Uncle Bob Helps Out

Uncle Bob Helps Out
2008
Interactive video (proximity sensor, projector, custom software, computer, excerpt from the film Frenzy, directed by Alfred Hitchcock)

This piece features a famous long tracking shot from the film Frenzy. In this shot, the camera follows a serial killer and his next victim up a staircase to the killer's apartment, and then backs down the staircase and out into the street. In the piece, the viewer stands before a projection of the film excerpt and a proximity sensor. The excerpt is divided into segments, and the segments are each played in reverse. The length of the segments depends on the distance of the viewer to the piece. When the viewer is farthest away, the segment length is the entire length of the excerpt, so it plays continuously backwards. As the viewer gets closer, the segments get shorter, creating a violent, lunging effect. When the viewer is closest, the segment length is one frame, so the excerpt plays continuously forwards. A sense of temporal and spatial ambiguity is created when the backwards motion of the camera is viewed in reverse.

This piece was programmed with Processing.