by Jeff SCHER
2011 / color / sound / 1S / 2' 00 |
The long-awaited demise of an extraordinary winter has released a pent-up spring. The days are longer and softer. Flowers are opening, the birds are back and the courting season has begun in earnest. Spring's sprung and New York City is giddy with it. I imagined every structure in every borough suddenly being freed from its stodgy, frozen-at-right-angles shackles as well. Straight lines are for winter. Spring is all about curves and things that wiggle and grow — like everything in "Spring City."
"Spring City" was photographed entirely by exploiting a neat quirk of the camera on my two-year-old iPhone. Shaking the phone vigorously while taking pictures in bright light will produce wonderfully rubbery, fun-house-mirror effects. Turning these still images into a movie required taking over 4,000 of them, wiggling the camera each time. The jiggling, jello-like movement is the sum of the differences between the distortions. The resulting film becomes a big wiggly dance when set to Shay Lynch's mambo.
While gathering the images for this film I spent a lot of time on various street corners, looking a little nuts, shaking my phone furiously at the city. Not a single person asked what I was doing. Of course, many people were busy looking at their own phones, but I think a lot of behavior that would have seemed eccentric not long ago now seems normal once you spot the phone in hand or ear. I'm all for the convergence of media in our pocket devices these days, but I'm still surprised when my camera rings while I'm shooting something and someone wants to talk on it. I originally wrote this and made the film the Times on my blog The Animated Life.
distribution format | Digital file on server |
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screen | 16/9 (single screen) |
speed | 25 fps |
sound | sound |
rental fee | 20,00 € |