Gabriele Gentili

He-3 is a Future energy from the moon.
This is a abstracted clip of the gas helium-3

This is an off-shoot from a visual performance accompanying the Rambert Dance Company at the Queen Elizabeth Hall, South Bank, London UK. Originally a flat-e (flat-e.com) project, they approached me to create abstract visual layers containing subtle hints of human forms and motion, which could tie in with the movement of the dancers on stage. Working with footage of the dancers, I got a bit side-tracked and started experimenting and digressing (after delivering of course ;).

The visuals in this video clip are not how they will be in the final Rambert performance (which has a different look & feel, as well as other elements filmed and created by flat-e). Neither is the soundtrack in this video clip the music used in the actual Rambert performance, and is not what the dance was choreographed to. This is just a standalone piece born from working on the Rambert performance.

When the clip starts, you probably won't recognize a human shape at first, but your eyes and mind will be searching, seeking mental connections between abstract shapes and recognizable patterns, like looking for shapes in clouds. You'll be questioning what you see, is that him? is he sitting? is he crouching? is he kneeling? until all of a sudden, he'll be crystal clear. Then you'll try and keep him in focus, following him as he moves around, tracking each limb, using his motion to construct an image of the parts you can't see. He'll fade in and out of clarity. At times you'll be clinging onto just the tip of his hand swinging round, trying to identify any other recognizable parts. You might see another arm or leg and grab onto it, fighting not to lose him. Then he'll be crystal clear again, and then all of a sudden vanish, literally in a puff of smoke, and your eyes will start searching again...

Created with a custom app written in C++ with openFrameworks (openframeworks.cc).

more information at memo.tv/reincarnation

The dancers are Robin Gladwin and Miguel Altunaga. Choreography by Alexander Whitley.

rambert.org.uk/about_rambert/dancers/alexander_whitley
rambert.org.uk/about_rambert/dancers/robin_gladwin
rambert.org.uk/about_rambert/dancers/miguel_altunaga

This is simply my original 'Music is Math' animation with one very small but significant difference, I changed the random seed number. This number is basically the starting point for all random numbers throughout the code used to create the branches, particle motion etc.

The original seed value was 1973, the year I was born, and I was thinking of what other numbers I could use for a second video, and Nelson Mandela's prison number came to mind - 46664.