ARBORIFORM - ALYS BEACH
Role: Animation, Visual & Sound Design
Event: Digital Graffiti Festival, Alys Beach
Created: 2024
Arboriform is a collection of visual patterns found across nature and technology that mimic the branching formations of trees. These bifurcating shapes can be seen in everything from lightning and neural connections to broken LCD screens and topographic maps. By illuminating these similarities, Arboriform seeks to show the interconnectivity between humans and nature in microscopic and macroscopic scale. The piece has been projected on a grove of trees infront of a house, allowing for an interplay between the manmade architecture and natural forest. The piece was selected as Best in Show at Digital Graffiti Festival in Alys Beach. Special thanks to John Colette for including my work and helping me understand the wonderful world of MadMapper’s spatial scanner feature.
PROJECTION AT ALYS BEACH
Arboriform was projected on a home in Alys Beach that featured a small grove of trees in front. Content was mapped to each individual tree to create a dimensional experience for viewers. Madmappers spacial scanner feature was very helpful for mapping the various surfaces.
SYNAPSE
The first act of Arboriform was created using a desktop tesla coil, MRI brain scans and Adobe’s Firefly AI software. The desktop teslacoil was filmed with a BlackMagic 6K camera and the resulting footage was distributed across the building. That same footage was run through Adobe Firefly as a structural base and then a prompt about neurons viewed through an electron microscope was applied.
LIQUID CRYSTAL DISPLAY
This scene was created by smashing various LCD screens pulled from televisions and computers. Once the screens were backlit by a light table, the liquid became visible and could be animated by pressing on the surface of the screens. Each liquid effect was filmed with a BlackMagic 6K camera and a Zeiss 50mm Macroplanar lens.
ELECTRIFIED LANDSCAPES
This scene was created by shocking thermal paper with a desktop tesla coil and then running the resulting imagery through Adobe Firefly to create black and white topography. Height maps of mountain ranges were also downloaded from Terrain.party and rendered in Cinema4D.
HEAT MAPS
The element that started Arboriform was an observation of how leaves contain a very similar structure to the branches of the tree they grow upon. Several leaves were scanned and color corrected in Adobe AfterEffects to give them a heat-map aesthetic. These leaves were then run through Adobe Firefly as a structure reference while the prompt turned them into psychedelic topographic maps.
PSYCHEDELIC CIRCUITS
The final scene of Arboriform sequences through several different circuit boards that feature branching line work between their components. The circuitboards were photographed and then color corrected in Adobe AfterEffects to create a heat map aesthetic.
CREDITS
Design, Animation and Music: Peter Clark
Projection Technical Assistance: John Colette