immersive media
treat by Julia Zanin de Paula
"Any sufficiently advanced technology is indistinguishable from magic."
Arthur C. Clarke
intro
I grew up obsessed with fairytales and folklore. I feel storytelling has always helped me cope with and understand deeper issues in life in the forms of monsters, weird imagery, and fantastical elements. So, for me, the opportunity to bring to life serious matters on a project that ties magical and peculiar elements into scientific evidence, climate information, and real change is beyond amazing. There is a real and exciting opportunity to touch people through video form here, apart from leaving my mark on the world at an amazing museum and initiative.
In the depths of the Amazon forest of Brazil, there is a legend of a boy with bright orange hair, and his feet are turned backward, this legend is named “Curupira”.
Curupira uses its backward feet to create footprints that lead to its starting point, thus making hunters and travelers confused. He will prey on poachers and hunters who take more than they need of the forest, also attacking people who hunt animals.
Across countries and cultures, there are many different versions of the legend, of this creature of the forest, protector of nature and animals. How beautiful that different cultures create different entities to take care of Mother Nature, it is something sacred. Peruvians call it Shapishico, the Slavic call it Leshy, the Greek called it Gaya, and nowadays we call it Greta Thunberg … All over the world, humans have craved this one-off savior and protector that would bring justice to nature. Human nature is to emphasize myth, and magical realism, with heroism, story, and narrative. And that’s why I love bringing magical elements into my work.
That’s also why I feel this film will benefit from mythical and magical elements, that come beyond just reality and science, to incite interest, put seeds in people’s minds, and tickle them into thinking deeper about climate change and their role in it.
Now, I don’t want to be too extreme on our magical elements and metaphors. They only work when used with parsimony. They can only serve, touch, and enchant audiences when they are combined with well-thought-out real-life imagery. A movie about flying creatures having fun in the sky won’t be as powerful as a movie about humans who learn they can fly after going through a journey and discovering their wings. The Point here is that we need to work on a narrative script that will take our audience through a well-thought-out narrative, that is occasionally interrupted - or surprised - by magical elements and metaphors.
This pitch is much more about the tone and the mood I want to bring to the piece than the script. The script I can only build after understanding the museum more deeply. So please take away a general idea of what my brain is connecting to, but know I will diligently study and come up with ideas that fit the concepts needed once we have those more clearly outlined.
I would like to avoid the clichés of educational videos. The ones that show the ocean with many plastic bags and shocking images of tortoises with their nostrils filled with straws. My initial response to this video is to steer away from these images and touch people more imaginatively and deeply, without shocking them, but amazing them.
immersive?
I’ve been thinking a lot during this week about how to make a video more interactive in a fun and innovative way. And I’m completely open to exploring different things. What is brewing in my mind right now, and exciting me, is the possibility of using augmented reality to expand the universe we are showing on screen.
Imagine a virtual world superimposing our video and the room itself when one of our museum attendees are grabbing their phones to record the room. In my mind, we would make such breathtaking videos, that people would want to shoot Instagram and TikTok content right in front of it. Like Bloomtanica in NYC.
So, after not resisting our breathtaking cinematic visuals, sometimes sensory and graphical, the audience takes out their phone and points the camera to the screen. And boom, even more content invades their camera screen. (Examples of how both would interact later in here)
“The cosmos is within us. We are made of star-stuff. We are a way for the universe to know itself.”
Carl Sagan
the journey of emotions
Right now, in my brain, our video would come up after all lights at this room are turning off changing the mood radically. The film begins and we see a journey. Beautiful images of people in extraordinary places. Exploring nature, appreciating life. We can also mix it with textural and sensory shots of liquids/ plants/ molecules. In the background, as a voice-over, we hear the voices of scientists, explorers, and philosophers, all dwelling on the state of our planet. The voices could contrast with what we are seeing, a very negative recollection of the state of humankind while we see peace and movement and thriving humanity. I love the works of Richard Dawkins about biology or someone like James Baldwin. I would mix in scientists with free thinkers, stepping up the conversation to a deeper, meaningful level.
After sitting with these stunning images and sensory sounds, we get transported to a world of uniqueness and peculiarity. Maybe our characters start flying, and we see cars covered in flowers, (expand on ideas of peculiarity here, be more specific with the references). The voices of scientists and thinkers shut up. We sit in silence and absorb the beauty of the images.
AR world could now positively add to these images, see more people flying, more flowers growing everywhere and on people they point their phone cameras to.
As the images come back to reality, the reality is suddenly a little less “natural”. We see technology expanding people’s lifestyles. Electrical cars, working remotely, green energy, you name it. As a voice-over, we hear the positive impact changes humans have approached actually make a change in the environment (ozone layer closing, oceans getting cleaner, less plastic consumption, industry using recycled materials).
As the images come back to reality, the reality is suddenly a little less “natural”. We see technology expanding people’s lifestyles. Electrical cars, working remotely, green energy, you name it. As a voice-over, we hear the positive impact changes humans have approached actually make a change in the environment (ozone layer closing, oceans getting cleaner, less plastic consumption, industry using recycled materials).
In the AR world, we see the technological world giving space to thriving nature. Trees growing, calm, and clear water on the floor of the space. Clear beautiful skies.
This is just a flushed-out script I’m having by myself. This concept can expand and be added on. The whole point here is that we would take the audience through an emotional journey (fear, strangeness, hopefulness) with images and sound at the screen. And, if the audience is open to it, we would ADD to that journey with augmented reality. I haven’t seen AR being used in this scale before and it would be a very interesting challenge to make such a huge interactive piece. But it seems like a nice concept to be explored or adapted to.
“Not everything that is faced can be changed, but nothing can be changed until it is faced.”
James Baldwin
All the tools being used would just add to this emotional journey this video/ museum room can take them through. Sound, image, and interactiveness would play into this journey. The important thing is: that if art is strong enough, the message and the imagery take people on an immersive journey by itself, without having to spell it out completely. That would be my most valuable quest.
