Anti VJ

Interview with Anti VJ

Joanie Lemercier (Crustea)

Romain Tardy (Aalto)

- Can you tell us a little bit about yourselves?

J: There are four of us in this crew and we are quite a new collaboration. We are spread over France, England and Belgium. We all share the same idea that we want to push the old style of visuals/VJ-ing further away from the old-skool 3D tunnels, colour cycles and psychedelia stuff and do more 3D shapes, installation projects and mix our styles together.

R: Yes, we are dealing more with sculpture nowadays, compared to traditional graphics or trying to project our work onto 3D shapes or transparent materials instead of always onto a flat screen.

J: Usually we do just VJ sets or installations, but for the Glade Festival, for example, we needed to mix it with live visuals using a couple of video cameras, one on the stage and the other in the VJ tower. A normal set for a VJ is around 1-3 hours so working at the Glade Festival we had to produce 10 hours of video for each of the three days which was pretty hard to do; a lot of improvisation and experimentation.

R: What was also interesting was that sometimes Joanie would be filming on the stage and I would be in the VJ tower and we would have to use sign language and invent new words and hand actions.

Youtube : Light sculpture

- What has been one your most memorable moments?

J: At the Glade festival, I had a visual section of a man running in a chicken costume and I actually had a chicken costume with me at the festival so I wore it for about an hour and ran on the spot while Romain filmed me and looped the recorded film and added loads of effects on it.

- How did you both get into VJ-ing?

R: I actually started off doing a Graphics Art course and was really into drawing.

Youtube : 3Destruct audiovisual installation

I was just looking for a different way to show my work so I started doing 2D Animation and one day a friend of mine was doing a small party in Paris and needed some visuals. So I put together some of my animations in about two days and really enjoyed the experience and the fact that prepared content could be played live.

J: The first proper VJ-ing I saw was Coldcut in 1998 playing an AV set. I moved from France to Bristol and a friend of mine who was a DJ had a projector and wanted to do something and because I came from a Graphic Design background I thought this would be a great opportunity to make some moving visuals.

Youtube : Projection on building

Since then, I have seen what other possibilities there are to mix with visuals and have been experimenting ever since.

- What software/hardware do you use?

R: I use a Mac Powerbook that is hooked up to two Midi controllers, one to trigger the visuals and the other to control the opacity of the visuals. I am using some software called Modul8 which was developed in Switzerland and allows you to do multi projections.

Youtube : Inode A/V project

I like it because it has the same configuration as Photoshop or After Effects as it allows you to prepare graphic elements in Modul8 and you can animate it live.

J: I use a PC and run Arkaos VJ software for triggering and playing samples and I also love to use Modul8 for real-time compositing software. I have a midi controller with loads of knobs and faders which I use to trigger and sometimes I will use a Wii Nintendo remote! We found a way to get the Wii to pick up signals via Bluetooth and convert them to midi so we can use it to control even things like Ableton Live.

Youtube : Live visuals with a wiimote

The other great thing is that the Wii remote has gravity sensors and acceleration sensors so you can fade the visuals by just moving your arm in the air!

- When you play live, do you tend to use more real film footage or do you prefer to use animations and digital artwork?

R: For me personally, I prefer to use animations that I have generated myself which are mostly 2D graphics. I am now working on some paper cut-out shapes that are animated because I like to make a link between real techniques like drawing or cutting and then mixing it with digital motion graphics.

Youtube : Nordik Impact - Visual installation

J: When I do VJ sets in clubs I use a lot of real film footage that I didn't produce myself, even though it is much more interesting to make your own. So with the film footage, I try to use them in a way that allows them to re-create a narrative and to try to link all the visuals together. In my installations, I really like the idea of projecting onto 3D shapes more like sculptures or buildings and trying to map them with the visuals. This is an effect that is not effective on a screen as the effect stays constricted onto a 2D screen.

Anti VJ : http://antivj.com

myspace : http://myspace.com/antivj

Crustea : myspace.com/crustea

Aalto : myspace.com/vj_aalto

Written by Selph