Physalia Can Make You Happy. Or So It Seems
Almost every guy out there will, at some point, experience that moment when they realise they are turning into their Dad. For some people it’s when they criticise what is considered ‘music today’, tell a teenager they ‘don’t know they’re born’ or when they point out a car window and tell their children ‘this all used to be under water once’. Sometimes it’s a little more shocking, for example, when you notice that you make the same noise when you try to get out of a comfortable seat or a family member mistakes your voice on the phone. My moment came when I watched ‘INDUCTANCE’ a short movie by Barcelona Studio, Physalia.
Until that point I thought myself to be quite contemporary, quite modern. I own an iPhone, can navigate around a computer and can play on all the next generation consoles with some degree of skill. In addition, I know who’s who in the DC universe and who’s slept with whom in the Marvel Comics. I know that Airborne Toxic Event is a band, not a bowel movement and was a fan of Scott Pilgrim BEFORE it was a movie. I figured nothing could surprise me. I was streetwise, tech savvy and could earn a good few points in the pop culture categories.
…But along came Physalia with their short and made me realise that I’m not as up-to-date as I thought.
When I first watched Inductance it was from a link attached to an e-mail from a website. This is quite important when you consider how the opening footage starts; showing you Google searches and eBay auctions. The fact that I was already on the internet was much more fitting than slouched in front of the TV or in a theatre.
Inductance video:
Inductance was made for the F5 festival, an event that focuses on artistic creativity in film and animation. Skwigly was able to talk to Physalia over the projects origin.
Physalia: “The organisers from F5 contacted us and asked us to create a short piece (2 minutes max) and the only brief was ‘happy’. We had the idea of creating a machine and showing that process, as we have always thought the process of creating a piece is very magical. We had lots of ideas in the concept stage that could be used for the piece and by some trial and error methods; we tested these ideas and found they didn’t work. By a sudden spark of inspiration, started by the coloured F5 logo, we decided we wanted to have these flying balls.”
In answering the brief the way they did Physalia has shown why they are considered one of the most innovative and imaginative studios in Europe. A brief containing just one word can be a daunting task for some people as it’s normally the limitations of a project that dictates the outcome.
Physalia: “Facing the topic of happiness is one of the hardest things for creators, because there are so many nuances we wanted to escape… being corny, preachy or simplistic… it was a very interesting process, having to face our own ideas of happiness. We think part of [Inductance’s] success is that we had a really good time shooting and creating it, even with all the problems, and that shows.”
Once the final concept was decided on, the piece took only three weeks to produce with only four people involved in the development and filming. Three people from Physalia and software designer Gerrardo del Hierro. Finally sound designer Fernando Dominguez from Dvein (another highly respected Barcelona studio) was responsible for the music.
Shortly after my first viewing, I turned my monitor round to one of my colleagues. Once I played the video again, like me he was wowed. Unlike me however, he said something that hadn’t even crossed my mind. ‘Is it fake?’
Physalia: “One of the bases of the video was to create something that could eventually be built but that for obvious logistics and budget reasons we couldn’t. We did a lot of research on the subject, and honestly we don’t know if this could be accomplished or not. As much as we would love to be so scientifically knowledgeable as to be able to get to do this someday, we couldn’t even start thinking about building the contraption for real.”
Anybody who has ever shown their parents how to set Sky to record or change the contrast on their TV will know what it’s like to have that moment; feeling a mixed combination of pride and satisfaction dressed with a little bit of ego. Now I know what the other side of the coin feels like.
Physalia: “We are still surprised about the reception of the short, even though our main aim was always to create magic. People do believe great things can be done with technology proving that the barriers of magic and science are constantly being blurred. As Arthur C. Clarke said “Any sufficiently advanced technology is indistinguishable from magic”. We can only wish that science keeps on fascinating us the way it does.”
My experience watching Inductance and learning that it is not physically possible to achieve, concerned me. What were the boundaries of reality when it came to our technical limitations? I remember on April 1st 2010, Apple released a video revealing their new keyboard technology. A circular disc like the one used on the iPod, was to replace the QWERTY keys. The video went viral in a matter of minutes, people believing this to be the new big thing. But once they realised it was April fools they knew it was all a big joke. There was no way that technology could achieve that. Right? Just like with Inductance, none of those electronics within the balls were real. Right?
Physalia: “They were, as the giant magnet, just for show. We do however develop our own hardware and half the contraption in the film, our self-built motion control (which is supposed to be controlling the balls), is for real, and works! Now that our motion control system is finally finished and fully operative, we will be exploring that boundary, not only for enhancing our VFX, but for creating ‘real’ things. You’ll be very soon able to check again another product of this exploration, as our motion control and light-box have been used to create a short piece for a huge collaboration between motion artists and sound designers, (entitled) Resonance. In it, we explore the opposite concept than that of Inductance: that of something that is real but looks completely unreal and virtual. There is always more than meets the eye!”
I can only conclude that the world is a lot more alien to me than I initially thought. Looking at it with newly opened eyes I realise I can only name the ORIGINAL 150 Pokemon, I can’t remember which member(s) of Take That is gay, and I often spend a good portion of my evenings complaining about the detestable Injury Lawyers 4U adverts. I have no idea what the storyline to Ben10 is and evidently I can’t tell the difference between animation and reality. I feel like the people who panicked on the first radio broadcast of Orson Welles’ War Of The Worlds or the people who on, it’s initial release, couldn’t see the illusion behind Ray Harryhausen’s puppetry in The Beast from 50,000 Fathoms.
Credits:
Direction: Physalia ( physaliastudio.com ) & Gerardo del Hierro ( grrddh.com )
Music: Fernando Dominguez.
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Here’s a sneak peak look at Physalia’s new ‘Resonance animation…