EUSTY AND THE SEVERN
For my Major Personal Project I have been fortunate enough to work in collaboration with a Live Brief. The Project is to restore the last remaining Coracle shed in the UK, residing in Iron bridge and brought to life by the Rogers Family; a family of coracle makers dating back at least 250 years. Sadly, the last of the coracle men, Eustace Rogers, died in 2003, and the tradition or coracle making is facing being lost.
The Ironbridge Coracle Trust have been granted funding to restore the shed, and create a virtual museums to re-tell the fascinating story of the coracle men to a modern audience. They are also working on a heritage trail through Ironbridge to link the two sites, as well as workshops in coracle making and educational activities for schools.
I chose to follow the brief and work on it from a Performance Design approach. My project is a projected installation combining illustration and original photographs, telling the story of the Rogers family. As a designer with a love for local history, and being from Shropshire myself, I felt a personal connection to the story. I have explored projection mapping technology in response to the brief;
"Telling the story of the coracle men in an exciting and imaginative way...Magical and entertaining"
Sample of the Brief from the Ironbridge Coracle Trust
I was given the full brief currently being in used in the live project, to follow during my final major. This page talks about the plans for the Coracle shed; to restore preserve the building, and the plans to install projections visible via peepholes in the shed walls.
A Brief History...
The Ironbridge Coracle Trust was set up by a group of local passionate residents who wanted to ensure the craft of coracle making is not lost to the Gorge. A Coracle is a round boat made of willow and coated in calico and tar to waterproof it. Versions of coracle have existed in other countries for hundreds of years, but each community builds their coracle to their own design. They were great for paddling across the fast currents of the Severn, for fishing and transporting goods, as well as saving residents from drowning in the dangerous currents!
My response to the brief was to create an installation, using projectors, to tell the story of the Rogers family and their Coracle making Legacy. Using projection mapping technology and animation, I wanted to produce and installation which which was exciting to watch, immersive and breaks the boundaries of a typical museum layout.
The installation will be portable, with a projected animation on the exterior, and a replicated interior, showing how the Coracle shed would have looked, completed with sawdust, dripping tar, a coracle in progress of being a built and all the tools the Rogers family would have collected.
Design and Development
The next process was learning the technology needed for projection mapped installations. The physical structure is actually very simple, it will be a shed shaped wooden frame, cladded in white boards; the only only detail being a window on both of the larger sides. These windows will be covered in a projection material so not to break the image projected on the white surface.
Click through images for more information.
Illustrations
In order to create simple animations, I first went through my storyline and illustrated the characters, objects, animals and scenes. I chose to hand illustrate everything in order to give the animation a children's storybook style. By using Adobe After Effects I do not need to illustrate every single position in order to create movement.
Swipe through to see the full collection of illustrations.
Animations
After I had produced illustrations and transformed them into an animation, I projected the footage onto a 1:10 model of the shed.
These clips show the animation that was use in the installation.
The footage was projected onto various surfaces of the shed, to bring it life from its static white appearance.
All Videos
All Videos
Introduction - Eustace Narration
Front Projection - Tommy Rogers
Front Projection - Harry Rogers
Front Porjection - Eustace Rogers
The Final Installation
The images on the left show the test of the animation on the 1:10 scale Model. The test were very effective but at this point I could only do one side at a time. It wasn't until I moved onto to the full size shed I could encorporate the other two projectors.
On the right are stills of the final realised Installation. I projected my animation onto the full size white shed which I have constructed myself. I showed the Installation over 15th May, playing the full installation over 10 times during the day. The day was a great success and member of the Coracle Trust have been so impressed that they have asked me to continue to work with them on the actual Coracle Shed Project.
The Next Step
Below is a digital concept of what could be done with the projection installation next. The Greenwood Centre in Ironbridge is already working in conjunction with the Coracle Trust and have agreed to hold my installation over the summer to a local audience.
After I graduate I will be working for Ironbridge Coracle Trust on a freelance basis; illustrating, animating and design for the new museum.
Please see my most recent developments in this project on my page.
