Post 12: A Side Trip to Playing Cards History

    How this came about, I don't remember exactly... Something to do with Marie Antoinette's taste for games, and games that people played in the 18th Century. Also, there is this little teasing tidbit of information about Cherubini being so dejected and depressed around 1807-1808 that he stayed home cutting up playing cards and assembling them into landscapes. I could not find any corroboration or any images of the landscapes in question anywhere else:
     "Disappointed and discouraged by lack of recognition, Cherubini produced scarcely anything in the two years which followed. He was broken-hearted and in ill health.He divided his time between drawing, botany, and cutting up playing cards into figures and landscapes which he framed and placed on the walls around his study. Not until 1809 was he aroused from this morbid indolence". 
   Still, it is an interesting visual proposition, so I looked for and found a bridge deck of French Royalty Playing cards. 

  They are not bad, but really a bit too traditional for my taste. Platnik Austrian cards...
  So I suddenly found myself designing my own deck of Royal Playing Cards in Photoshop... Things are still very fluid, but just to give you an idea, here is what I have so far: 

Louis XVI

 and Marie Antoinette

                  Louis XVIII

and Marie Josephine de Savoie

Henri IV

                                             and Marie de Medicis

                                                      Francois Premier

  I also have a few variations  for the backs of the decks, using a border from  Masonic Board, and old prints from the period:

 I don't know yet how I will use them in the show, but have no doubt they will find their place. The projection is a huge  5760 x 1080 pixels, so I am designing the cards 3000 x 2000 pixels, which is about as large as possible with material found on the Internet. 

Post 11: What is Carlos' Requiem Interpretation be like?

   It is going to be a serious problem for me working on the images until I have a reasonable approximation of what Carlos' final interpretation will be. I can allow for a certain amount of adjustment by breaking up the video in clips that are cued precisely to the final performance at dramatic musical moments. But that has to be within reason.
  When I was originally approached by Pierre about the Project, I wasn't familiar with this particular Requiem and went straight to iTunes to find the music. I found a number of different versions, and clicked my way through most of them listening to snippets until I figured out which one I LIKED. That happened to be Matthew Best and the Corydon Singer. But there are a lot of other versions out there.
  I actually went back to look yesterday, and found 16 recordings +, going back to Toscanini's in 1928:

  There also seem to be some variations on exactly how the Requiem is broken up in performance. The score I have, which is old, has 7 parts:

   INTROIT, GRADUEL, DIES IRAE, OFFERTOIRE, SANCTUS, PIE JESU, AGNUS DEI.  

   In the version I am listening to, Matthew Best breaks things up in 8 parts:

     INTROIT AND KYRIE, GRADUATE, DIES IRAE, OFFERTORIUM:DOMINE JESU CHRISTE, OFFERTORIUM: HOSTIAS, SANCTUS, PIE JESU, AGNUS DEI.

   Martin Perlman does the same thing with the Boston Baroque.

  On the other hand, Carlo Maria Giulini does it another way, grouping sections to make only 5 parts:

 INTROIT, GRADUEL DIES IRAE, OFFERTOIRE, SNCTUS PIE JESU, AGNUS DEI

    Toscanini stuck with the original 7 parts score, and so does Ricardo Mutti.

   All this is a little confusing, and I need to know what Carlos is going to do, and what version out there is closest to what his interpretation will be, so I have a sound track to set images to that is reasonably close to the final ASO performance.

Post 10: Setting up my Studio Workspace

   As I explained earlier, I want to recreate as closely a possible in the studio the situation in the Concert hall, mainly in order to get a good idea of how things will look like in the dark on the three big screen, and rehearse the performance. It will also allow me to show Pierre, Carlos, and other people at the Symphony what I have in store for them, and get their approval for my material.
 I have received the two new Mitsubishi Projectors and the Matrox box. I have set up the 3 projectors on tripods on top of my desk, and have hung the piece of Spandex high up in front of my computer:

 But I have been struggling to get things going, and the computer was going crazy when I plugged in the 3 projectors. So I plugged instead in 3 old 1920 x 1080 monitors into the Matrox Box, and plugged the Matrox into the computer's Graphic Card second DVI output and a USB plug for power. I went ahead and reinstalled the drivers, and did a firmware update.
Things now seem to work properly, and I have a desktop stretching across the 3 monitors:

Post 9: Concert at Railroad Park Friday Night

   After watching Carlos shape the music and work with the musicians at rehearsal on Tuesday, I was particularly interesting in seing the final performance at Railroad Park at 8 on Friday night.
   Rachel and I drove down early to get a parking space, and Michael helped us haul and set up our folding chairs, cooler and picnic on the grassy knoll, way too far from the tent. I could not hear a thing, and quickly moved my chair first row center, which happened to be unoccupied, as actually were all the front rows...I suppose people were afraid to get too close. 
   Anyway, once up close, the sound was fine, and I could see the musicians play and Carlos conduct very well. Mind you, a Symphony Orchestra is not the ideal kind of orchestra for outdoors, even with a stack of rather ineffective speakers. Trains going by a few feet away are a noisy distraction, as are helicopters flying directly overhead. But I knew the music and had heard it in rehearsal, so I did enjoy the evening.

  The weather was great, the sky a deep turquoise, with Venus rising above the tent(OK ,I enhanced it a little!) 

Post 8: First Creative Meeting

    Everybody came to my house early Thursday as planned, and we sat in the living room with a glass of wine, first to get to know Carlos better, and second to start to figure out what his vision was for that Requiem Projection, and the future of things at ASO in general.
  Most importantly, I got to ask the question that had been on my mind and was really my biggest concern: how are we going we keep the images and the music in synch over the course of a 5 minutes movement. I had already decided to start a new video with each movement, but that is not enough.
  Preuit and I had tried to come up with ways to do that, with advice from one of his old LA Symphony friends. Would Carlos consider using some kind of click track, or at least give us a basic music track, or would he be willing to follow visual cues to help keep the music in synch with the images.
  The answer to all those was a very nice no, which I expected after watching him conduct rehearsals, and actually totally understand. He wants to retain the option to "go with the inspiration" (my words), and adjust the tempo at will at any moment of each performance, depending on the genius of a particular soloist that day, or simply his mood or that of the audience.
   That puts the ball totally in my corner when it comes to having a particular visual effect exactly synchronized with a particular sound in the performance. I will need to know the score perfectly, and be able to anticipate every key moment. I wish I could read music... Pierre said somebody would help me.
  In simple words, there will be no continuous video set to an approximate music track,not even on per movement, but rather dozens of short video snippets that will need to be manually cued and launched exactly at the correct instant preceding a key sound,  drum roll, trumpet call, crescendo, etc... That is a totally new way to work for me, and  more akin to a live performance than my previous efforts. A bit like VJing, but with video clips instead of loops, and with utmost precision. Scary indeed. The BAD THING is that if I miss a cue, there is no going back. The GOOD THING is that if I miss a cue, I can still get the next one right!
   If Resolume Avenue VJ Software was able to handle multiple layers of full HD loops without skipping, that would be an option, but I don't think it can. At least, my current version won't. I just install the new version and will see if it works better
   I will also look into using QLab and Isadora, both of which can cue video on the touch of a key, or with a MIDI input.

POST 7: Putting together a working team and informal "advisory board"

    I feel the project is too important to do it alone. Besides Pierre Ruhe, who initiated the Project, Adam Stermer who will handle all the staging, and Carlos Izcaray who is the de facto Conductor of the whole show, I want to bring in some of my best creative Artist friends as artistic advisors, technical advisors, collaborators, and "associate brain stormers" at large.
   I hope this first Cherubini Requiem Project will expand and grow into a series of Cutting Edge Audio Visual Symphonic Events that will put Birmingham and the ASO on the map with the likes of Miami, LA, Berlin, New York, and why not think big,  Sydney.
  So I have so far asked(in alphabetical order) Liesa Cole, Randal Crow, Preuit Holland, and Christophe Nicolet to bring in their various talents. Our first general meeting is this Thursday at my house, starting around a glass of wine, and finishing around the dinner table. I find it the best way to unleash energy, dream big, have fun, and figure out how to do it...   Can't wait for Thursday!

   By the way, Carlos is in town for rehearsal on Wednesday at 10, and performance by the ASO at Railroad park at 8 on Friday. Don't miss it! Bring blankets, chairs, drinks, and wear rainproof clothing just in case.

Post 6: Some technical Issues

   There will be a number of technical issues to resolve, most of them thank God being in Adam's court... He has two great 5K projectors, and will have to procure a third one to match.
   The animation I am developing in After Effects for the show is 5640 pixels Wide x 1080 pixels High, to span the entire width of the 3 fabric panels with three 1920 x 1080 projectors.
  We will need a Triple Head Matrox Box or similar device to split that ultra wide image between the 3 projectors. I just went ahead and ordered one from B&H with Mini Display Port Input, and 3 DVI Outputs :

   I am not sure at this point whether we should have a slight overlap between the images or not. This is something we may have to test live...
  The subject of Real Live Tests is critical to me. I am well aware that we will have the third rental projector only a few days before the show, when it is too late to redo anything. I cannot take that chance, and plan to do thorough testing from the start on a scaled down setup.
  I already have a wonderful ultra short throw Mitsubishi 3K 720p projector. For an unexplained reason, these were either unavailable for the last year or so,or very expensive, but just I luckily just found a batch for sale at a very good price. My friend Christophe bought one, and I just ordered a second one for myself. That makes 3 between us. I am actually seriously wondering about ordering a third one while they are available, as I have a Frida Kahlo project on hold that would require four...I will use the Matrox Box to connect them to my computer. Here goes my budget...
  Anyhow, I will shortly have access to 3 identical 3K projectors, and plan to drape a 60" High x 26ft Wide fabric panel high up in my studio ceiling in a configuration similar to the final setup, to be able to test the show at roughly 1/4 size as it progresses to completion along the course of the coming year.

   A very serious technical issue is actually in my and Carlos' court, and we will have to debate the possible solutions very carefully.
The issue is the timing of the images to the music. It is not a huge issue in the slow rather contemplative first parts of the Requiem. But when the Dies Irae hit hard with trumpets and drums, and continues with numerous dramatic moments, it is going to be crucial that the timing be correct within a split second. How do we achieve that, we will have to figure out... It is very difficult to speed up or slow down a video on the fly to match the music. I will no doubt have a separate movie for each section of the Requiem, and click the Start button when the conductor lift's his baton. But what if there is a slight drifting over the course of a particular movement. 
   Movie sound track conductors and drummers commonly use a click track, but it is a big constraint. There is another concept around used in Cubase called "Hit Points", or "Markers". Might we use a version of that?
   It is also possible through live audio analysis to automatically trigger images. Nut that would not make for a very smooth video, would it?
   Back to Square one. Anybody out there, please help!

Pictures of the setup coming soon...