OUAN404 - Study Task 3 - Len Lye - Free Radicals (1958)

Free Radicals' is a black and white short film by avant-garde film maker, Len Lye. The method of producing the film is something that I find really interesting in that he actually scratched the film stock in order to produce the effect given on the final film. The types of movement that was achieved using this method is an incredibly free form of expressive mark making it seems to me. I also love the simplicity of the shapes and colours used. The black and white works well with the timbre of the sounds, rhythm and general tempo of the sound features in Free Radicals.

Throughout the video varying shapes are used to represent the sounds visually that in my opinion work well. Abstract lines of different lengths and weights are used at different segments depending on the section of the sound being played. As well as this there is a sort of rough and very free feeling aspect to the quality of the lines that Len Lye produced for this animation, of course scratching film stock is a tedious and very basic technique in itself to produce texture and visuals within the animation but despite this rough approach I think it fits the audio being played.

Another thing worth noting about the animation quality in general is that I really like the transitions between shapes and lines as they kind of transition from one shape to the next. I think that the transitions work extremely well and are almost seamless, which I imagine was a difficult feat given the nature of the technique that was used. One effect I also like which comes as a bi-product of the way the visuals were created but the slight stuttering of lines almost looks as if they are vibrating, which is highly appropriate given the energy portrayed in the audio as well as the fact it is an accompaniment to sound in the first place, so this kind of jitter as a whole added to the animation.