Description

As a dance major, it is required that I take a course called Survey of Dance Technologies with faculty member Tim Glenn. It was for this course's final project that I made "Shift." In creating this work, there was a great deal of artistic freedom permitted but certain guidelines had to be met such as including various editing and camera techniques. In this video, montage editing, continuity editing, a variety of camera angles, as well as an original sound score are included. Because this project was a site-specific videodance, the choreography was created on location. My intention was to utilize the environment, while complimenting the choreography by applying these dance-specific camera and editing techniques. I had no initial intentions or storyline when I began to work on "Shift." The choreography, storyline, and camera angles were a result of various improvisations on site, which ultimately found a natural way of coming together.

Unique Features

"Shift" is particularly important to me, because it was my first dance for camera composition. It look me quite a bit of time to finally find the right location for my project, but when I stumbled upon this particular location I knew it was the one. Some may have thought this space was too small for a video dance, but I saw an infinite number of possibilities. The location in itself is very unique and serene, so I wanted to take advantage of all it had to offer. I have the dancer in the video using the benches and swing, in addition to emphasizing the different textures at the site in order to give the viewer a keen sense of the environment. During the editing process, I played a lot with trying to find ways to surprise the viewer. For example, I worked on finding similar themes throughout the choreography and seamlessly connecting them together through editing. I also experimented with different camera angles such as bird's eye view, low angles, high angles, worms eye view, mid level, among others in order to compliment the choreography and site.