The Day ACMI Stood Still.

It’s hard to put into words what I liked the most about ACMI. OK, I lie but don’t you just think that’s an awesome start to 250 word essay about the class trip to end all class trips? (Except for the one where someone takes a ‘funny’ trip down the emergency stairs.) But I digress.

The following are the things I found interesting at ACMI.

The discovery that games aren’t just procrastination tools for the disenfranchised youth of today. But exercises in world building and instruments for those inclined to political messages. Unfortunately 1 person player games make me ill literally so I couldn’t really focus on the ooh sparkly because it made me feel nauseous. In conclusion Games can be FUN but I won’t be exploring that area of expertise unless it’s to create a brand new poker machine games (I’ve got ideas) and playing tetris.

With that out of the way the ‘World Without End’ exhibition was the main focus of interest to me on this excursion to ACMI. Within that there were 3 installations that impressed and inspired me.

The first of these was Simon Carrol and Martin Friedel’s “History of a Day” a multiple screen installation set in the round. The time-lapse photography was awe inspiring and I really enjoyed the way it was set so that each screen shows the same subject but different aspects and recordings of it. I could have spent hours trying to catch everything.

Lynette Wallworth’s “Hold: Vessel 1” was another of the exhibits that fascinated me. Having the imagery projected onto hand held bowls was a revelation to me. Before this I must admit it hadn’t occurred to me that this could be a way of presenting something. In my mind it opened up a lot of possibilities and ideas in how things can be presented. Not only that, it was all quite pretty too.

The installation that has stuck in my mind the most is Christian Boustani’s “A Viagem (The Voyage)” Not only was a great learning experience in learning the history of an important event in Portugal’s history. But how it conveyed this message was eye-catching and the grand scale of this piece, all the little details involved kept me interested. The use of film, video and computer animation was indeed as ‘dazzling’ as the guide book made it out to be. I would actually really like to go back and watch this over and over again. I’m sure I missed something in the presentation.

Overall this trip reignited my interest in Multimedia. Since starting this course I have found myself weighed down by the little working details in creating multimedia projects which sucked most of the creativity out of me. Seeing what is being done in the industry right now has given me ideas of what I might be able to do in the future. Thanks to the ACMI trip I now remember why I wanted to get into this course in the first place.

THE END.

Ack, wasn't that just a piece of sugary rubbish. I really mean it though, honestly.