Posts Tagged With: Doctor Who

The Doctor Who Experience

Posted on February 25, 2012 by Mark

It’s amazing that The Vibes is nearly one year old, and yet you’ve all been spared one of my great obsessions. I just got back from London, where Panos and I went to The Doctor Who Experience, part thrill-ride, part exhibition. It’s the nearest you can get to actually being in the fifty-year-old BBC sic-fi show. For those of you who aren’t familiar with the world of the Tardis, Doctor Who is the perfect story: an infinite format which can be applied to just about anything that’s happened, and everything that hasn’t. It’s all about an alien with a stolen time/spacecraft, roaming the universe in search of trouble, saving lives and planets and fighting evil.

This is a short film of our trip to space, which includes a remix of Delia Derbyshire’s ground-breaking electronic theme, which is widely regarded as the earliest example of techno. She recorded it in 1962. Read it and weep, Detroit.

Watch in high definition and full screen…

“All of time and space; everywhere and anywhere; every star that ever was. Where do you want to start?” as the Doctor says to his companion. When it comes to travel, he’s universally free range. The sheer scope of this format means that the show keeps regenerating, much like the Time Lord himself. It never gets boring and big hitters like Steven Spielberg and Peter Jackson are eyeing the film rights as the Doctor’s profile continues to grow. For the madman with a box, this is going to be a great year. There, that was painless, wasn’t it?

Mark and the Tardis

Tardis Console side view

Panos in the Tardis

Tardis console closeup

80s Tardis

Sash of Rassilon

Mark on the Tardis Set

Mark and the Giant Robot

Freezer Counter

Wooden King

Mark and the Dalek

Junk Tardis

Davros

1960s Dalek

Dalek

Zygon

Daleks through the ages

Sontaran

The Tardis Console

Mark and the Cyberman

The Time Rotor

Mark and Panos in the Tardis

The remix from the video can be listened to here,

Or download here (right click)

I decided to remix Delia Derbyshire’s iconic and pioneering version of the Doctor Who theme to get me out of copyright wrangles when I posted the above video on YouTube. I took three samples, a ‘seething’ sound which was a kind of slithering hiss, the Tardis wheezing and a single bass note, which sounds a bit like a drum. It turned into an epic project and I stalled halfway through. Rather than go insane, I re-recorded the complete half of the track in reverse, and stuck it on the end of the first half, effectively doubling the length of the track and making it sound like I’d done twice the work. George Martin would love me. Delia, however would probably not join me on the dance floor as I threw shapes to the funked up version of her tune. And rightly so: her thundering realisation of Ron Grainer’s theme was the very first example of electronic dance music and about 20 years ahead of it’s time. It’s definitive and unique. No other piece of music has sounded like it before or since, and like a siren it excites and unsettles. It’s interesting to note that this version has never been successfully improved upon, in 50 years of Doctor Who.

Other Doctor Who posts: Art Deco Dalek, Doctor WhoTube and Who Tune Remixed

Categories: Music, Photography, Travel, Vibe Monitor, Video | Tags: 2012, Cybermen, Daleks, Delia Derbyshire, Doctor Who, Dr Who, Exhibition, London, Music, photography, random, Sci-fi, Tardis, Television, The Doctor Who Experience, Travel | 22 Comments

Check out my Vibe-O-scope: Video Curios

Posted on November 16, 2011 by Mark

$kaleidoscope fractal$

This is my slightly random video chart of great tunes and freaky videos. See Grace Jones stretched into something very alien or just groove with Blondie. From Lemon Jelly’s demonic kaleidoscope to Goldfrapp’s bizarre animations, it’s a trip.

Click here to see the Vibe-O-scope.

Categories: Music, Vibe Monitor, Video | Tags: animation, Blondie, Doctor Who, fractals, Goldfrapp, Grace Jones, kaleidoscope, Lemon Jelly, Music, music video, Tardis, The Avalanches, The Found Sound Orchestra | Leave a comment

Art From Mark – Fun With Photoshop

Posted on November 7, 2011 by Mark

This is a digital painting I did based on a very dull photograph of a little flower shop in Manchester’s Northern Quarter. To see how the picture was transformed, check out the original here.

This was my first attempt at a magazine cover, which was an assignment for OutNorthWest Magazine in Manchester. My brief was to provide a bright, uplifting image to inspire people and increase readership. I went for warm summer colours and a radiant, aspirational character, based on a photograph of a real person. Part of my inspiration was the Hed Kandi CD covers, and I think I managed to inject some pop culture into the image, because circulation spiked immediately: it was the most successful issue to date. Inset is the printed cover. I’ll be posting more magazine covers soon, but first:

Regular readers may recognise this image from my blog header. It’s Sparky, my ginger cat taken from a photograph of him singing. He was more than likely yawning, but singing sounds better. The original image can be seen in a forthcoming post about this handsome ginger tom in December.

There was some speculation a few years ago that the Daleks would be redesigned in the style of the 1920s. Noticing that the original Dalek already had a bit of a retro-industrial look to it, I designed the Art Deco Dalek, just for fun. Using an original 1960s movie Dalek as a base, I incorporated elements from chrome radios, toasters and glass valves – thank Buddha for Google Images.

This is my psychedelic CD cover for a compilation I did for friends called Far Out. It shows a Ganesh-type figure holding a Sonic Screwdriver (from Doctor Who,) a Mars Bar and an iPhone. I’ve noticed a have a radial style to a lot of my artwork, and rather than admit to being repetitive, I’m embracing it as my unique signature.

This is Panos, taken from a photograph and processed in the same style as the magazine cover above.

My friend Nikie wanted to raise her profile, so I designed this poster for her, using elements from her well-establshed barber shop in Manchester.

Here is another friend of mine, recreated in Photoshop.

This was made as part of a series of still images for an animation which I included in a Goldfrapp video. You can see the eye blinking here in the Goldfrapp Live! video.

And finally, my friends got married and as a big surprise, I did a huge ‘Gilbert and George’-style canvas which I gave them to blast away any nerves just before the ceremony. The canvas now hangs in pride of place in their hallway, and creates quite a stir for new guests as they come through the door.