully – I need some lunch.

Wednesday 18th: Mixing, mixing mixing, all day and into the night with Olivier Rhéaume… The downstairs floor of the SAT is open plan and there’s been a full orchestra ‘practicing’ most of the week. Insanely good players, completely perfect to my ears, we’re working on the 2nd floor and hearing Holst‘s piece ‘Mars’ from The Planets suite wafting up the stairwell was amazing. Apprarently we really pissed them off with the volume we were mixing at unfortunately. Had a midday break to go and record a mix for CBC (see last post) and do an interview for La Devoir paper then dinner and back to the mix until 11pm.

Thursday 19th: Show day – last minute emergency, some donut (me) left a reference film in place of the last sequence. When we watched the whole thing through we got to the end and it looked like someone had used an animated gif in place of a hi res image sequence, not a good way to end the show. Currently re-rendering from the proper source files…

Posted in DJ Food, Event, Film, Gigs. | No Comments |

Around Montreal last week

It’s been a bit quiet on the blog this past week as I’ve been away in Montreal doing the ‘Search Engine’ shows at the SAT (Société des Arts Technologiques), I fly back to the UK this evening so I’d like to share what I’ve seen and done all week. It’s three posts until the 1000th entry so I’ll set the scene before the big 1k reveal. First off, I’m sure anyone who’s visited Montreal will know that it’s a city full of great street art and unique architecture, once hosting Expo 67 (the Buckminster Fuller dome is still there if not in its former glory).

The view above was taken from the 15th floor of the CBC building (Canadian Broadcasting Company) where I was doing a mix for a late night show, Bande a Part, the Fuller dome is just out of shot on the righ. Unfortunately I didn’t have time to make it over to the old site but I’ll be back and then it’s top of the list. It’s impossible to walk around though without being confronted by huge murals, graffiti pieces or interesting signage, the best of which I’ve put in the small gallery here.

DELIAPHONICLOGO_220107_BLCKMS193 Acapellas Anonymous 24:11:2003 PRSMS193 Acapellas Anonymous 24:11:2003 CDrElectrik Collage logo webMS192 Coldcut Alien Sphinx on Solid Steel 16:09:1994 tape

Pat Hamou, an old friend who worked for Ninja Tune North America and was responsible for suggesting this whole project to the SAT, had curated an exhibition of screen printed gig posters called Music On Paper which was held in the crypt gallery of a church. It’s just finished but there were some great posters on display including the one he designed for my gig.
The next two posts are quite content-heavy so I might not get time to post them before I leave, more when I return to the UK…

Posted in Art, Event, Poster / flyer. | 1 Comment |

Poster for the SATosphere shows

Only a week to go until the full dome shows at the SATosphere in Montreal and here’s a poster that Pat Hamou has worked up to be sold at the venue. These will be printed in metallics, can’t wait to see that!

*UPDATE: you can now purchase the remaining posters here from Pat via Etsy.

There’s still work to do before I press the final render button but here are some screen shots I’ve been posting on Facebook.

 

Posted in DJ Food, Gigs, Poster / flyer. | No Comments |

Worldwide mag design article extras

When I did the interview on design for music in the digital age for Gilles Peterson‘s Worldwide + magazine I submitted a lot of extra images that weren’t able to be used for space reasons. I thought I’d put them up here as I love them all and they illustrate some of the people I talk about who didn’t get featured visually.

The mag is now available on iTunes to download for the iPad.

Top to bottom, left to right:

Julian House / Ghost Box label,

The Designers Republic / Emigre magazine cover,

Michael C. Place / Build poster,

Vaughn Oliver & Chris Bigg – V23 / Lonely Is An Eyesore deluxe LP,

Pete Fowler / The Magic Numbers LP,

Mr Krum / The Simonsound mp3.


 

Posted in Design, DJ Food, Magazines, Packaging, Records. | No Comments |

Kid Koala ‘2-Bit Blues’ cut to 100 year old animation

Kid Koala‘s new album ’12-Bit Blues’ is due to drop on September 17th and a couple of tracks, ‘2-Bit Blues’ / ‘6-Bit Blues’ (can you see a pattern forming here?) are doing the rounds on promo. I discovered the film, ‘The Cameraman’s Revenge’, a few years back – a story of insect infidelity, animated in Russia a hundred years ago this year! I thought it was the perfect pairing with Koala’s music as he has a, as yet unreleased, project involving an insect band in the works, made entirely from 3D models.

The original film is 11 minutes long so I had to speed it up dramatically to fit it to the music but the original was silent and it invokes those early examples of film where they set the speeds too fast. I must stress, this isn’t the official video or anything, just something I made for my DJ sets. You can pre-order the album here, which comes with a bonus flexi disc and DIY cardboard turntable that will play the disc.

Posted in Film, Music, Ninja Tune. | 3 Comments |

Castles made of Sound

In the last week I’ve played in the grounds of three castles – well, two were Forts actually – in Italy, France and the UK. Salerno was the first, actually playing on a rooftop terrace overlooking the sea on the Italian coast (above). Secondly the Nuit Carrées festival in Antibes, France, playing on a stage by a small amphitheatre next to the Fort Carré (below). The sound at this festival was unbelievably clear, most probably due to the acoustics of the amphitheatre and the fort was lit up as a backdrop.

Finally, last night, I played at the Kelburn Garden Party in Scotland on a stage overlooking Kelburn Castle, an incredible site being that two sides are completely covered in art from Brazilian artists Os Gemeos and Nina & Nunca. It is quite a sight to behold, Sau Paulo street art meets Scottish heritage, and was completed in 2007, a year before the same artists covered parts of the Tate Modern in London. Sadly it seems that the render on the castle is being affected by the paint, which is causing it to crumble, so the mural will be lost soon much to the dismay of the owner Patrick Boyle, The 10th Earl of Glasgow.

Apparently parts of the castle are haunted, Tara, one of the organisers who picked me up from the airport, told me she’d been woken the night before by the feeling of being cuddled in bed by something unknown. When he told it to go away she’d been scratched three times on the back of her head and other guests had reportedly had their ribs squeezed and bum pinched whilst staying in the same room. Another time a handbag had flown across the room and hit her on the head and it’s widely believed that the ghost is a mischievous female who was a guest at the castle at one time and liked it so much that she didn’t want to leave. Supposedly there is some kind of vortex in one corner of the room through which spirits can come and go and the temperature is noticeably lower in that part.

Talking of vortex’s, to add to the incredible scenery surrounding Kelburn and nearby town Largs, out between two islands just off the west coast is one of the world’s largest whirlpools. Called The Corryvreckan Whirlpool, it is formed around a single rock jutting up from the seabed, several small whirlpools exist, occasionally widening to form one giant vortex which has been deemed unnavigable.

The grounds of the castle are something to behold, recent winds have caused several huge trees to crash down, one of them taking out a bridge across a stream just a week before. Plans to project my AV set onto the castle were unfortunately scuppered when it appeared that my technical rider hadn’t made its way to the right people and the right cables weren’t available. After my set I got a cab to the hotel in the next town, only to find that everything was locked up and I had no key (we hadn’t checked in, going straight from the airport to the festival). Fortunately a couple with a key arrived shortly afterwards and let me in and I managed to find an unlocked single room to crash in.

Posted in DJ Food, Gigs, Photography. | 2 Comments |

The Herbaliser – There Were Seven album

The Herbaliser return on October 8th with their 7th album proper, (not including Session 1&2, Herbal Blend, Herbal Tonic etc.), ‘There Were Seven’. There’s a loose concept at work within the album, which I don’t want to give away too much of but there are a myriad of clues in the titles, lyrics and graphics to a narrative that runs through much of the album.

I’ve kindly been asked back to design the record, which will be available on vinyl, CD and download plus a very limited special vinyl package from their own Dept. H label. Full details of the ltd. vinyl are yet to be finalised but even the standard vinyl will be a special package and I’m looking forward to getting that one back from the printers.

The album features vocals from MCs Ghettosocks, Muneshine, Timbuktu, George The Poet and vocals from Hannah Clive. A promo single, ‘The Lost Boy‘ will be doing the rounds soon with remixes forthcoming from The Colman Brothers, 2econd Class Citizen and more…

Posted in Design, Openmind designs, Poster / flyer. | 8 Comments |

Win Memory 9 & Falty DL music on Solid Steel tonight


Memory 9‘s new 12″ packaging and disc, plus the new Falty DL release in retro Ninja house bag. Win both of these tonight on Solid Steel between 7-9pm GMT on Strongroom Alive. I’ll be in the studio with Jon More from Coldcut and Memory 9 is supplying the guest mix.
My mix has a lot of killer new Hip Hop including an exclusive first play from the new Herbaliser album plus DJ Format, 2econd Class Citizen, Mister Jason, Cut Chemist, Soundsci and an unreleased mix of ‘The Illectrik Hoax’ by The Amorphous Androgynous.
And here’s the show:

Posted in Design, Ninja Tune, Records, Solid Steel. | 1 Comment |

Jim Mahfood

Always enjoy Jim Mahfood‘s work, very much looking forward to his take on Tank Girl this summer. He also has a new book out collecting his online adventures as a working artist, Los Angeles Ink Stains. He has a print out to go with it too as well as toys, T-shirts and more. Go here

Posted in Art, Books, Comics. | No Comments |

Soundsci – Formula 99 LP out today

The Soundsci LP is finally out today! Ex-Dynamic Syncopation producer Jonny Cuba and current part-Herbaliser DJ Ollie Teeba – alongside ex-Mass Influence MC Audessey, U-George and Oxygen. The deluxe bundle I posted about a few weeks back sold out in a day but the regular vinyl and digital is out now. Here’s a little snippets mix by Ollie Teeba to wet the taste buds…

[youtube width=”640″ height=”479″]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VKP0rmBUMp8&feature=youtu.be[/youtube]

and an even longer version on Soundcloud…

Posted in Design, Music, Records. | 1 Comment |

Vintage kids magazines from Italy

Steve Cook and I went on a scavenge for old magazines on my birthday earlier this year and, whilst in a well known West London basement, Steve found dozens of kids magazines from the 60’s and 70’s.

I’ve only had time to scan a few pieces but they are riddled with beautiful illustrations and typography from back in the day, check the Mini 22 logo on the toy gun ad for instance (there’s a telling amount of adverts for toy guns in each issue). Absolutely LOVE the robot cover and spread, which Steve graciously gave up for me from the pile, see also the ad for a vintage Lego train set.

These scans are primarly from an Italian mag called Corriere dei Piccoli (Italian for “Courier of the Little Ones”) and Steve has some from French ‘Lissette’ over on his Secret Oranges blog today. There’s plenty more from both mags to come from both of us so stay tuned and click images for larger versions.

Posted in Art, Design, Magazines. | No Comments |