From Remix to Transmedia via Self Sampling

So much of the discourse about remix relates to the sampling of other people’s material, that the idea of applying remix to your own work becomes lost. However within remix culture, there exists a sub-genre known as self sampling (also referred to as self-appropriation and self-copying). It is a methodology by which practitioners remix their own work, investigating in an iterative fashion material from any point in their career, and transmute it into new forms. By using self-sampling you can sidestep contentious issues of copyright infringement. 

Self-sampling is such a useful way of working, because it gives you a chance to improve on ideas that maybe didn’t work the first time around, and re-do them in new ways. You can apply it to a multitude of separate ideas, that individually wouldn’t be strong enough to stand alone; and by bringing them under the umbrella of one project via remix, create something where the whole is greater than the sum of its parts. It’s a way of realising the creative potential inherent in any idea, no matter how old or intially unworkable.

Still from remixed Travelogue-styled motion graphic. © copyright Zak Waipara.

So how could this work in my Masters project, when applying self-sampling to transmedia? As in my previous Honours project, self sampled material forms the jumping-off point from which to choose the various forms the story might take. Storytelling is then divided amongst those forms, with each form providing different strengths and avenues. Various iterations of my personal projects have already undergone this kind of treatment, when I was re-training in the field of digital design. Now I am applying this logic to a new comic project. For example, the following comic page came about through imagining how I would treat a particular scene, if it were an animation rather than a flat page of artwork.

A work-in-progress comic page. © copyright Zak Waipara.

Initially I had planned to open the scene on just the bird’s eye shot, looking down on the landscape. Thinking about it as an animation instead seemed to suggest a camera swooping low over the sea, toward an island growing steadily closer. The final layout is a combination of the two ideas and makes for a more interesting composition overall. If we enlarge on this idea across multiple platforms, it actually requires a different way of thinking, especially if you are planning a transmedia approach from the start rather than just adapting an existing work. Preparation is key... 

When working in the opposite direction, from static images to motion design, information inherent in the static picture will suggest what techniques and camera moves to use, and what changes to make in adapting one to the other. This may involve creating new artwork to supplement the existing art. Working in divergent media actually creates different perspectives, and that can result in art and story choices that you may not have intially considered, if you weren’t applying transmedia techniques.