Introduction
“Gallop of Freedom” is an animation video project that attempts to showcase a series of Chinese ink painting inspired animated videos created using digitally sampled time varying data from various image source to create the illusion of "movement".
Audience Feedback Form for ACMI-RMIT Audience Lab
Background
According to Chinese lunar calendar, 2026 is “the year of fire horse”, which occurs every 60 years and symbolises “transformation” and “movement”. With intention to celebrate the year, the theme of the project is inspired by the dynamic and minimalistic depiction of galloping horses from Chinese ink paintings.
The earliest attempt of similar endeavour for motion picture was achieved by Eadweard Muybridge in the late 19 century. He pioneered photographic studies of motions by photographing time lapse moving subjects including galloping horses to create animated photos, which was the precursor of "key frame animation" in the digital era. The reason that the illusion of "movement" can be created by sequentially playing back static images rapidly is because our visual perception system has the ability to process, interpret and sometimes fill in missing information.
The visual perception of "motion" or "movement" involves photoreceptor cells (rods and cones) in the retina of our eyes, which are light sensitive and capable of converting light as neural signals to the brain for detecting and interpreting the "change" of information. Therefore, creating the "change" of information of a subject becomes the key for creating the visual effect of "motion", which also means, quite possibly, the subject may not even need to "move".
This project will seek to explore visual perception of "movement" using fundamentals in mathematics along with image and video processing tools for the artistic creation.
Video Sample at Australian Centre for the Moving Image (ACMI)