Amanda Williams – Portfolio

The Printmakers Association of WA has a new website address. Please take a moment to visit and update your bookmark: http://www.pawa.org.au

Around six months I wrote a post questioning my involvement in the Landfill Art project. I was disappointed when I found after the work was finished that I was expected to send it half way round the world, at my cost, never to be seen again. Nowhere in my correspondence with Ken Marquis nor anywhere on the website did it say that was what was expected. Yes, I did look both before and after – I really thought I would be sending an image or two by email or FTP – not the work itself.

Since I couldn’t afford the postage, my painted hubcap landed in a box of other projects that never went anywhere. Art is like that. It not that I objected to giving something to a worthy cause – I’m often asked and often do. Always, though, I know upfront that is what is expected. Also, it’s relevant to say here that making a living from art isn’t easy – currently it’s pretty much impossible. I still couldn’t afford the postage if I wanted to send it.

This morning I woke to find an inbox full of messages with the request that their correspondence be published. Some of it is not very nice… Read the rest of this entry »

Another short animation – this one just 36 seconds long but 100+ hours in the making. Seriously. I’m still plodding on with my Curtin BA (Fine Art) majoring in sculpture but squeezing in a bit of film whenever I think I can get away with it… The brief for this project was, in fact, stop motion animation so no squeezing required. Ahhh I’m my comfort zone. Unfortunately not. The difficulties were that it be around 30 seconds long and use really cruddy software… something that any student might have access to. I used Windows Movie Maker because if you have Windows – you have MM. It was a horror – regularly locking up and losing my work and only one “layer” each for audio and video. An NLE it ain’t! Fair enough – its not the software that makes the film – it simply makes it more or less difficult than it need be. What this meant in practical terms was a series of photos… no green screen, no layering, and no special effects.

To make it more interesting to make I tackled it as a “flat” animation rather than puppet and set (because I’d just finished my part of Hollow City Chronicles and wanted to try something completely different). I also wanted the ability to move the background as well as the “puppets” – which were in fact cut up photos – lots and lots of cut up photos…The solution was to break up an old a set of home-made shelves – replacing the timber with the pieces of glass I use when while raising seedlings. (Just borrowed them – no seedlings at this time of year here!) The camera was on the tripod which was gaffa taped to the top so it could look down through the glass. I used the EOS software that comes with the Canon 450D to remote control the camera.

This style of animation is “replacement animation” the image pieces themselves have no flexibility so to change them they have to be replaced with a new piece – very carefully, in the right spot, over and over again to get the effect of movement. Lots of fun but slow.

The other challenge with this was to create some sort of narrative in around 30 seconds. The end result is a mixed up fairy tale – which depends on the viewer recognising Red Riding Hood, Goldilocks (who doesn’t even appear), Snow White and the three bears. You are left to decide for yourself who or what is for lunch at the Teddy Bears Picnic. Its all a bit dark.

The bottom line is that forests are dangerous places. And bears are not to be trusted…

As promised: part 2 of the making of The Bystander Effect (a short film which was part of the Hollow City Chronicles).

The set for the animation was intended as a sculpture rather than a set. The decision to use it for a film came later.

The puppet was made using the ever-popular wire and cushion foam technology. (Nick Hilligoss has a fantastic series of how-to’s on Picturetrail) The puppet, then, was too big for the set (and couldn’t, workably, be much smaller with that method of construction) so she was filmed against a green backdrop – made by painting some cheap canvases and a piece of 3mm MDF.

The canvases stand up with the aid of small clamps.

While the puppet stands up with help from a magnet – a small but powerful rare-earth one from an electronics store.

The series of photos were then fed into Cinegobs a wonderful freeware utility which removes the green and spits out an AVI file ready for editing with an NLE such as Adobe Premiere. (Yes, Premiere does do chroma keying but, strangely, not as well as Cinegobs!)

The Hollow City Chronicles exhibition has opened and the web site is officially launched. The sets and other forensic evidence will be showing at Midland Polytechnic until March 4, 2011.

I thought I’d take my short film “The Bystander Effect” apart and show how it was made. It’s all low budget (no budget!), learn-as-you-go stuff. I make no claims to be an expert, just curious and crazy.

The opening scene shows the city from above.

The city isn’t real, of course, it’s a sculpture and it was too big to just lean over the ladder and snap the pic. The lamps are ordinary desk lamps on stands (hope no one in the house wants to read…). The green curtains weren’t needed for this shot – they were there from other filming – we’ll get to that.

The camera used for the film is a Canon 450D which comes with software that allows it to be controlled from a PC (including seeing what could be seen through the viewfinder). It made it possible to clamp the camera to a roof beam above the set and still be able to use it! Just add an extra long USB cable… It’s not a dedicated “animation camera” (is there such a thing?) it’s the one the family has – four of us share it (unless one of us is hogging it to make a film… in which case it’s probably bolted to the ceiling!)

Tomorrow I’ll introduce the puppet and show how she got into the picture.

There are fabulous resources to be found at Internet Archive. How about this 1936 classic directed by Alexander Korda? Too real to be a popular hit in its day but then and now an entertaining way to bolster your art history if you’re a serious student trying to remember too much! Enjoy.

Around six months ago I received an interesting email from an organisation called landillart.org

Hi Amanda,

Eighteen months ago I started a global artist reclamation initiative called The Landfillart Project.

The project will involve one thousand and forty-one (1,041) artists worldwide. To date there are over nine hundred artists involved across 51 countries. This artist initiative is by far the largest undertaking of its kind.

As a result of your recognition and accomplishments in the arts, I am contacting you. I am hopeful that after spending a few minutes on our website, you will accept my proposal to join this landmark global artist reclamation project.

The website looked good, the project intriguing and environmental issues area really important to me. I said yes and in a short flurry of correspondence agreed that I would find a hubcap here and could get the piece done in three to four months. I found a hubcap fairly quickly – actually I had to pay for it – dumps don’t give anything away any more! The thinking time took longer, and my exhibition, work and study commitments got in the way before I finally had it prepped and painted. Photographed it wet and sent it off only a week or two late. Back to work. I thought I was done.

The reply from Ken Marquis arrived within a few days… Read the rest of this entry »

It’s that time of year again.

The City of Swan’s annual art awards are opening on Friday 5th November 2010 which means it’ll be a busy week behind the scenes. I am, again, one of the curating team which means longs days, sore feet and a meaningful relationship with a ladder… since there are over 200 works to be sorted and hung so that they are all looking an absolute picture (groan… sorry about that, couldn’t resist).

If you want to attend the opening you’ll need to RSVP by Wednesday.

The exhibition then runs until November 21, 2010, 10am to 4pm daily.
It’s at the Midland Junction Arts Centre
276 Great Eastern Hwy
(Cnr Cale St), Midland

More details on the event page at their website.

There’s a small dam near where I live that I’ve often walked to at night, in the cooler months of the year, to listen to the frogs. A few weeks ago I had cause to visit during the day time and was appalled at the rubbish. A lot of it was alcohol containers and included a fair bit of broken glass. I simply hadn’t seen it in the dark. Can you imagine a kangaroo landing on that glass… I resolved to clean it up.

And made a short film while I was at it. This one is a proper film rather than animation but still made with a digital camera. The trouble was I was working alone so I was film crew as well being the actor… How do you pick up rubbish and film it at the same time. Also, being a bit camera shy, I didn’t want to be seen.

The solution was to rearranged the tripod so the camera was sitting upside down, between it’s legs. It gave me a handle to carry the camera, legs to safely put it down and, with care, a bit of a steady-cam effect so the home-made film didn’t look too home-made. It also only shot low which solved my problem of not wanting to be seen. While filming the big issue was to watch where the shadow of the tripod was falling!

The rest was in the editing. A couple of hours raw became six minutes of finished film and a wry comment on being the idiot cleaning up someone else’s mess.