io
hartman

Locative Media and the use of space

For the locative media project, I found myself wholeheartedly enjoying the assignment. It required me to think outside of usual video project guidelines to consider how an audience experiences sound design alongside the visual components. For this project I decided to use footage I shot while traveling in Europe over the summer. I chose passages from a book called Beautiful World Where Are you?  by Sally Rooney. This book was one that I finished while traveling, and although I would change a few things about the storylines and ending, the writing was human and beautiful in my eyes. This is why I chose these passages to go alongside the footage I shot. The person in the footage is my best friend of five years, who I've travelled with to many different countries and states. Because some of the passages I chose were written from the first person, I figured it made sense to have a human subject to be able to embody some kind of character and their experience. This is why I paired the two together. 

For the sound environment of these shots, I found myself a little more challenged. After deciding I was not going to try and create sounds that went with the visuals in a "correct" way, I turned to the materials I had available to me in my bedroom. These materials included my computer's keyboard, my bathroom sink, and the pages of notebooks. The most significant sound we hear alongside the book passages is the dripping of water. This kind of tactile sound creates dissonance within the experience of viewing the piece. The thoughts and emotions of the character in the passages are often about complex things that they are dealing with, whether it be relationships, career situations, or emotions. There's never a fully concrete way a situation in the story went. There is always some level of dissonance. When I think of dissonance, I can't visualize a fully specific scene. All I think of is an echoing emptiness of sorts. Which, in the echoing drips of the sink, I feel resonates with that feeling. Despite the bustling nature of travel and public spaces that exude loud abrasive sounds (transport, people's voices, etc.) there's a certain quietness in the space of this book. The characters exist within a busy world, but their emotions and interpersonal dynamics are what rule the story. I decided to bring this out in my project in every aspect.