JAPAN MEDIA ARTS FESTIVAL

PARTICIPATION IN OVERSEAS MEDIA ARTS FESTIVAL

Screening Program

Beyond the Technology


New modes of expression made possible by the continuing evolution of digital technology have produced today’s sense of great diversity.This program features the sensibilities of the creators and imaginative powers they share with regard to our contemporary world through the introduction of 11 works. (2016 updated version)


JAPAN MEDIA ARTS FESTIVAL
WORLD ORDER in BUDOKAN

WORLD ORDER (Japan)

Entertainment Division 2013 Jury Selections 2 min. 23sec.
Live performance, Video work

This music performance by WORLD ORDER at Nippon Budokan in April 2013 was a 90-minute spectacle presented to around 10,000 people in the audience. The staging was in 360-degrees, utilizing numerous creative effects. The much-talked-about performance peerlessly synchronized and merged dance with music, lighting and video.


JAPAN MEDIA ARTS FESTIVAL
TOKYO CITY SYMPHONY

OYAGI Tsubasa/BABA Kampei/TAKCOM/MIURA Koshi/WATANABE Takayuki/MAEDA Sadanori/HASHIMOTO Toshiyuki/TERAI Hironori/KAJIMA Takahiko (Japan)

Entertainment Division 2013 Jury Selections 3 min. 13sec.
Website, Media installation

This website lets users control 3D projection mapping on a 1/1,000-scale model of Tokyo's cityscape. Various visual motifs for the city (futuristic, rock, vibrant nature) are assigned to keys on the users' computer keyboards, as well as beautiful sounds, allowing particiants to have fun playing music by typing.


JAPAN MEDIA ARTS FESTIVAL
Flat Logic – The Book

Jan CHLUP (Czech Republic)

Art Division 2014 Jury Selections 1 min. 23 sec.
Video work

This video depicts the essence of a book. Pages are turned back and forth as a kind of unspoken narrative, while on the pages can be seen representations of views into particular interiors. Animated paintings were applied onto a 3D animated model. The captured changes in the paintings highlight the presence of passing time. The work explores relations between meaning, interpretation, time and space.


JAPAN MEDIA ARTS FESTIVAL
YAKENOHARA “RELAXIN’”

Saigo No Shudan (ARISAKA Ayumu / OITA Mai / KOHATA Ren) (Japan)

Entertainment Division 2013 New Face Award 5 min. 10sec.
Music video

This music video for the YAKENOHARA song RELAXIN’ uses stopmotion photography to depict the objects in a room shifting, inserted with Saigo No Shudan-esque nostalgic hand-drawn animations. A bedroom is the individual world of its inhabitant and each has its own flow of time. The objects there each possess memories, time and atmosphere, forming a membrane modeled on the inhabitant within a wealth of memory. Within this cosmic space, this work creates a single shared flux, a wave and a wind, and in which is enclosed a hidden theme and message that expresses time as a constant cycle of changes.


JAPAN MEDIA ARTS FESTIVAL
Travis “Moving”

Tom WRIGGLESWORTH / Matt ROBINSON (UK)

Entertainment Division 2013 Excellence Award 4 min. 28 sec.
Music video

Wriggles & Robins directed the music video for the single Moving by UK band Travis using a technique they had created and developed in an earlier piece called Love is in the Air. Filming in temperatures cold enough that you could “see your breath”, Wriggles & Robins projected animations into the mist from the warm breaths of the band members using a projector. This technique enabled them to animate a story without the need for any CGI or special effects whatsoever, as the visual effect was created “in camera”. The animations were carefully developed over a period of weeks, as the directors tested hundreds of variations, breathing each version and tweaking them to get the best image clarity. The film wasshot in an artificially chilled, subzero degree studio using multiple projectors and plenty of hot tea to keep the band warm.


JAPAN MEDIA ARTS FESTIVAL
Z-MACHINES

Z-MACHINES Project (Japan)

Entertainment Division 2013 Jury Selections 5 min. 20sec.
Robot, Live performance

This work is a band of three robots that create the "party experience of the future", simultaneously playing 22 drums to produce a transcendental high-speed performance at over 1,000 beats per minute. The band has collaborated with famous international music artists, such as Squarepusher, and appeared in numerous concerts.


JAPAN MEDIA ARTS FESTIVAL
Suidobashi Heavy Industry "KURATAS"

KURATA Kogoro / YOSHIZAKI Wataru (Japan)

Entertainment Division 2012 Excellence Award 3 min. 5sec.
Robot

The KURATAS project was born in June 2010 from a simple desire on the part of artist KURATA Kogoro: “I want to ride on a giant robot, but it seems no one has made one for that purpose. I may as well build it mysel f.” Robot control engineer YOSHIZAKI Wataru subsequently joined the project, and after about two years in production, KURATAS was unveiled on July 29, 2012 before an audience of thousands attending Wonder Festival 2012 Summer at Makuhari Messe. The debut was a success, and KURATAS went on to become a sensation in the media and social networks both at home and abroad. Four meters tall and weighing four tons, KURATAS is truly a giant robot. The user sits in a cockpit and operates controls that move its four limbs and torso ? and yes, it can walk. Its creators are currently improving KURATAS with the aim of mass-producing it.


JAPAN MEDIA ARTS FESTIVAL
Power of Optics

KOBAYASHI Tatsuyuki(Japan)

Entertainment Division 2014 Jury Selections 2 min.
Video work

This commercial features a light-powered Rube Goldberg machine – a contraption that performs a task through an elaborate chain reaction of operations – so the viewer can intuitively sense the various uses of optics. The actions that happen, including burning paper, bursting a balloon, lighting a match, and melting ice, are designed to seem like they are being caused and connected by optical power.


OK Go I Won't Let You Down
OK Go "I Won't Let You Down"

HARANO Morihiro / Damian KULASH, Jr. / SEKI Kazuaki / NISHIDA Jun / furitsukekagyou air:man (Japan)

Entertainment Division 2015 Jury Selections5 min. 20sec.
Music video

Music video for the American rock band OK Go. A dance performance using UNI-CUB, a transportation vehicle operated by weight shifting, is captured from various perspectives. The film, which was shot in a single take with the help of the latest drone technology, features a range of views including one captured on the ground at 0-meters height, to a view of 2,400 dancers captured from 700 meters in the air.


YASKAWA BUSHIDO PROJECT / industrial robot vs sword master
YASKAWA BUSHIDO PROJECT / industrial robot vs sword master

YASKAWA BUSHIDO PROJECT Team (ABE Mitsushi, Representative)(Japan)

Entertainment Division 2015 Jury Selections4 min. 55sec.
Video work

Sword techniques of MACHII Isao, who holds five world records, were studied through 3D analysis, and precisely reproduced by an industrial robot, “MOTOMAN-MH24”. Created with a theme of enabling robots to inherit advanced techniques engendered by Japanese culture, this work interprets human body performance through robot technology. The work attempts to express civility and empathy for others, which are important in bushido (Samurai's way).


group_inou [EYE]
group_inou [EYE]

HASHIMOTO Baku / NOGAMI Katsuki(Japan)

Entertainment Division 2015 New Face Award3 min. 32sec.
Music video

This work pertains to groupinou’s album MAP, which contains the track used in this music video. It was created by combining a rigorous optimization process that utilizes various digital tools with a process that involves meticulous frame-by-frame creation. Furthermore, the project’s production tools and methods were released to the public as open-source material. Although based on a simple idea, the resulting video is a manifestation of the artists’ enthusiasm, imbued with qualities that defy time and technological trends.