Projection Mapping, Animated Content Creation

MEMORY SPHERES

Eccentric Moments Come to Life with Light.

An immersive light installation with animations, photographs, and spatial sound design.

I was approached by the legendary ad agency, Wieden+Kennedy, to tour their impressive Downtown Portland office building and pitch ideas for augmenting the space with a lighting installation or projections. The goal was to highlight and bring attention to the architecture of their building during a hybrid founders' memorial and holiday party attended by over 2,000 past and present employees.

During my tour, I recommended that they fill the building with as much color and light as possible while I focused my efforts on an immersive installation in a two-story location called Upper Lodge, where I would create an original immersive light artwork titled Memory Spheres.

I've explored the technique of projecting through a translucent balloon to create a volumetric animation from 2D animations in the past, but this time I wanted to take the experience to another level.

I planned on crafting a living and flowing space filled with forty-one 36-inch balloons and one massive 72-inch balloon.

An exciting idea that pushed this project into its final form came from a brainstorming call with creative director Dan Viens at W+K. He suggested we add photographs of the wildest moments at the company into the spheres. Shortly after, a request was sent to current and past employees to submit the most eccentric, over-the-top, and shocking photographic evidence of the good times had at the agency in its forty years. The W+K team provided a final curated collection of 150 photos that I randomized and animated as a dazzling array.

I made four different custom animation sets that were composed and arranged to change the energy in the space. Spatialized sound design that corresponded to each animation was created in collaboration with Parallel Studio, which added depth and movement to the installation. The final piece of the puzzle was to combine the visuals and spatial sound design with a playlist we curated with John Johnson, AKA jay squared.

This flow of spatial sound, animations, and photographs was very effective in moving energy through the space.

Client — Wieden + Kennedy
Senior Producer — Jennifer Smith
Sound Design — Parallel Studio
Projection Integration — Meyer Pro
Lighting — Outlaw Lighting
Installation Assistance — Victoria Wells
Playlist Curation — John Johnson, Jessica Zollman Winslow

Additional thanks to Dan Viens, Phoebe Owens, Heather Smith Harvey, Connie Wohn, and Charlie Votruba.

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