Making the Landscape Part of the Collage and Exploring the Sound of the Landscape.

I assembled two ‘Window’ collages using pieces of the rock-rock rubbing done at Sunny Cove beach last week when completing my second filmed walk, seen in the video of this walk. These two pieces were of the same long, thin, landscape format as my previous ‘Journey’ collage pieces as I have found this to be the most effective formula to imply landscape and narrative after exploring multiple different formats and layouts throughout the last few months.

Deciding on the layout of the collage pieces took longer than I had anticipated as I wanted all areas of the piece to have approximately the same emphasis and importance, which was more difficult than it first seemed, though I feel that the outcome was effective overall. One canvas, ‘Window Collage #1’ had a roughly square shaped ‘window’ and, in order to find the most suitable ‘window’ format, the second canvas ‘Window Collage #2’ had a long, narrow ‘window’, similar in proportion to the stretcher itself.

‘Window Collage #1’

‘Window Collage #2’

I then took these pieces out into the same landscape that the frottage on them was sourced, Sunny Cove beach, photographing them in the landscape context and also using the camera to look through the ‘window’ of the piece into the landscape, making the landscape a part of the collage. This was very pleasingly cyclical in nature: on one walk I collected frottage on fabric using wet rock at Sunny Cove, then developed this visual research into two composed, gallery-appropriate works, before taking the work back out into the same landscape that it was conceived and incorporating that same landscape into the collage works, documenting this though photography.

The longer, more rectangular ‘window’ works the most effectively, referencing the windows of a nature-watching hide, which is ironic as I am using this ‘window’ in the collage to frame or view the natural landscape, whereas the square shaped ‘window’ appears more obviously like a cut-out piece of fabric.

The pigment, largely sourced from this exact beach, ties the whole image of the canvas collage and the landscape together as a single, cohesive entity, despite the more curated nature of the canvas itself as opposed to the beach.

As planned, on Tuesday this week I repeated the walk to Sunny Cove, again with the help of Film (and sound) student Joe, this time recording audio, not visual information. The sound I chose to record was general ambient sounds of the landscapes I was walking within, including beaches, footpaths and woodland environments.

Sound Piece (Just Sound)

Sound Piece (overlaid with 4K video)

I had considered recording spot effects to go along with the events of the video, however for many reasons I decided against this: firstly, this would be very time consuming, requiring a lot of work both pre and post production – having to make a list of every single sound in the video before even going out to record the sound for example, as well as having to meticulously edit and match each sound to the corresponding action in the video afterwards. Put simply, I would just be re-recording the sound for the video in better quality, but sound-by-sound instead of in one general recording, which was not what I was aiming for. I was however aiming for collecting a series of general ambient sounds from along the walk to Sunny Cove to exist both together with the video, but also as a piece in its own right, working to hopefully transport the audience to the locations the sounds were from, were they to close their eyes while listening, becoming immersed in the sounds. This is why my method of recording a few sections of ambient sound, not many individual sounds, in different landscapes along the walk worked effectively.

Due to it being my first time experimenting with sound as a medium there is, understandably, room for improvement in the finished product. Due to time restrictions there was only one day available for me to go out and record the sound, this day was unfortunately rather windy, making it more difficult to record pure sounds such as leaves rustling and waves crashing as the wind noise could still be heard over the top. Avoiding wind noise was one of the main reasons that I did not want to use the sound from the original video as the camera’s microphone would’ve picked up a lot of wind noise. Though, despite the conditions, the outcome of the sound recordings was still good, the wind does not take over the whole sound, but potentially even aids in the placement of the listener in the landscape; the landscape created through the audio has not been manufactured, it is candid and natural.

Comparing the two files that include sound: the 4K video with the sound incorporated, and the piece solely showing sound over a still image, I came to the conclusion that the most effective would be some sort of a crossover of the two pieces. The video with the overlaid sound implies that this sound was the sound recorded at the same time as the video, that it is the sound of the events/conditions shown in the video (which would’ve been the case had I use spot effects), so this gives the audience the expectation that they should be hearing the sounds that are not present in the sound given. The inclusion of the video with the sound also gives the audience a very literal image to relate to the sounds, whereas in the solely audio piece they have to use their imagination to let the sound place them in the landscape, making each person’s interpretation of the sound piece different and personal, like my own actual perception of the landscape when walking through it.

The installation idea I outlined in my previous journal post would be the most effective solution to this issue of imagination vs technicality. It would allow the two mediums of video and sound to exist both as separate entities and as one immersive, cohesive translation of the outdoor landscape into an indoor space.