improvisation?

[ivanp]

Hi there!
I'm pretty new to this forum and vj'ing in general. I've been thinking a bit about doing some visuals for my friend's jazz band - they're playing improvisational free jazz.

Natually i want the improvisational element of the music to be reflected in the visuals, and i just wondered what would be the best approach? Some software with audio in? Or is there a combination of analouge gear that is cabable of producing the same?

cheers,
Ivanp.

[eXhale]

hmm i'm doing quite a bit of improvisations with the band i'm playing with and i found a camera, especially used in conjunction with video feedback (filming the projection screen) gave the most interesting results. it's then easy to add your own layer of visuals with a mixer (when doing video feedback the best is chroma key or similar layering effects).

main problem with video feedback is that it's very dependant on the setup. it works perfectly for me at the moment because we have the huge screen in the middle of the room and i can film band members or various other stuff with the screen behind, and get always very interesting results. however i don't know if i'll ever be able to reproduce as interesting results on real concerts. :(

anyway, not sure if this is what you meant but just thought i'd share.

[eXhale]

oh and if you use a PC, give a try to resolume 1.1. with it it's easy to get samples from live performances (you just need a capture driver supported by resolume but with version 1.1 most are supported). for example you can film the musicians during a few seconds, record them in resolume and then replay the samples almost directly through resolume, putting them in loops and mixing them with your own visuals. doing this makes your visuals look very "live" without preventing you to use the full capabilities of the software.

[soundshadow]

We did some jazz impro aswell and found it usefull to pick some themes for the video.
I followed the themes freely in interaction with the musicians who watched the screen.
Indeed with feedback, internally via spare output to free input.
Camera pointed at monitor close range also works.
If you can produce some audio going with the images that would add a lot to the show. (Try VJamm from coldcut)

Goodluck!