Map of locations of the film crew.
Our film crew early in the morning of the blowdown day.
Camera gear is packed, batteries are charged.
Danger! Keep out!
Norfolk Court Blowdown
The Norfolk Court Blowdown is a new film produced and directed by WAVEparticle.
On Sunday 8th May 2016 the blowdown of the last towerblock in Laurieston was filmed by an extended WAVEparticle team from thirty-two positions; both circling the tower block and from co-ordinated points all over the city of Glasgow. The extensive film crew, including people from the local community, captured the collapse of this forty-three year old, twenty four storey building, which took four years to build and was demolished in just over four seconds.
The result is an extraordinary bank of footage that bears witness to the multiple perspectives from which the building, until recently, dominated horizons. Twelve of the cameras were positioned at equal distances around the demolition site perimeter. This allowed an examination of the demolition that will be edited to create an effect akin to bullet-time, capturing, for the first time anywhere in the world, an animation of a demolition where the viewpoint rotates around the building as it collapses.
The footage also includes a camera on a drone, offering a hovering scopic eye from a one hundred metre aerial perspective, three super-slow motion cameras, that stretch the four seconds into forty and a portentous shot from one mile away that frames the demolition from the viewpoint of the Necropolis Cemetery in the East of the City.
The WAVEparticle team are now working towards a film edit which will exist both as a single screen work for cinematic/network distribution and also as a unique 16 screen installation which will be shown adjacent to the site of the Norfolk Court demolition itself.
We are seeking to build a narration that includes reflection from the local community with the aim that the film revisits the event of the demolition from multiple perspectives as a means to open up space and time to reflect on the significant changes in the area over the last years.
If you would like to contribute or want to know more about this work, please contact us on info.at.wave@gmail.com.
This work is part of Art & Living: Laurieston, the art strategy for the Laurieston area developed by WAVEparticle in partnership with New Gorbals Housing Association and Urban Union.
