Canon EOS 5D Mark II
ƒ/2
100 mm
1/400
4000

From the mind of Andrew Bird. A quiet moment in low light.

“When I close my eyes sometimes and try to sleep, I can’t stop thinking about my own eyes. And it’s like your eyes start straining to see themselves.
That’s what it feels like to me.
It’s not pleasant.
I’m sorry if I put that idea in your head.”

“Electronic feedback is the sound of self destruction.”

His electronic looping weaves a fabric of overlays…. like a phase-shifted synaesthesia of fugue.

The TED video of his one-man-band performance just came out. Enjoy.

11 responses to “Strange Loops”

  1. Jamming with Thomas Dolby a couple days later…

    IMG_5302

  2. inspiring… experimental in terms of music…"reckless curiosity", loops as reaching out and in on the boundary condition of being human… "weather systems" and "don’t spill the wine"… me too, I did enjoy it!

  3. Intriguing and beautiful. A bit of recless curiosity should make up a part of each and every one of us. He has an interesting mind.

  4. this is a truly beautiful photo . . .

  5. Looping equals electronic music.

  6. Finally made the time to virtually attend this event. His music making is inspiring, however I’m ‘recklessly curious’ to know more about him.

    BTW, the photos here do justice to the artist(s)! Did you use a tri-pod or something to fix your camera, Steve? Thanks!

  7. Nope, just handheld. I avoid flash and tripods (except for extreme situations, like astrophotography). I was sitting in the audience, so a tripod would interfere.

    After some experimentation with other lenses in prior years, I have settled on a fast prime zoom — the 100mm f/2. It works great for indoor speakers (and is lightweight) . I shot Av priority at f/2 and boosted the the ISO to 4000 (still low noise on the Mark II) and dropped -1 EV to get the shutter speed up. Autoexposure cues off the backlit screen. Oh, and like most moving subjects, I took a bunch of shots and only shared the best.

  8. …much appreciated! So, it seems like a fair amount of experimentation, fast and lightweight lens and super sensitive sensor–regular cameras need to be at/less than ISO200 to yield such image.

  9. P.S. another fun quote as he introduced a song that did not make it to the TED video:
    "Musicians can get away with anything in their lyrics. We don’t have to back it up with data."

  10. [http://www.flickr.com/photos/jurvetson] hence the artist as futurist.

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