Thinking about critiques
After testing out some videos last week, I have two works I'd like to put forward for critique - the bark LIDAR and the mustard plant video (currently in "orb" form, but going to simplify).
going with projection for presentation
it's immediate, immersive, helps disrupt the subject-object viewer relationship which seems more apparent when looking at a screen; by scaling up the videos, the works become much more immediate, and I hope this will help shift away from a human-subject vs nature-object dichotomy
can place on table, doesn't need to be exhibition standard - focus in the work not the install.
have re-edited both clips; filmed some sound to go with the mustard flower one (similar to what was captured in the mustard plant video - background outdoor garden ambience) but unsure if I'll use it
I have included the device used to make each work in the title of each in an effort to think about their role as co-creators in the process. I'm not sure how far I will take this thought in future, but it's interesting to me thinking of them as artist assistants...
On the editing of the render and video footage:
technological consideration vs. overworking - is it enough that the device is capturing something (i.e. camera struggling to focus back and forth, the LIDAR scan not being quite right), or does it need extra fiddling with (i.e. blender sphere)? Is editing adding anything or is it just fluff?
bark LIDAR - currently too commercial - play with pacing, viewpoint
re-edited - much slower pace, black background
Tasks:
write some artist statements and titles for each work (below, rough)
think about core themes - the uncanny, surreal, not-quite-right; endearing nature of a technological device struggling to view the world/fallibility; the "shell" or surface-level view and the speculative (LIDAR)
a thought from a few weeks ago: I think when we capture something digitally, we capture the idea of it as seen through the device, and the language of that technological view creates a sort of mythological object... in doing this repeatedly, I think we build a broader conceptual idea/sign(?) of the thing, which may not be as authentic as the original that was being captured but that holds its own power nonetheless...
Remember: "everything builds to create content"
What does the object/artefact/work say as ‘idea + language = content.’?
While thinking about how the LIDAR program knits together the images to form a 3D object, it occurred to me that our eyes do a similar thing. The punctum caecum in the eye lacks photoreceptor cells - while this spot is insensitive to light, we have no conscious awareness it as the brain makes assumptions about the rest of our visible surroundings to fill it in. Similarly, scotoma blind spots are regions of reduced information within the visual field in which things often seem to disappear. I think this relates really nicely to Pipilotti Rist's idea of the eyes as cameras, especially in relation to the LIDAR works.

"Beyond its literal sense concerning the visual system, the term scotoma is also used metaphorically in several fields, including neurology, neuropsychology, psychology, philosophy, and politics. The common theme of all the figurative senses is of a gap not in visual function but in the mind's perception, cognition, or world view. Their concrete connection to the literal sense, however, is by the connection between the nervous system and the mind, via the chain of links from sensory input, to nerve conduction, to the brain, to perception (the processing
and interpreting of that input) via the brain-mind correlation, to psychological function. Thus there is not only...a visual inability to see an aspect of reality but also (or instead) a mental inability to conceive even the possibility of seeing that aspect, due to a cognitive schema that lacks any provision for it. *
Artist statement/s (to be revised)
These works are investigations on mediation, nature, ecology, and perception. Both videos explore the slippages and developments that occur when trying to accurately capture something via a digital device and examine both the perception of nature and the ability of technology to capture, mediate, and speculate.

oakbarkspiderweb.obj (iPhone 12)
Single-channel moving image of LIDAR scan
2 minute loop
This work explores the slippages between digital representation, perception and reality. The work features a LIDAR scan taken on an iPhone 12 of a spiderweb over the knot of an oak tree in Auckland Domain. In the process of the capture, minute details of the oak bark and spiderwebs are preserved, while at the same time abstract shapes emerge in the gaps of information that the camera was unable to process. In doing so, the camera's own imagination comes into play, envisioning what the inside of a tree and gaps between fragments could look like and filling these spaces with visual noise. Both elements of the bark's micro-ecology and the fallibility of the digital device are visualised, and the possible parallels between human and digital speculation are illustrated.

mustard (Xiaomi Mi 9) Single-channel moving image
50 second loop
This video work explores an envisioning of the world through a digital device and the perception of the natural world beyond everyday human capability. In investigating the mustard growing in my flat's backyard, the camera is taken through the plants at a level and distance difficult for the human eye to achieve. In the process, the camera struggles to focus on the subjects, dipping in and out of clarity - the tiny details of the plants are made visible while the scene becomes abstracted and overwhelming...
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