Bright sparks!: SYMBOLS

Showing posts with label SYMBOLS. Show all posts

Sunday, 24 May 2015

Star dust! By Lisa Boissy & Laura Malroux

“My thoughts are stars I cannot fathom into constellations” said John Green in The fault in Our Stars.

A constellation is a group of stars in the celestial sphere which make up a particular form that humans have named. Scientists and astrologers are fond of watching and studying them because they are spectacular, majestic and magical! Because they are inaccessible, people find them intriguing. There is a mystery about them that inspires not just scientists but artists too…

The constellations have inspired an innovative art project using light and dance: The Pleiades by the dance company Enra.

The choreographer and dancer Yasuku Mochizuki was inspired by the story of the Pleiades. Orion decided to hunt the Pleiades: seven sisters and their mother. To save their lives, the girls implored the Gods who made them first into doves and then into constellations. In the show, we recognize the story.

Mochizuki uses light in all his shows: Torque Starter, Primitive, etc. Light is the Enra trademark.

Primitive

In The Pleiades, combining elements of dance, performance art, music, technology, light and more, the versatile Japanese troupe has made magic. The show tells us an incredible story. Thanks to the stage’s emptiness and simplicity the spectator is flabbergasted by the dancers’ performances. The two graceful dancers, Saya Watatani and Maki Yokoyami, are perfectly coordinated with the light. Light becomes a partner, a friend. During the show, we are always wondering if it is it the dancer who leads the light or the light which leads the dancer.

It is a really original performance. Different constellations are included and are in perfect harmony with the reality. The stage is plunged into darkness, and the only light source is the constellation. So, we are impressed: we can see all the dance figures because the light follows the dancers. Furthermore, Saya and Maki perform in unison and with the light. Everyone has his own interpretation and his own feelings. There dancers make it spectacular, just like the constellations! There is also curiosity: the spectator wants to see more after each move! In fact, all the emotions can be felt: pleasure, satisfaction, excitement...

Here, the light doesn’t only represent the different constellations of the Pleiades, but also the Northern Lights and water splashing. So light is diverted from its principal function. That’s the major characteristic of art, to make us see things differently. The movements are simple, but perfectly done. It’s a delight to the eyes. Moreover, the chief attraction of this show is surely the fact that the dancers seem to control all this light power and, suddenly, it’s dark and we just see the shining constellations.

Torque Starter

Even the people who are not very interested by constellations learn a lot about them, while being happy to learn. Even those not very fond of dance find it interesting because it shows them a new generation of dancers and performances.

“Wow!” is what everyone says after having seen the show. If you have not seen it yet, go!

Tuesday, 19 May 2015

Optical illusions! By Marion Nairabeze, Maëlle Rivalier & Camille Simonet

Click on this! http://www.michaelbach.de/ot/

First, look at these optical illusions:

Who do you see? Monroe or Einstein?

Is it Gala or Lincoln?

An old couple or a guitarist and a woman?

What do you see?

In what direction is the train going? Difficult to guess, right?

Second, a short explanation of how vision works for curious people:

Click on this! http://www.acnr.co.uk/pdfs/volume6issue2/v6i2visual.pdf

Optical illusions are misperceptions of form, color, size or movement of objects. They are, for the eye, an altered perception of reality.

The eyes behave more or less like a camera. The eye has a diaphragm, an iris which lets in more or less light as it opens or closes. Behind the iris, a deformable lens, called the crystalline, allows the images to be formed on a sensitive membrane: the retina

The retina consists of rods and cones. Cones allow diurnal vision (color). There are three types of cones, receptive to red, green, blue. Rods allow night vision.

Under the influence of the light that enters through the iris, the rods and cones produce small amounts of energy and nerve impulses which are passed on up to the brain by the optical nerve. The brain then analyzes the information.

Optical illusions are errors of interpretation of our brain which tries to give meaning to all the information which is received even if there is none. This results in amplification of contrasts, creating contours, colors, perspectives, reliefs, etc.

Third, an explanation of an illusion:

1) Primary or geometric illusions

These illusions occur when the eye stops only on certain parts of the image (angles, symmetry axes, breaks lines). Then, these areas become more important than others, such as in the Titchener illusion.

2) Effect of angles

We underestimate obtuse angles and overestimate sharp corners because the eye has a tendency to bring the angles to a right angle. In a Zöllner illusion, the lines appear to us deformed because of small lines which are on the big ones. The oblique lines do not seem parallel though they actually are.

The same goes for the Müller-Lyer illusion. The eye does not pay attention to segments but sees first the angles at their end. It appears that one is larger than the other.

3) Movement illusion

It turns! It will make us dizzy. Don’t be afraid, you are not hallucinating, you are suffering from an movement illusion. The human eye gets tired fast when it stares at an object for a long time. If, however, we look next to the object, it avoids staring too intensely and the image strikes other segments of the retina which have their full capacity.

4) Artistic illusions

There are three types of artistic illusions. A group that shows illusion drawings gives rise to visual interpretations that are very different from the properties of the elements shown.

Our brain is used to seeing a real head. But here, the head consists of many animals: an elephant, a kangaroo, a bear... So the brain has trouble analyzing this image.

In the following picture we see a tree and the sea, but aren’t they something else? A baby, no?

Each drawing may result in at least two visual mutually exclusive interpretations. The observer can normally voluntarily move from one interpretation to another, once the different interpretations have been identified and given us some clues about the different interpretations.

This cartoon, created by Willian Hill in 1915, is entitled "My mother / My young woman." The image has two possible interpretations: you see the young woman or the old witch. It is sometimes difficult to switch from one to the other!

Impossible groups: different parts of each of the drawings give rise to conflicting interpretations. All items in this category cannot exist, or it would be highly unlikely that they exist in reality.

The Penrose triangle is an impossible object designed by the mathematician Roger Penrose in the 1950s. By the paradox between logic and reality, which extends to other spheres (cultural impossibility), impossible objects thus give rise to mathematical curiosities and artistic inspirations.

Optical illusions and cultures

"The influence of the culture and of the environment on our visual perception ", this theory was explored for the first time by Robert Laws, a Scottish missionary, working at Malawi in Africa during the 19th century.

Look at this picture:

What do you see? What is the woman carrying on her head? When researchers put this question to African people, they answered “a box”. Then they asked “where does the scene take place?” This person with a culture with few “corners” naturally said that the family was sitting under a tree. We westerners, accustomed to comfort, see a scene which takes place in a room with a window with a view outside.

Finally, optical illusions show that our vision is always a matter of personal interpretation!

If you enjoyed our article, please send us a comment!

Aurora Borealis. By Matthieu Hollaender & Pierre Caillet

Igor is small. He is a member of an Inuit community. One evening, he was playing by himself not far from the family home. Suddenly he rushed home to talk to his grandfather.

“Grandpa, I think the Gods are sending us a message!”

“What are you saying my little boy? What did you see?”

“I saw a big spot of color spreading in the sky! What was it grandpa?

“Come and sit beside me, next to the fire, I'll tell you the story of this mystery. You are now old enough to understand.”

They huddle together under the caribou skin.

“There are a lot of stories about this extraordinary thing you have seen; each country has its explanation, different from ours, but they are all wrong! Look at our neighbors, they are real poets! They think that a fox wanders through the Arctic snow and lights up the sky thanks to its tail sowing sparks of snow, giving off colors. And the fishermen of the Ice Lakes believe that it is the reflection of herring scales on the water! For the Inuit from the south of Alaska, those of the Yukon River, this special light in the sky simply represents the souls of deer, salmon, seal or beluga dancing. But this light also represents a threat. That is why they hunt it with their knives. To discourage their children from playing outside too late, their parents tell them that this special light will catch them, cut off their heads and play soccer with their heads! Of course it’s not true, don’t worry, it’s a silly superstition!”

“So, what’s the real reason, Grandad?”

“As you know, the sun is guarded by the God Odor and the moon is protected by Elanore. They fight each other because they both want to rule the world. That is why there is a period of darkness followed by a period of light. We have been in darkness for 4 months now. It’s the same every year. It’s because of a trick played by Elanore on Odor. She hides Odor’s light. The colored spots that you saw are stardust from Odor’s torch; he is looking in all the nooks and crannies for his sun. These spots do not last forever in the sky because the sun god is careful not to get caught by Elanore. That is why it changes place quite very often.”

“I am going out to help Odor find his sun, Grandad!”

“Oh, no you're not! You go to bed now. You can help him tomorrow find his sun…”

Igor went to bed, and he dreamt of stars...

A heated debate on the nature of fire... By Simon Amado, Joachim Huon De Kermadec & Hugo Madebène

Saturday, 31 January 2015

Lights!

In the cinema you can arrange the lights in such a way as to leave darkness between the area illuminated by the backlight and the area illuminated by the fill light, depending on how moody you want the shot to be. This works very well and usually the light is always used to enhance the expressions of the characters’ faces. It is the basic technique to put the character “in the spotlight”.

The Cabinet of Dr Caligari

1910s to 1930s

During the latter half of the 1910s, filmmakers adopted two significant new techniques, both derived from other art forms. One was the use of carbon arc spotlights, which had previously been used in theater and which allowed a strong light to be directed from a distance onto a particular actor or area of the set. The other was the use of diffusing screens, which already belonged to the repertoire of the still photographer. Diffusers could be used to transform a hard light into a soft light that did not cast such severe shadows. The increasing use of soft lighting techniques, whether they relied on reflectors or diffusers, had particular benefits for facial lighting. Soft lighting produced more flattering effects and, with the rise of the star system during this decade, it was becoming ever more important to make the actors look attractive. The dark was used to shoot movies with more drama, or for horror movies like Nosferatu by Murneau (1922). In the 1930s movies continued to be in black and white. They only used bright light in order to convey a happy emotion and to shoot comic films.

The Third Man

1940s

In the 1940s, the techniques were more or less the same as in the 1930s. For example The Third Man by Carol Reed or The Birds by Hitchcock used the same techniques as in the 1930s.

1950s

In the 1950s, many movies ended with a sunset. The directors used really intense lights and filters. Sometimes, six filters were used on the camera, one to control the shadow and the other ones to control the colors.

Ivan's Childhood

1980s

In the 1980s, directors insisted on the landscapes which were lit with the natural light of the sun or really bright spots. They preferred natural elements. The movie Ivan’s Childhood by Tarkovski is the perfect example of this technique. There is a scene where a child goes straight in the marsh and a torch crosses the screen before the sunset.

The Silence of the Lambs

1990s

Using lights of different color temperatures was one of the techniques used. This means using lights of different colors in the same shot. It can be use to reinforce the emotions that the movie director wants to convey. It’s the technique the director of The Silence of The Lambs used to inspire fear when Hannibal Lecter appears…

A.I.

2000s

One of the most used techniques in the years 2000 was silhouetting. It uses a dark subject and a very bright background to give a mysterious and a dark mood to give suspense. Also, the movies of this decade used a lot of light, especially in action movies like Avatar. In the movie A.I., the light reflects danger and mystery, a feeling of adventure. Then the lights convey hope when the child gets the possibility to talk to his mother. It is an angelic light, a really intense one. The visual elements became really important in the 2000s: the colors and the camera motions. The light has major importance in this decade. The use of a punctual light has an influence on the perception of the visual elements which must captivate the eyes of the spectators.

Lincoln

2010s

The movies of this decade favor grey tones. The movies are dark, like Lincoln by Steven Spielberg. The directors want to tone down colors in their movies. Warm colors have disappeared, the colors used are mostly grey and blue. The light must be blocked because the themes are dark and the directors don’t want the light to undermine this.

Friday, 30 January 2015

Au calme clair de lune triste et beau...

> Debussy: Clair de lune

> Fauré: Clair de lune

> Dvorak: Song to the moon

> Beethoven: Moonlight sonata

Sunday, 25 January 2015

Saturday, 17 January 2015

Las Luminarias

Photos from The Guardian

Sunday, 28 December 2014

Rainbows

What is a rainbow?

> Dispersion

> Grosseteste, medieval scientist, explained the rainbow

Fiat lux!

What does "fiat lux" mean?

La Ville des Lumières. By Agathe Lafoy & Marjolaine de Sury

Lyon is the "Ville des Lumières"!

The Lyon “Fête des lumières” was created in 1643 to express the population’s gratitude toward the Virgin Mary. It has been celebrated on the 8^th December each year since then. This festival became popular in 1852 due to the newly built statue of the Virgin Mary next to the Basilica. The festival changed from a celebration to the Nativity of the Virgin to what is has become today, a day of joy mainly concentrated on artistic designs using a variety of lighting effects. People can make their own glass display in their homes to participate in the event but the City Council also pays artists and professional decorators to add their own personal creations to the city and its surroundings.

This festival is known around the globe as one of the biggest festive gatherings in terms of people who go there after the Rio Carnival and Oktoberfest. Lasting four days, up to 4 million tourists attend each year. The two biggest attractions of the festival are normally at the Fourvière Basilica, the facades of which are lit up with different colors and patterns. The second important location is at Place des Terreaux which has a different light show every year.

The festival is growing every year and has won many prizes including the famous trophy for the best public event in 2006.

We interviewed Brooke, a friend of ours, who kindly shared her experience: “I went there in 2013 and it was one of the best moments of my life. The light shows made me feel like I was in a completely different world and the music put me in a mood that was magical… It was the best feeling I have ever had! My favorite event was the Ferris Wheel; my favorite part was the story of Pierrot waking up. I really recommend going, it’s a fantastic festival!’’