What We Do: To whom it may concern. my name is craig gafoor and I work alot in the party scene as a V.J. In that I video mix my own computer animations in time to the music doing an online edit in real time. Matching what the d.j. does mix for mix, he crossfades and I do @ the same time matching the beat and flowing with the music. To do this live I use a Panasonic mx50 and four Svhs recorders with five preview monitors running blue key, green key , unmixed and mixed footage. For larger gigs I use my own offline editing systems running @ D1. To make the content I use : Lightwave 3d Maya digital fusion speed razor premier PhotoShop meta creations 5d monsters etc etc around 30-40 programs in all. I would like to come along to some of the parties that you put on and V.J. for you live in australia. To this end here is some info on 2012fx ltd. (1) is an article from wax magazine. (2) is some info on 2012fx ltd and the footage 2012fx is running live @ the moment. (1) 2012FX - Craig Gafoor by Bertie Cairns WAX VJing is the cool new way to impose mediocrity on clubbers. Dodgy graphics occasionally change in time with the beat and more frequently go mental when the music breaks into a three minute lull. Like ropey disco lights on automatic, the fuzzy screen emphasises what is missing rather than adding anything to the clubbing experience. The Idler magazine stuck a knife into the aspirations of every multimedia wannabe: "Show me shelves groaning under a dusty set of acid house records and I'll show you a crammed zip drive full of electronic wank." Quite. Or so I thought until I encountered Craig Gafoor at 2012FX. His video for trance gods, Koxbox, received world wide play on MTV - without the usual pluggers twisting the arms of reluctant TV executives. His VJ shows are designed to make crowds hallucinate without any chemical aids and he has turned down large sums of money to do it all for techno. The familiar grey box and computer screen dominate the view. Behind the comfy swivel chair hide a large TV and some decks with a flash Numark mixer. "Got those a few weeks ago," he explains forestalling any mission to hunt old, dusty vinyl. This was a surprising office for someone who has worked with the Ministry of Sound, the Essential festival, and many leading trance labels. But I didn't know Craig's anarchic attitude to his expertise. Let me explain. Craig's little grey box holds about 100,000 of hard and software. He used to work in the film animation business. He was the first employee, and remains a consultant, for AMGfx; who have worked on such movies as "Lost in Space". He has been offered 100,000 to work on projects like the new Star Wars film, and should charge at least 3,000 for a days work as a video animator. He admits that his former colleagues think he is raving mad but Craig has a mission. "I want to provide high quality videos that will get television play for bands who could not afford the real cost. I charged Koxbox in the region of 8,000 but the work is worth 80,000 in the market. However, I will only work with bands who I like and whose music I enjoy." He knows there is a huge demand for high quality dance videos but most of the bands have barely enough cash to put on a live show, let alone invest in flash graphics that might only see the inside of their living room. By the time they get major label money thrown at them he believes big brother is diluting their work. I watched the video with anticipation. Initially I was disappointed by what I saw, because it was ravey. I was, however, sucked into the heart of the pulsing multi- coloured, fragmenting, mesmeric vortex as we careered through multi-dimensional space, past geometric constructs. The complexity was awe-inspiring and one viewing was not enough to catch more than an impression of what was happening. As though responding to my unspoken comment Craig said, "We made it very ravey and flashy for MTV but it is the level of editing that sold it." Oh dear, into the land of tekkie-speak, but editing is the key: Editing is the number of visual layers in each frame we see on the screen. Most cheap computer animated dance videos consist of a couple of layers because each graphic takes time and costs money. Craig and his company are putting more images into every frame, than many a professional, high budget animated video. The Koxbox film had 15 to 20 layers and each layer had 20 edits. If you then remember that TV in Europe has 25 frames per second you begin to understand the massive body of work that Craig put together. If you ran each layer back to back, the five minute video would play for four hours. We then dived into video's individual frames and Craig revealed just how carefully he works out his imagery - even when the audience will barely notice it. Each word he used was balanced with its opposite. Images of Mayan Temples and codexes rub shoulders with the Egyptian and Tibetan Books of the Dead, the Kabbalah and scenes of the Burning Man festival in Nevada. "I'm after the mathematical geometric construct - or layers of fractally evolving language." Which I think means that if you take a frame from his video it will open up to reveal a another connected image, which will in turn open to reveal another - like a fractal. He has also developed a close link between the music and the images. He separates the full sound that we hear into individual riffs or patterns, converting them into a curve. This curve then links up to an image, or layer in the video, making it change when the music changes. At its most basic - if you had a dancing man, instead of seeing him jump up and down in time with a track, Craig could make the snare move his hand, every drum roll wiggle his back-side and with every break-down he would drift like a leaf on a breeze. He takes a similar attitude to his VJ gigs, providing state-of-the-art technology for the price of a dodgy second hand car. He creates individual imagery for each night that he plays at and edits everything live. "Promoters are being ripped-off by so called VJs who are using old graphics. I spend weeks before each gig creating designs especially for the customer." Craig has taken the parallel with DJing to its logical conclusion by responding to the crowd; introducing live shots into his show and creating a journey that taps into the audience's brain-waves. Yes, he taps into their brain-waves. "I use entrainment techniques which means pulsing images at Hertz frequencies....These techniques were first developed during the Vietnam war for brainwashing. These were bad reasons but used right they can elevate people into a blissed-out state, naturally." I began to see why he thinks most VJs are crap. The brain's wave patterns align with the pulses that an image emits. Craig begins his show with the frequency that corresponds to an a brain waves - our normal waking state. During the night he will move the frequencies up to a d state where we begin to make our own images - yes we hallucinate. Craig becomes a visual chemist - handing out visual hits to anyone who wants to get naturally high. "The screen becomes like an inter-dimensional jump gate - at this point my work becomes irrelevant," and the power of each individual 's mind takes control. He has spent four years perfecting the technique to make it safe. Getting it wrong is potentially dangerous. There was a recent example on Japanese TV where unsuitable frequencies were incorporated into a children's cartoon and 200 viewers were hospitalised. Craig says that he has never had anyone fitting during his show. Entrainment is, by the way, banned from television - his video for Koxbox had to conform to strict standards - no more than four flashes per second. In a typically modest way he explains: "The live stuff is for fun - it is me jamming - a hobby." Once again he's "doing it for techno." His love of trance, in particular, and dance music in general, goes back to the early days at parties like Energy, Schoom and Back to the Future. He believes the atmosphere of late 90's psychedelic parties is the closest you can get to the old way of partying. He is not one of those back to '88 bores, however, and was much more interested in talking about nights like Pendragon or TIP. "The trance scene is like a baby, if looked after it could be beautiful." He is fiercely anti-establishment and resents the corporate take-over of the dance world but at the same time he is a realist. Big companies want to get in on the dance world and he feels their money should be accepted and used to benefit the whole scene. With other major bands interested in using 2012FX for their videos this year looks set to be phenomenally busy, (2) < E.D.X. > What's in the name? It's a state of mind. E.D.X. is an Extra Dimensional Experiment; a genesis of one mans creativity & cutting edge technology in a fusion of ones imagination & binary code. 2012fx Ltd have created a mathematical geodesic multiplanar language of spiritual icons & genetic memories from the edge of reality. Where does this reality start & where does the Extra Dimensional Experiments end? Do you dare to step aboard this multidimensional rollercoaster ride into oblivion? E.D.X. is an experiment in editing techniques & digital art that takes a head charge at traditional video production & drags it kicking & screaming into the 21st century. Using some of the worlds most advance hardware & software to take one mans vision of an altered state of conciseness into reality. One year in the making and with no budgetary constraints, this level of computer imagery has never yet been commissioned, as the cost of building the 100's of models and thousands of edits would run into the millions. This mind-expanding project is a testament to the digital engineer & his vision of a place where language & information are one with spirit & thought. A Cybereality where your only true limit is your own imagination. This is only one of many projects undertaken by 2012fx Ltd who have created digital work for some of the biggest names in show business: Virgin Records - Billie Piper ZTT - Massive Management - The Art Of Noise & Lai Larni The Ministry Of Sound Carwash Ruskilder (Denmark) Room at the top (RAT) Radio 1 - Essential Festival Glastonbury - Numark - Vestax & ESO RCA Records - North & South Thunder Ridge Sound Systems If you are interested in 2012fx doing some of your live gigs then feel free to get in contact with me. yours sincerely Mr Craig Gafoor Director 2012fx ltd www.u-global.com craig@2012fx.com +44 (0) 181-670-9958 Why is the company called 2012FX? 2012 is the date set by the Mayans in South America for the end of the fifth age of man and the beginning of the sixth. Some believe it will be a new age of light, love, expanded consciousness and space travel. The Mayan calendar has intrigued archaeologists and new agers for years and some of the Mayan art work seems to depict men in space machines. pls sent all relpys to 2012fx@a1freenet.co.uk 2012fx doing it for teknology Preferred Vibe: trance tekno hard house nu-energy and a mad for it bunch of people Favourite Events: t.i.p. flying rhino twisted Favourite Moments: first hit of dmt The Future: film director Social Comments: i am another yourself more... : get me over and i will rock your universe Phone: +44 181 670 9958 Postal Address: 31 elderwood place elder road west norwood london se27 ohj u.k. |
