Notebook Phase

""Notebook Phase"" is a minimalist animation that unites complementary opposites through movement and sound. It portrays a whimsical figure in between nature and technique, noise and silence, structure and freedom. The animation is reflected on a water surface moved by sound, thereby forming wave patterns that correspond to the animation. The viewer can thus observe both: the computer generated image as well as its distorted reflection on the water.Essentially, the whole animation, in which a whimsical figure juggles with a circle and a notebook, is based on a single movement pattern varied only through minimal transformations. Both, the movement of the figure as well as its sound are controlled by pure sine waves. The result is an almost synesthetic relationship in which the viewer seems to see the sound and to hear the movement. The composition is divided into two sections of about four minutes that contrast and complement each other. It starts and ends with the image of a circle.The first section is a logarithmic deceleration of the animation to a fraction of its original speed. The turbulent movements of the notebook figure gradually transform into meditative silence. Sounds that were still audible at the beginning go beyond the infrasonic frequency range; other high frequent movements become now perceptible. Having reached this quasi-atomic state of motion, the animation accelerates back to its original speed.In the second section, another six notebook figures apper and start to perform the same movement pattern. However, as their speeds are slightly different from each other, a phase shift occurs and the figures melt into an ever-changing mass of sound and movement. Finally, the phases converge and at the point of absolute synchronicity the six figures suddenly explode. Now, Notebookman ruptures the conceptual purity of the work by improvising a whimsical solo until he finally liquifies back into a circle.