Monday, October 11, 2010

New ways of seeing architecture: Alex Roman's The Third&The Seventh



Spanish-born artist Alex Roman describes his striking film, The Third&The Seventh as trying "to illustrate architecture art across a photographic point of view where main subjects are already-built spaces. Sometimes in an abstract way. Sometimes surreal".  The twelve-minute work, best viewed in HD full screen, includes meditations of the interplay of light and nature on such iconic structures as Mie's Barcelona Pavilion, Louis Kahn's Yale Library and Santiago Calatrava's Milwaukee art Museum.

And it's all virtual. "I use 3DS Max and Vray for rendering," says Roman to Motionographer's Justice Cone, "Photoshop for texture work, AfterEffects for compositing and color grading and Adobe Premiere for edit it all."

The piece's consistently slow rhythms makes the work a bit on the lugubrious side, a little slow, a little heavy, a little too much in love with its own artistry, but there's no denying this is a stunning piece of work, one that could help lead the way past the press-agent photography of architecture that too often manages to kill any sense of the magic - and mystery - of the buildings.

(thanks to EuroRSCG Chicago's Baptiste Limb for showcasing this film)

2 comments:

Rick Lightburn said...

Haven't watched it yet, but "Slow and lugubrious" aren't good signs--to my gf's lasting displeasure, I dozed off during a viewing of the film about Gaudi, which was quiet and slow

micanichi said...

I've been watching at his animations for a few years now and while they are stunning, I can never get past the gimmicky 3D gymnastics he employs so frequently throughout. His references to fountain pens, parchment and antique cameras in this animation add nothing beyond the fact that he can depict them with such great realism. In the end, without a narrative in sight, his greatest achievement is making you think you are looking at the real thing, which is all too common in architectural illustration these days. It's really a film about software.