Craig Ward - Adobe Remix

Craig Ward x Adobe

Earlier this year I was asked to participate in the Adobe Remix project, and below is my response to the brief in stills and moving image. You can read more about the process further down.

The idea behind the execution was, well, ideas… And in particular, Adobe and the Creative Cloud as a facilitator of these ideas. The lightbulb has long been a visual expression of inspiration, and the Adobe Creative Cloud represents a coming together of countless creative minds. Inspired by this, I created a 1700cu/ft installation of the Adobe logo, suspended in a three dimensional space using hundreds of suspended lightbulbs and anamorphic perspective - meaning the Adobe logo is only visible from one specific viewpoint.

The Completed Installation

This photograph was captured by Jonathan Pilkington on a Linhof Technikardan large format camera, with an exposure time of around 2 minutes at 400asa. A selection of digital Polaroids on D800e, F5.6 @ 10 seconds were also captured.

Behind The Scenes

I asked my good friends at Mooseherd to create a behind the scenes video, and a full blow out of the process can be found below. Yes, I do have a nervous laugh in front of camera, you're not imagining it... :/ Soundtrack provided by everyone's new favourite band, LEGS.

The Prestige*

*The final part of the magic trick. The piece was always intended to be seen in three dimensions, so we shot this fun reveal video. Enjoy!

The Process

I had worked using anamorphic perspective before, but the difficulty came in translating what traditionally occurs on 2D planes (such as walls etc), into a three dimensional sculpture hanging in mid air.

I went back to basics and as a proof of concept, created a mask of the Adobe logo on clear perspex. Looking through a camera the entire time, I verbally directed my assistant, Niral Parekh, on placing tape around my studio according to what I saw through the mask. Once the mask was removed, the logo was still in place and able to be photographed, so I reasoned that a similar method would work for the mid air versions, so long as the camera stayed in a locked position. Yes, the image below is backwards, kind of an accident of the process.

Understanding that decisions would still need to be made on the fly come build time, I attempted to model the piece in 3D ahead of the build to better understand the complexities and to give me an idea of scale. We weren’t able to use the placement of the bulbs as a guide as the camera angle was to be chosen later on, but the idea of a 10 x 10 grid as the basis of the canopy held true.

The frame was built in about a day and a half, and around 2500 feet of cable was threaded though the holes before the whole piece, weighing around 300lbs, was hoisted 12ft into the air and suspended from the ceiling.

A grid of 100 holes were drilled into the canopy, and the cables threaded through. In addition, the bulbs were on 5 dimmer channels, so we could alter the brightness of various sets of bulbs for visual variation.

Our original intention had been to create the piece at the workshop before moving it to a studio location for the shoot. However, after watching it come to life over the course of the build, it became more and more a part of the space it occupied. So, at the last minute, we made the decision to cancel the studio and to shoot the piece where it stood / hung.

On hanging the bulbs, instead of squinting through a camera for 2 days, we live streamed video from the camera to a monitor and placed a mask of the Adobe logo over that to guide the placement of the bulbs on the X, Y and Z axis. Axis which verbally became ‘Up, down, towards you, towards the back and towards the door…” This was no mean feet when you’re effectively working in a mirror and directing two guys with the same name (Sean / Shawn).

The final piece is something of a personal triumph - certainly the largest piece I’ve ever created, conceptually relevant and affording me the opportunity to both learn something new, to direct, and to remain hands on throughout the process. I’d like to thank Adobe for inviting me to take part.

Credits & Links

Concept, design and art direction was by myself
http://www.wordsarepictures.com

…and in the spirit of bringing together creative minds, I worked with a killer team to help bring the piece to life…

Sincere thanks go to Jason Singleton and his team (Kitty, Tango and Cash)
at Treatment Studios for help constructing the piece:
http://www.treatmentstudio.net

Jonathan Pilkington, my studio mate and a technically superb photographer used to
working in low light stepped in on photography duties:
http://www.jonathanpilkington.com

All of the motion aspects and behind the scenes footage were perfectly captured
by Laura and Jim at Mooseherd Creative:
http://www.mooseherd.com

Soundtrack to the moving image pieces provided by LEGS:
http://www.feellegs.com

The project simply could not have happened without all of the above,
so please show your appreciation and be sure to check out their respective works.