SeeBanff!

http://www.naimark.net/projects/banff/banff_i2.html
© Michael Naimark ; http://www.naimark.net/projects/banff/banff_i2.html

Michael Naimark

SeeBanff! , –
Co-workers & Funding

Executive Producers
Douglas MacLeod, Banff Centre for the Arts
David Liddle, Interval Research Corporation

Principal Collaborators
Film Production: Gilles Tassé, Banff
Video Post-Production: Charles Lassiter, Interval Research
Software and Optics: Christoph Dohrmann, Interval Research
Interface Electronics: Robert Alkire, Interval Research
Cabinetry and Mechanics: Robert Adams, Interval Research
Technical Assistance: Scott Wallters, Interval Research
Special Cabinetry: Andy Hope, Piranha Design, San Francisco
Special Mechanics: Mark Pauline, Survival Research Labs, San Francisco

Additional Collaborators

CANADA
Banff Centre: Lorne Falk, John Harrison, Cathy McGinnis, Mary Anne Moser

Roy Cross, Banff; James Martin, Canadian National Parks Service, Banff; Mireille Perron, Alberta College of Art, Calgary; Capital Film Lab, Edmunton; Studio Post, Edmunton; Banff Lifts Ltd., Banff; Columbia Icefields Tours, Banff; Whyte Museum, Banff

UNITED STATES
Interval Research: Aviv Bergman, Lee Felsenstein, David Gessel, Noël Hirst, Jason Lewis, Carol Moran, Steve Saunders, Chris Seguine, Andrew Singer, Richard Shoup, Rachel Strickland, Bill Verplank, Cedric Whigham, John Woodfill, Ramin Zabih

Thomas Cockrill, Byron Antiques, Byron, CA; Judith Donath, MIT Media Lab, Cambridge; Lisa Goldman, Interactive Media Festival, San Francisco; L. H. Lassiter, M.D., Miller Eye Center, Chattanooga; Daniel Zelinsky, Musee Mecanique, San Francisco; Allied Diner Film and Video, San Francisco; Monaco Film Labs, San Francisco; Western Images, San Francisco; Exploratorium, San Francisco; San Francisco Art Institute










Video
See Banff
http://www.naimark.net/projects/banff.html
Mnemosyne
Last updated:
Documents
  • http://www.naimark.net/projects/banff/banff_i2.html
    Stereogram from the See Banff footage
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  • http://www.naimark.net/projects/banff/banff_i1.html
    see banff
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  • photo: Louis Psihoyos
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Description
SEE BANFF! is an interactive stereoscopic installation. It bears a strong - and intentional - resemblance to an Edison kinetoscope, which made its public debut one hundred years ago in April 1894. It achieved instant popularity, but was short-lived. One and a half years later, in December 1895, the Lumiere brothers publicly exhibited projected film, and cinema as we know it was born. The kinetoscope became a transitionary symbol during a turbulent era in the media arts.

Physically, SEE BANFF! is a self-contained unit about the size of a podium, made out of walnut and brass, with a viewing hood on top and a crank on the side, as well as a selector for chosing one of the silent "views."

These views were filmed around Banff and rural Alberta in autumn 1993. They were recorded with two stop-frame 16mm film cameras mounted on a "super jogger" baby carriage. Stereoscopic recording was either triggered by an intervalometer (for timelapse) or by an encoder on one of the carriage wheels (for dollys and moviemaps). Since the filming was "stop-frame" (rather than "real-time"), time and space appear compressed.

The imagery is part of an investigation of the role of media and its relationship to landscape, tourism, and growth. Recordings were made dollying along waterfalls, glaciers, mountains, and farmland; moviemapping up and down popular natural trails; and timelapsing tourists.

SEE BANFF! looks and feel like a real kinetoscope. Turning the crank allows the user to browse back and forth, to "move through," the material.

Michael Naimark
Keywords
  • aesthetics
    • illusionary
    • remediated
  • genres
    • installations
  • subjects
    • Arts and Visual Culture
      • expanded cinema
      • film (discipline)
      • stereoscopes
    • Media and Communication
      • intermediality
      • media archaeology
  • technology
    • hardware
      • mobile devices
Technology & Material
Hardware
2 stop-frame 16mm film cameras
"super jogger" baby carriage
Interactive laserdisc system
Method
Stereoscopic optics
Faux kinetoscope
Software
intervalometer (timelapse) and encoder for stereoscopic recording based on a stop-frame method
Exhibitions & Events
Dallas Video Festival
Mill Valley Film Festival, California
ISEA 1994 [The Fifth International Symposium on Electronic Art]
Bibliography
4 publications