Some notes on the Winter Garden 360 film
“All over the place, from the popular culture to the propaganda system, there is constant pressure to make people feel that they are helpless, that the only role they can have is to ratify decisions and to consume.” Noam Chomsky
Sound bites
I’m listening to a 360 film I've been working on for three years. Ok, I've made that sound more epic than it actually is. Yes, the first shoot did happen in December 2016 but then I did nothing for 18 months. Just waiting for something to happen. Then everything happened very quickly. I did a second shoot in September 2018 and the last shoot in the week before Christmas.
Now, three months later I'm listening to the Sound mix in my headset. It's spatial. When I turn my head to look at a sound or look away from a sound the sound doesn't move. Like an obedient dog it stays put, inseparable from the thing it belongs to. But something’s bothering me and it's the same thing that's been bothering me for weeks. It's the voices in my head. Sound bites from interviews that I've been ordering and re ordering, whittling away at, shuffling around for weeks on end. Most of them sound all right. But one of them - to my ears - is driving me round the bend.
I'd interviewed Hazel during the first shoot in 2016. We'd taken over a small space in the back of a house on Cairns Street. Hazel held forth for over an hour. It was gripping, poetic, eloquent, candid, and brilliant. Unfortunately, although she was wearing a lapel mic we hadn't turned it on. Or something. The crappy mic that comes with the camera was doing all the work. And so the voice I'm hearing in my headset is a constant reminder of that mistake. It does sound a bit echoey.
To be honest all the interviews reveal the limits of my sound recording know how. You can hear the traffic. Or the air conditioning. Or hair dryers. Or the bloody echo. Part of the problem, I think, was that I was just choosing the wrong spaces to do the interviews in. Spaces that were as far from a sound booth in audio terms as one could hope to find. Hazel is just the worst offender.
Introduction
In December 2015 Assemble – a collective of artists and designers– won the Turner Prize for their work with theembattled residents of Granby, in Toxteth, Liverpool. Since the riots in ‘81, the residents had been trapped in a downward spiral of ‘managed decline’, and were constantly facing the demolition of their homes and the relocation of their community.
But they fought back. And their weapon of choice was creativity. Taking control of their streets with gardens, murals and markets, they reclaimed their neighbourhood. In 2011 theyformed a Community Land Trust and then, four years later, they joined forces with Assemble to work out ways to rebuild their community and get Granby back on its feet.
Together they reimagined what the neighborhood could look like. One idea that emerged from this collaboration, and which really took hold, was to transform two derelict Victorian houses on Cairns Street into a Winter Garden and artists’ residence. A well-known illustration of this concept depicts the interior of a terraced house with trees inside it. For many, the image of lush vegetation flourishing within the envelope of a Victorian house captured the essence of this extraordinary partnership and the hope of revitalising a neighbourhood.
Work on the Winter Garden began in 2016 and was completed three years later. In a world where everything is transactional, where so much is being sold off and where very few social spaces are being built, the people of Granby and Assemble have created a public space where people can meet and talk and build a community.
What is this film?
“The Winter Garden”isa 360 film that captures this transformation. At its heart are the residents of Granby who pulled themselves out of some pretty dire circumstances, revitalised their neighborhood and turned a derelict house in the middle of a street into a community centre and artists residence.
Shot and edited over three years, and made possible by a grant from The Space, the film focuses on the Winter Garden itself, as well as the surrounding neighborhood.
At the core of the film are scenes that place the user inside the Winter Garden during key stages of its build. We see it in its derelict state – four brick walls and no roof. We’re there when the trees are brought in, and we’re there a few months later when the space is being used by the residents for a gardening workshop. Punctuating these scenes are moments that place us within the neighbourhood – a resident’s home, a hair and beauty salon, the local streets.
One of our aims when making this film was to convey the aspirations of the residents themselves and make them the focus of the experience. These are peoplewho faced the demolition of their homes and fought back with creativity instead of negativity and hate. The narrative for the film is therefore delivered, owned and driven by the residents who touch on their feelings about the past and, more importantly, voice their hopes for the future. This flow of sound bites is drawn from interviews conducted over the three years of the build.
We hope that, when experiencing this film, the user will feel as if they are actually in Granby, in the midst of something extraordinary while hearing the innermost thoughts of the people who live there.
It is what it is
I've just purchased an Oculus Go headset. This is a couple of weeks after the picture edit is locked and a few days after the Sound mix. Up till now I've been experiencing the film inside a six quid cardboard box made by Google while listening to the soundtrack on my headphones. An experience that's better than you’d think. But now, having shelled out on this shiny new headset, I was expecting a quantum leap forward. David Betteridge, The director, had emailed me the other day to say how great the sequences were looking in 6K. And at the Sound mix I’d done with Breen Turner at the National Film and Television school we'd tackled the variability of the dialogue and made Hazel sound pretty good.
So with the headset on, and a thumbnail of Granby floating in front of me, I’m apprehensive, but also excited. I watch the film. And indeed it does look fantastic. It also sounds great. But... Hazel… had I fooled myself into thinking we’d got rid of that echo?
I email David. He's had to put up with my Hazel obsession for some time now. He says it sounds better. I’ll never completely undo the quality of that initial recording. It is what it is. I'm simultaneously relieved and ... I decide to look at some other films for comparison.
There’s a bunch of great 360 documentaries you can access through the Oculus. And so I’m listening to these other films, with their narrators talking in the middle of my head. Refugees, prisoners, teenagers, tour guides, educational voice-overs, presidents, all of them sound the same. Perfect. Crisp. Bright. Nuanced. These are voices that resonate in your head. Recorded by people who know exactly what they're doing.
But hang on...there is something that’s not quite right. Something that’s creating a disconnect between what I’m hearing and what I’m seeing. And at the moment, I can’t quite put my finger on what that thing is?
The social / political context
It’s worth noting that the build of the Winter Garden and indeed the production of the film covers a particularly tumultuous period in the life of this country. Pre-production began not long before the murder of Jo Cox in 2016 and the project began to wrap up around the time we were originally scheduled to leave the EU, March 29th2019.
Throughout this period, the impact of austerity and the toxic waters stirred up by Brexit were creating a nation more divided than ever. Hate crimes at an all time high. Social care marginalised and the welfare state under attack. So much negative energy.
It’s against this backdrop that the collaboration between Assemble and the residents of Granby takes place. Together they constructed a different narrative. Yes, the residents pushed back – but not in a destructive, hateful way. Instead they applied creativity, a DIY spirit and a willingness to welcome and embrace others. In its way, the Winter Garden is part of an on-going project that stands as an antidote to the fear-mongering and hateful rhetoric of our times.
The War On Story
“The storytelling that shapes our world view now is so male dominated it’s creating a singular world view that everyone sees but is not reflective of what the world actually is’. Jenn Duong. Immersive VR Director
Deciding to shoot this project in 360 was an easy decision to make. It’s a great way to reveal space and to capture an environment. But there were other reasons it felt right. Alongside VR, AR and Mixed Reality, 360 has an important role to play in what I call the war on story.
The stories a society tells itself so often reflect the worldview of those with the power and the money to influence those stories. Through movies, soap operas and advertising we passively soak up these narratives. They move us, entertain us and shape the way we think and feel. At the same time they work to reinforce the legitimacy of certain groups while marginalising and disempowering others.
Latterly, of course, fuelled by the internet, by social media and by a ‘connected global user base’, these reactionary narratives are under attack. There is a war on story – a desire to replace the tired ‘old truths’ we have been spoon fed for generations and replace them with new stories and different voices.
Of course if you want to stop hearing a particular story, it’s a good idea to disrupt the way it’s delivered as well. With the development of immersive technologies, such as 360, content creators are more able to escape the straight jacket of linear storytelling and explore new ways of putting the user at the heart of the experience.
With 360 filmmaking the ‘masterful gaze’ of the Director, is removed, the field of vision is opened out and the audience, in theory, can look wherever they want! This makes it much harder to force them down a narrative corridor. So there is a war on story here too – in the actual way a story is communicated.
I for one welcome the disruption. Story has become a kind of mantra that’s repeated again and again, as if without it we’re lost. And so often the pursuit of it pushes away other qualities that make an experience memorable. So for me the making of the Winter Garden, became an opportunity to explore qualities such as presence, emotional involvement and transparency and see how they play out in this new medium.
Presence
In her article Technologies of Seeing and Technologies of Corporeality, Mandy Rose observes how people experience a ‘documentary’ once they put on a headset. She refers to the quality of presence: “This feeling of being inside the events depicted in VR”.
She also notes that: “Along with presence there often follows an intense emotional involvement - the participant feels they are witnessing unmediated reality”
This heightened emotional state that comes with presence is not without dangers. Rose quotes the academic Kate Nash who looked at the ethics of mediated presence in her article “Virtual Reality Witness”. Nash observes that: “The simulated nature of the medium and the sense that presence produces of being involved in events rather than just observing them across space and time carries with it a risk of ‘improper distance”
For the filmmaker who wants the audience to ‘get it’ and connect with the meaning of a film, presence, and the heightened sense of proximity it creates, can become a fog that envelops the audience and dulls their ability to perceive what’s going on. In this instance the well trumpeted phrase ‘immersive media’ could have a double meaning: the threat of being submerged or drowning as well as the promise of unlimited horizons and unmediated reality.
For me, as the project developed, an intriguing question was how to avoid ‘improper distance’ so that the audience is able to maintain their objectivity and not get caught up in the ‘illusion’ of being there. With ‘The Winter Garden’ I would argue that there are a number of ‘creative interventions’ that enable us to retain our critical distance:
The most obvious of these ‘interventions’ are the voices of the residents. The flow of observations, anecdotes and insights demand our attention, encouraging us to connect intellectually with the core themes and not get lost in the streets and houses of Granby.
The second is the use of music. An important part of the soundscape, the music - composed by Jack Wyllie and Will Ward at 19 Sound - underpins the emotional core of the film but also works as a reminder that we are watching an authored film, not unmediated reality.
The third aspect is the films reluctance to dwell too long in a particular location. Certainly, as befits this type of film making, we linger in spaces more than we would if it was a flat 2D film. But we cut to different scenes quicker than other 360 films might do. Do these ‘cuts’ pull us out of the immersive ‘fog’ and help us maintain a critical distance? I think they do.
I also hope that this project gently and effectively explores ways we can untether ourselves from traditional storytelling and still create something that’s powerful, emotive and memorable. It’s an attempt to tell a new story. And, at the same time, do this in a way that is fresh and engaging.
360 and immersive media help us to tell stories differently. It’s vital that we use them to embrace new voices and new perspectives.
Not drowning but waving
Some friends have come over. We’ve just eaten and we’re now sitting in the front room, while most of the kids are in the back on the PlayStation. We talk about this and that and then I’m asked how are things and what have I been up to. I talk about the Granby film and I’m somewhat amazed that I haven’t in the last three years mentioned it to them. They’re interested. I take the opportunity to show them the film through the headset. It’s fascinating to watch them experience the world all around them – stepping back, turning around, talking us through what they’re seeing. Their reactions make me smile. It’s like they’re walking through a strange big house, at each turn they encounter something or somebody that’s slightly unexpected. They’re youngest has a go too. It’s lovely. He wants to touch everything and everyone. But he can’t see his hands. So he says hello and waves at them instead. From where I’m sitting I can hear the soundtrack.
And then I realise what might be working with the sound and the voices. My rubbish recordings may actually have helped to produce a better connection between the sound and the visuals. Because the voices are clearly not recorded in a studio there is an ambient quality to them that reflects the rooms and environments they were recoded in. There is a synergy going on between the pictures and the sound. Everything a professional sound recordist would aim to obliterate I failed to remove. The clinical perfection of the voice-overs I was hearing in those other films is gone. In its place are the voices of real people, recoded in the same rooms, the same shops and the same streets that I’m looking at in my headset. I don’t think this makes the experience more immersive because hearing voices in my head is thankfully still not a part of my everyday experience. But is does make the experience feel more real. More immediate.And this realisation helps me appreciate Hazel’s contribution too. Hearing her bold, confident assertions makes me feellike we’re tapping into some found recordings of this great thinker and orator. And it wouldn't have happened this way if I’d know what I was doing. It wasn't by design. It was just chance.
A garden space in the middle of a construction site
The charity Global Generation was founded in 2004. A response to a culture which elevates consumerism above everything and sees the earth as a mere commodity. In the face of these challenges, and perhaps counter intuitively, the charity put it’s faith in the creative potential of people living and working in the city.
Global Generation operates in boroughs that have some of the highest deprivation and crime statistics in the UK. It helps these communities become healthy and environmentally responsible. To the disenfranchised young people living in these areas it offers a way out- enabling them to develop the social, emotional and practical skills they will need to experience the world in a more connected way.
Businesses too are encouraged to engage with the communities they operate in. Young people learn from them and visa versa. A great deal of the Charities success is down to the way they bring these different groups together around the rhythms and patterns of nature. Gardens, for example, are designed and built on top of office buildings and in front of restaurants. This creates an income and is an opportunity for businesses to work alongside young people around a set of priorities that are different to the day - to - day needs of running a company.
A wonderful example of the charities philosophy is the Skip Garden in Kings Cross. Built in 2009, the garden is situated in the middle of an ever - changing construction site. As the site developed the garden was picked up and moved. Much of it is built from construction waste, with its development managed by a mix of volunteers, local young people and architecture students.
The garden has now become home to a series of activities that run throughout the year. These are a mix of environmental workshops and creative arts that make use of the abundant natural flora growing in the garden. Sourcing good food, cooking and eating together is central to the charities community building process. The delightful result of all this is the Skip Garden kitchen – a commercial café and events space. Together, the kitchen and garden are central to the charities vision.
At the Skip Garden hospitality training and the chance of employment are offered to local young people. So far over 150 local young people have participated in the Generator youth leadership programme run by the charity.
To tell the story of the Skip Garden in more human terms we spent time with three young people who are closely involved with the project.
How we made a film with the Turner Prize winners
We’ve just made a film with Assemble, the extraordinary collective of artists, designers and architects who won the 2015 Turner Prize.
The film looks at the developing relationship between Assemble, the residents of Granby Four Streets in Liverpool and the beautiful products coming out of the workshop they jointly run. Products you can buy from their website, I hasten to add.
The difficult thing was nailing the story. It was a bit like putting up a tent. You look at the instructions. You see what’s come out of the bag. And you realise it’s much bigger and more complex than you initially thought.
The story behind this years Turner Prize is one of ‘bloody minded’ residents and creative visionaries working together in the service of a community that’s been under siege for decades. In 1981, after years of overt racism and neglect, the patience of Toxteth had run out. The people rioted. Afterwards things got even worse. Wave after wave of urban planning seemed to have only one objective: demoralise the people, tear it all up and start all over again. (Ok, that’s three objectives but you get my drift). The thing is, the people who lived there didn’t want to start all over again. This was their home. Jump forward thirty-five years and the residents of Granby Four Streets are already turning things around. When Assemble arrive, the once beaten up, bullied and neglected neighbourhood has become the fabric they can work on together.
My journey started on a bright day in November a couple of weeks before the Turner Prize was announced. I was meeting Lewis Jones and Fran Edgerley of Assemble at their studio in Stratford to discus a film. Assemble wanted something that would focus on the workshop and get people excited by the products. And for good reason. Assemble are nothing if not altruistic and the money going into the workshop goes back into the community and the project.
Great stuff. Although I could see a problem. The Guardian quoted someone from Assemble saying they are “sort of architects, sort of not, sort of maybe”. I’m sure this is a reflection of their self-effacing approach to life and work. But if I wasn’t careful I’d be making a “sort of, sort of not, sort of maybe advert”. Assemble naturally shy away from anything that’s superficial or glossy. So do I. I loathe the advertising industry and the out-dated dinosaurs and concepts still lumbering around. Everything is about the big idea. In this world it’s easy for anything that’s real, authentic or genuinely insightful to be replaced by lazy stereotypes, beautiful cinematography and phoney emotional moments.
Personally I believe what makes a film great is its story. And to truly believe and trust that story it needs to be based on real experiences and real insights. People and places you can recognise, identify with and like. Otherwise it becomes just another advert selling just another lie. In contrast I want to deliver something that’s timely, relevant and authentic.
Six days later and I’m in Liverpool to do some research. I’m having a breakfast meet with Fran before she walks me round the neighbourhood. We talk about the film. We agree that, although it’s about the workshop, the heart of it should be the people who work there and the residents who’ve been its inspiration throughout. Maybe it is an advert. Maybe it’s not. But it’s a film with a great back-story — ‘stubborn and audacious’ residents imbued with a spirit of making, who chose creativity as their weapon of choice.
Afterwards Fran shows me the workshop and introduces me to some key people in the community. All of them are happy to talk and welcome me into their homes. They tell me how they fought back against the insidious attempts to nudge them out. They planted gardens in the pavement. They painted murals. They campaigned. They reclaimed their streets and ushered in Assemble, who immediately ‘got them’ and worked with them as partners to refurbish the homes.
Despite all this I was struggling to construct an elegant visual ‘fit’ between the workshop and the community. And then finally I met Eleanor, a razor sharp woman with a great sense of humour, who’s lived in Granby since the mid 70s. Eleanor talked about the workshop in a way that reminded me of something I’d read previously. In the early days you could walk into the workshop — a converted newsagents by the way — and upstairs there would be artists creating beautiful herringbone fabrics while downstairs Assemble and the residents would pass around the biscuits, talk, laugh and share ideas. The workshop had become a social and creative hub.
And for me this is what the film became. A film about people. About hopes and dreams. About strength and determination. About making. About creativity. And the DIY spirit which Assemble recognised and loved and which is now continuing with the workshop. This space, once a functional necessity — making the tables, chairs, fireplaces, door knobs and lampshades that replaced the ones stripped out from the homes — is now one of the most vibrant legacies of their relationship. Based on designs generated by Assemble it employs local artists, trains young residents and produces things that are delightful and useful.
What I hope the film shows is that Assemble and the people of Granby are re-imagining what a neighbourhood can look like. The 15 or so members who make up the collective are brilliant ideas people who, amongst other things, love to collaborate with communities. They turn cities into more human, inspiring and enjoyable places to live.
The film’s perhaps longer than my friends at Assemble wanted. But it’s a film that’s enriched by the experiences and anecdotes of real people. Their history. Their story. And hopefully a happy ending which has grown out of so much hardship.
To see and buy the beautiful, handmade products made at the workshop please do visit the website. www.GranbyWorkshop.com