wordplay: Cantaloupe Claus (Orangepeelmoses.com)
image: V.Scratch / Valerio Spoletini
These days, everyone and their MILF knows what a DJ is and does. DJs have gradually clawed their way out of the underground and onto the pop culture radar. Many of the most experienced DJs are bona fide rock stars at this point. VJs or video jockeys, not one time on-air MTV hosts like Downtown Julie Brown but the video collage artists responsible for mixing and projecting visual content in nightclubs (and even concert venues), occupy much more anonymous shoes. They are becoming more and more common and a few, including my buddy Boris (Videolicious), even tour to a certain extent, but the average club goer hasn’t the foggiest idea who the VJ is, let alone what he does. Most of us have seen the trippy visuals on flat screens near the DJ booth at clubs like Vinyl and The Church, but how many of you have ever found yourself wondering exactly what goes into making them happen? The first time I personally hired a VJ was for a show called Mesogroovic 2.5 at CU’s Club 156 ten years ago. I have worked with several VJs since, including those of Denver’s Dig Interactive, but still have little clue what they actually do. In an effort to school both myself and my readers, I recently shadowed and then picked the virtual brain of SoCo’s resident VJ, Keisuke Shingu, about the history, culture and logistics of being a VJ.
Where were you born?
I was born in Shizuoka City, which is an hour away with high-speed train ride from central Tokyo. The city is near an ocean where you can surf in the summertime and, if you drive 30 minutes to the mountain side, you can camp and hike.
What was your childhood like?
Since I was born in the largest baby boom generation in Japan, there was something new always targeted to my generation and I was excited on those of kids-trendy things since I was little. Playing Nintendo games after school, watching Japanese Anime & Manga (comics) such as Dragonball Z (Dragonball Z started first only in comics when I was 7 or 8 years old. TV show started few years later) and all kinds of Robotech and SF stuff (Godzilla, Gundam, Cyborg 009, Yamato, Gatchaman, Kamem Rider, Ultraman, Nausica, Castle in the Sky, AKIRA etc), and playing out of them like trading cards, games, books as such. I used to watch American TV programs too. I also skateboarded in junior high and broke my arms a couple of times. For music, I started listening to non-commercial music from junior high (7th grade?) and first got into Beatles, and the Japanese electronic music unit called YMO, and then started listening all kinds of music since then. I guess my childhood cultural influences were combinations of Japanese and American culture, which I found interesting later on.
What is VJing? How would you define it?
VJ is a term for Visual Jockey, who transforms sound scape (atmosphere)
into synaesthetic visual forms. It is an art form of real time motion
graphics/video mixing for DJs and dance floor.
When did you first get into VJing?
It was back in year 94'. I first played at an underground after hours club in Tokyo called Maniac Love. It was with resident DJ Q'Hey who is now a headliner of second largest techno festival in Japan called Metamorphose.
How did you learn how to do it?
I was a film school student and learning media art, motion graphics, and video editing. I made a VJ unit with my school buddy who had a Commodore Amiga for real time video editing and effects. I had a Macintosh with Adobe Photoshop, Illustrator, Premiere and was using 3D software to create some motion graphics, and we decided to get together and teamed up to make something new. We were not much into the normal video editing processes that we had learned at school at that time, and wanted to do more interactive and abstract experimental stuff. I was in love with electronic music and all of my inspiration came from listening to electronic sounds, so becoming a VJ at the clubs seemed to be the ideal output and we brought everything we needed to make real time performance at the club. So, it was kind of do-it-yourself approach and I learned things piece by piece.
When and where did you to score your first paid gig?
I did another gig at the legendary club called Gold in Tokyo right after I did the gig at Maniac Love. A friend of mine threw a party there and I made their logos looks like 3D wireframe and threw some videos on top of it. It set certain atmosphere to the event and I got paid for the first time. Although, I wasn't thinking to make money with VJing, so I did a lot of shows for free. It was all about experimentation and doing something interesting in a club environment.
When did you move to Colorado? Why?
I came here in October 2000. I was working for a media research center at Kyoto University of Art and Design till 99' and this software company called Quark got to know me from interactive projects I was working on at that time. They came to see me twice and I became an early adaptor of their prototype software. I spent days and nights with it and produced some interactive projects, afterwards they made me an offer to work for U.S headquarters in Denver and I decided to move on. It was an exciting offer to me since I wanted to live and work outside of Japan. I worked at Tokyo office about a year and then come to Denver headquarter later on. All I had at that time were two suit cases and a job offer. I had no idea how Denver is like, however, I was all excited about living in America and starting my life with completely new environment.
How did you land your current regular gig with SoCo Nightlife?
I did my first VJ gig for the Basement Sessions at Friday Vinyl for Little Mike and Lee Burridge. Lee was doing his 365 Tour at that time and I used to go to Little Mike's parties a lot, so I wanted to do something for them and that was the starting point. I met so many of like-minded people from club scene in Denver and over past several years I became friends with a lot of DJs and promoters (too many to list), and they are the ones who brought me to do visuals for their parties. Most importantly - the person who brought me to regular gigs at the Church on Thursdays is B-Rad. He gave me some freedom to do visuals, so I never got bored doing it at the Church on Thursdays, since then things just kept going and I started doing other parties with Triad Dragons (Skylab, Caffeine, Global Dance, etc). At the same time, I am a good friend of An-ism (VJ Ryan & John) who does visuals for Vinyl on Saturdays, so when they are not available I do it for Vinyl. I also did some nights at Shelter Fridays. Having said that, I probably didn't think to start VJing again without meeting with the people on the dance floor and sharing so many of fun nights. *I like to list many names here.... like Ha, Cathy, Dragon from Triad, Crazy Larry & Phil, Wyatt & Scott from Church Thursdays, Jonas & Sir Thomas from Vinyl Saturdays.
What hardware and software does your standard rig consist of?
My main setup used to be [motion dive. tokyo] + [Kaos pad from KORG] + [DVD player] + [Edirol V-4], and sometimes a live video feed to capture dance floor or DJ booth. I recently made a switch to this new software called Modul8, which is a replacement of motion dive. Tokyo.
How much has your rig evolved since you first started VJing years ago?
There was no VJ software when I first became VJ in Tokyo, so around that time it was all hardware based. The motion dive. tokyo was breakthrough software to me because it has its own controller to mix video and motion graphics like DJ's mixing sounds. The intuitiveness of the controller and its quick response amazed me. It's so much different when you mix videos with a mouse or own dedicated controller. I mean, things are closer to instrumental if you have the controller, more inspiration flows in that way. In addition to that setup, I wanted to add some more organic effects on top of it and Kaos Pad does exactly what I wanted to do, which is real time motion effects with sensitive touch screen. It's crazy to think how technology evolved in last 10 years, because the majority of the work I had to spend back then was carrying all the equipment to the clubs and set things up. Mixing video in real time was a dream back then, and having VJ software on a laptop and just plugging the cable into the club projector is a giant leap. There are still areas to be improved, like more high-resolution visuals, and multi-projections as such, but as you can see, Pioneer announced new mixer which also has visual controls with touch screen (SVM-1000), I think the crossover of audio + visual is already happening and it's an exciting direction, clubs and DJs can offer richer experience to crowds.
Who are your biggest VJ influences?
Tomato (Underworld's art unit), Cold Cut, D:Fuse, Analog Recycling, and XL Video who tour with U2, Bjork, Chemical Brothers, and Daft Punk. My best VJ buddy is Ryan from An-ism and we did several shows together and we talk a lot about art and cultural stuff. Another VJ buddy is V.Scratch from Switzerland who plays at several art festivals in Europe such as Sonar at Barcelona, and Mapping at Geneva. I would say VJs are likely to influence each other since it's still in early stages and there is no standard setup, so it's fun to talk about setups and inspiring each other.
How often do touring DJs bring their own pre-made visuals or even their own VJ?
DJs like Bad Boy Bill, Paul Van Dyk, Tiesto, Armin Van Buuren brings their DVDs with their logos and images in it. Those are like 15 minute touring DVDs and, in most cases, DJs let me mix visuals during their set. There are DJs like Sandra Collins, Sander Kleinenberg, Rabbit in the Moon who brings own visual crew, and it is an integral part of their gigs.
Ever get a little jealous that DJs get more recognition than VJs?
Not at all. They are the ones who set the atmosphere of the night and I am here to support them. I sometimes feel like local DJs in Denver are not recognized as they should be, honestly, sometime those guys mix better than headliners, but no one knows who they are. I understand many people go to clubs to see big name DJs, but when local DJs tore it up and crowds put their hands in the air, they should know who the DJ is. That's why I put DJ names on the screen and sometimes I tell people I am cheerleading DJs. Although, I have to say VJ culture here is not common but if you go to Japan or Europe - VJ's names are listed on flyers and I do appreciate that. I sometimes find it difficult to explain what VJ is about - when people come talk to me, "Oh, you are doing lights!" or "Oh, you are the lighting guy!"..., so my only hope is to get proper recognition as a VJ. I would never get jealous about popularity because I love dance music so much and being a part of club culture is more important than popularity.
Where can one go to learn more about the art form?
I don't think there are any VJ schools, but there are art schools who have interactive art, media art, and video editing classes would be a good place to learn about all the elements you need for VJing. I went to film school and I was doing graphics and interactive design for a while, so understanding two dimensional graphics techniques definitely helped me to expand the variations of visual mixes.
Another aspect of VJing is to do it for bands. Let's say if you go to see U2 concert, they put a lot of efforts on visuals and that's an integral part of their show. I am always amazed when those musicians care about visuals on their stage. Those visuals are well prepared to fit the theme of their shows with music. Concerts with visuals are a good place to learn. Other than that, maybe modern museums who features media art and video installations.
What does the future of VJing hold?
I think crossover of DJ and VJ might happen in the future. The new mixer from Pioneer (SVM-1000) has visual mixing features on the central touch screen and now DJs are able to mix visuals while they are mixing sounds. On the software side, audio software like Ableton Live already supports integrating videos into the musical composition and VJ software can have audio inputs for making visuals in-synch with music. In the future, I would like to see more high-resolution visuals. HDTV is becoming popular these days and you can tell the experience you get from that technology is far better than normal DVDs. The existing laptop doesn't have enough power to mix HDTV quality videos, but it wouldn't be an issue within few years. I personally like to see multi-projections happening in club environment, so I can put different visuals to different screens. Anyways, VJing is always tight together with latest technology..., so something completely new might happen.
Thursdays @ The Church
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