Hasta La Ideas

Craig Ward‘s short promo film for Jon Hopkins‘ forthcoming album, Immunity, (out on Domino in early June) features unlikely stars: microscopic food dye crystals…

Jon Hopkins – Immunity official teaser video from Craig Ward on Vimeo.

Ward worked on the promo with Linden Gledhill (regular CR blog readers may recall the pair worked together on last year’s Cascades video for Ryan Teague) who combined the role of ‘crystal cultivator’ and DOP, growing food dye crystals and shooting them using a research grade Olympus BH-2 microscope and a Canon EOS 5D mark II camera rigged up with some LED lighting and a high speed flash.

“The microscope also uses Differencial Interference Contrast optics (DIC), a special technique which allow the observer to see normally transparant objects,” Gledhill explains of his set-up. “It’s the tuning of these optics which creates the wide range of colours. Most of the images were done at 100 to 1000x magnification.”

A selection of images from the 10,000+ images taken by Gledhill during the process will also be used in the design of the album cover which Ward is currently working on.

Credits

Director Craig Ward
Producer Cathy Kwan
Exec producer James Stevenson Bretton
Production company Blinkart & Hornet Inc.
Crystal cultivator/DOP Linden Gledhill
Editor R.J. Glass
Compositor Shir Lieberman
Colour correction Yussef Cole

See more of Craig Ward’s work at BlinkArt.

CR in print
The March issue of CR magazine celebrates 150 years of the London Underground. In it we introduce a new book by Mark Ovenden, which is the first study of all aspects of the tube’s design evolution; we ask Harry Beck authority, Ken Garland, what he makes of a new tube map concept by Mark Noad; we investigate the enduring appeal of Edward Johnston’s eponymous typeface; Michael Evamy reports on the design story of world-famous roundel; we look at the London Transport Museum’s new exhibition of 150 key posters from its archive; we explore the rich history of platform art, and also the Underground’s communications and advertising, past and present. Plus, we talk to London Transport Museum’s head of trading about TfL’s approach to brand licensing and merchandising. In Crit, Rick Poynor reviews Branding Terror, a book about terrorist logos, while Paul Belford looks at how a 1980 ad managed to do away with everything bar a product demo. Finally, Daniel Benneworth-Grey reflects on the merits on working home alone. Buy your copy here.

Please note, CR now has a limited presence on the newsstand at WH Smith high street stores (although it can still be found in WH Smith travel branches at train stations and airports). If you cannot find a copy of CR in your town, your WH Smith store or a local independent newsagent can order it for you. You can search for your nearest stockist here. Alternatively, call us on 020 7970 4878, or buy a copy direct from us. Based outside the UK? Simply call +44(0)207 970 4878 to find your nearest stockist. Better yet, subscribe to CR for a year here and save yourself almost 30% on the printed magazine.

CR for the iPad
Read in-depth features and analysis plus exclusive iPad-only content in the Creative Review iPad App. Longer, more in-depth features than we run on the blog, portfolios of great, full-screen images and hi-res video. If the blog is about news, comment and debate, the iPad is about inspiration, viewing and reading. As well as providing exclusive, iPad-only content, the app will also update with new content throughout each month.