Media Design
Since 2018, I have media designed for a multitude of shows and personal projects. In 2019, I was asked to design a dance piece for Thought In Motion, the dance yearly showcase titled, In Search of Color. In 2020, I was brought on as the media designer for Men On Boats. A big undertaking that became my senior thesis, but it was a well worth project.
Below are pictures and videos from both of the above shows.
Men on Boats
Men on Boats was a project two years in the making. While it was supposed to be the fall 2020 mainstage show, it got delayed and heavily redesigned amidst the Covid-19 pandemic. While there were not going to be projections in the original design, the need to film the show instead of creating an in person experience made them necessary.
This production proved to be one of the theatre department's toughest tasks yet. Recording the show was not something that anyone had experience with before. There was much group learning to be had. One of the first tasks was to decide how to rear project in a thrust style stage. Due to there being no audience, I decided we could reverse the stage. Sightlines were a thing for actual audiences, not a film recording. From the schematic, the projectors can be seen way up in the balcony, while three 16ft tall screens are used as screens. Using Qlab to map the projectors and display the images, the final results were stunning.
In addition to media designing this show, I also worked on a stop-motion-esque puppet for the water scenes in the show. More information about that can be found here:
In Search of Color
In Search of Color was a piece directed by Leslie Jones for the University of Minnesota-Dance Department Fall Showcase. It is an abstract exploration of race through dance and what it means to have different skin colors in different spaces. It is based on quotes from many different black feminist writers such as Audre Lorde, Bell Hooks, Toni Morrison, and Alice Walker.
For the abstract, spacey feel, I collaborated with Leslie on the design. She wanted it to be disorienting with quotes from the above authors to be visible through space. I took her ideas and came up with the images and video you see above. I took all the ideas into Adobe Photoshop, After Effects, and Premiere to make the final results.