THE ART OF WHAT IF METROPOLIS

GRACE SANSBURY CHANCE, 14/12/2018

THE CITY OF LUMINOUS, IN COLLABORATION
WITH OSKAR FISCHINGER
CONTEXT
• About Oskar Fischinger
• Influence map
• Travelogue
• Thumbnails
• Concept art
• Break down between 3D Models and Matte painting
• Production Design
• Orthographs
• Matte painting
• Lead up to final scene
OSKAR FISCHINGER
Oskar Fischinger was born in Gelnhausen, Germany on 22 June 1900, and was a
German-American abstract animator, filmmaker, and painter, notable for creating
abstract musical animation many decades before the appearance of computer
graphics and music videos.
He originally chose music as a career, studying violin and organ building before
1914. He was trained in architectural drafting and tool design as he too young
and unhealthy for war duty.
His first film experiments, made in the early 1920s, are among his most radical. In
Wax Experiments and Spirals Fischinger designed visual patterns of extreme
complexity which often develop in overlapping cycles, yet he interrupts these
patterns with radical editing of single frames of contrasting imagery. He created
special effects for Fritz Lang's 1929 Woman in the Moon, one of the first sci-fi
rocket movies, and influenced Disney's Fantasia.
Among Fischinger's form-breaking experiments of the era were the abstract
multiple-projector performances under the concept name of Raumlichtkunst,
which could use up to five film projectors and several slide projectors. These
were performed around the 1926-1927 and had individual performances in it, a
few examples of these performances are called Fieber and Macht.
INFLUENCE MAP
TRAVELOGUE
As you walk along a night covered road, bright neon lights appear in the distance, cutting through the
darkness and acting a like a beacon for wanderers roaming the land. As you walk closer to these lights, you
notice that there is only one path leading to somewhere, and if there are more, these are hidden from
your eyes. At first, the city appears to be just a mass of colours with little signs of life but the closer to
these you get, the clearer the lights begin to take form and shapes start to appear through this city.
As you approach the city, the more you notice about the place. Spheres, cubes and more odd shapes begin
to cut through the city glow. The closer you get the more detail you begin to notice about these shapes,
does that cube have diamond shaped windows? Each shape seems to give off their own slight light which
adds to the brightness and colourfulness of the city, making you wonder what each one is made of. As you
start to walk among spheres, cubes and other shapes which you have now seen them for what they are.
You notice that some seem to be float above the dark ground. As you walk closer you notice dark shaped
rising up to meet these float buildings, and that these strong poles are keeping these buildings up. As you
move through this bright, cheerful and mystery place, you begin to get a sense about what goes on
throughout the city and the more you look and see and experience what the city has to offer, you began to
wander why this city of light was so full of these lights, where the lights part of their religion where they
worship the Gods for their gift of light, light up those around, or was the nights as long as the days or how
hey only have light for a specific amount of time each year?
TRAVELOGUE
As you move between the bright buildings, you notice the movement of the locals around you. All the citizens of
the city are wearing bright neon colours as they go about their business, those of higher wealth seem to wear
long clean robes with bright jewellery while the less wealth seems to wear dull coloured ripped robes with little
to no accessories at all. All the citizens seem to follow the main road in the city, the road which shines a brilliant
grey through the city, creating a path for those lost and those who know their way. This road also seems to have
golden swirls or patterns shining through the grey. Whether the gold represents a deeper meaning or there for
just decoration, you guess you’ll never know. Next to this beacon of light embedded into the ground itself, lies
streams of bright lights, each a bright colour, flowing trough the ground and giving of light as they wave between
buildings.
As you wander through this bright city following the brightly lit road, you notice some of the citizens carrying
around pots of paint, each a different colour, and a set of ladders. As you watch them, you see that these workers
have gone up to a sphere which has less of a glow then those around it and started to paint. With each stroke of
paint, the building begins to regain its life.
While you continue to wander, you notice people standing around large clay pots and slowly mixing a powder
into the mixture. As they mix, people come forth carrying bags of this mineral-like substance and place them next
to the pots while the painters coming and going, collecting pots of the mixture and leaving to bring more life to
the buildings, and leaving the pots to be refilled.
TRAVELOGUE
The centre of the city is the liveliest part of the city. It is where most of the entertainments, stores, restaurants
and bars. While around the messier and less satisfying jobs are around the outskirts of the city, like factories for
making paint for the buildings. The smell of fried food and the sweetness of baked goods linger in the air, enticing
people to come and buy one of their goods. While in the outskirts, smoke rises from chimneys as people work.
Also, in the centre of the city, lies the city centre where most of the deciding of the city takes place. Quite a large
building, it is quite around compared to other places in the city. On of this v shaped building lies two massive
domes, lighting up the entire area around them as they emit light, this you could tell, was an important place.
Next to this building, sits a smaller sized circle shaped building also wearing a dome, but only one suggesting that
it is still slightly important. Along the side of this building it is adored by windows shaped like the windows you
usually see on ships. As you stand admiring this building you notice that some of the Locals who were carrying
pots were bring the finished versions here, suggesting this building was either used as storage, which is unlikely
considering how similar it is to the city centre, meaning it could also be a workshop for locals to paint or craft
different thing for the city.
As you start to leave this bright, colourful city you look back, to get one last look of the city, of luminous, standing
out against the dark calling those to it with its light, so that you can remember it as you are likely never to come
back and find the city of luminous again.
THUMBNAILS
ORIGINAL CONCEPT ART
CONCEPT ART
BREAK DOWN
Matte Painting

3D Models
KEY ASSETS
ORTHOGRAPHICS
MATTE PAINTING
TEXTURES
FINAL RENDER