Glitches, databending, and understanding codecs and file formats.
For one of my classes during my studies in BS Digital Arts and Design, I was assigned a project that involved creating an experimental video. We were also given the task to explain why we chose the project that we did. My experimental video was a glitch video.
I grew up on videos, VCRs, digital video formats, etc, and even made my own videos on my parents computer as a teenager. What I learned was not only the use of digital formats and their importance in today’s society, but also the fact that videos use different file formats, such as AVI, MP4, etc. While I understood that different file formats served different purposes, I never quite fully understood what was going on “under the hood” so to speak when it comes to file formats and video players. Why is it that some video players can play some videos but not others? Why is bitrate so important? Why do videos lose quality when transferring them to other mediums like high quality DvDs as opposed to low quality CDs? These are questions that most video editing professionals know the “end result” answer to, such as “bitrate is important because people have slow internet” or “crappy CDs play back video at a crap quality because, well, it’s a crappy CD you picked up from Wal-Mart for a dollar per 100″ - but, nobody ever quite knows the technical reason.
Interestingly enough, in a previous class, I was introduced to something called datamoshing. I played around with this effect to get sort of a glitched effect for a previous project, and so for my experimental video, I explored this even further. I came across an artist named Nick Briz, whose portfolio you can find here:
For my experimental video, the only part of Nick’s portfolio I really explored was the glitch codec tutorial, which was a tutorial on how to glitch videos. His process is very different than datamoshing, but still results in some very interesting effects. The reason why I chose to utilize this glitch codec tutorial for my experimental video is because it involved cracking open codec files, messing with the algorithms and data contained within, then viewing the videos on different players, such as Windows Media Player vs VLC. Even though it was the same glitched video, different players would play them differently, and I would get different results - which taught me quite a bit about how different video players handle videos differently.
Overall, I learned quite a bit about video formats, players and codecs from the experimental video. I also learned that Nick Briz does a lot more than just glitch codec tutorials - he does quite a bit actually, and even teaches his methods, philosophies and thoughts on technology and the use thereof online and in front of audiences.
It is this person who I’ve decided to do my research on - to learn why he chose the path he did, to see what I can learn from him, and to understand how he thinks - because quite honestly, his stuff is very interesting, and a tech savvy person like me can learn a thing or two by breaking stuff. To me, breaking videos and files and observing the results is sort of like smashing a clock to see what makes it tick, then seeing what happens if I put it back together incorrectly.
If you want to see the experimental video I mentioned, here is a link to it:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HPzRLffd5Ew
