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Interview with Morph by Ollie Brooke

Grant Muir aka Morph is among the heavy weights in the VJ world, having worked with pretty much every major act and DJ to grace Australian shores and numerous trans-global tours under his belt. As far as VJing goes Morph takes the whole thing quite seriously, not content with just being a player he is currently spearheading the development of OpenTZT, a VJ application. Yet the VJ is often a somewhat misunderstood or unknown quantity when it comes to club culture. With that in mind Ollie Brooke decided to get some background on the art and Morph, kindly, agreed to help him on his quest...

VJing - in a nutshell can you describe exactly what it is that you, or VJs in general, actually do, beyond the technical side and more into the creative elements you bring to a show through your art?
Working with the Promoter and the Artist/DJs, VJ's  bridge the  visual gap that is present @ alot of elecronic music events. However VJing has developed well beyond that to basically entail many aspects of visual accompaniment to music.

Many more people would be familiar with DJs at clubs and how the whole thing works – the DJ feeding energy through music into the crowd who feed it back through dancing and the cycle escalates (in the case of a good DJ) into a damn good time. With VJing there seems to be little feedback from the crowd to the VJ, how do you get your kicks as a VJ, what is it that drives you to do it and be as good as you can, are there any parallels you could draw with the DJ side of things ?

Often you do actually get feedback in comments and appreciation from the crowd, so that element is not entirely lacking.  Although I guess as a VJ (and also a big music fan myself) a feeling of satisfaction and also elevation comes along with presenting something that you FEEL is working perfectly with the music, vibe and space. Being in that zome brings you together with the DJ and the crowd.

A VJ's role could be said to be making up for the lack of a visual performance by a DJ, not being a band there is little to entertain apart from the music, how does this description sit with you?

Its relatively accurate for a certain club style environment, although when a DJ or Band already does have a visual element to their performance visuals can highlight those things (in the case of scratch DJs for example), or compliment the image the band portray such as a performance I did a while back with industrial outfit KMFDM.

DJing is often about a journey, as is VJing according to your bio, but also you mention that your sets vary depending on the type of DJ – what is your preferred style of VJing, the quick short sharp stuff or the long builders?

Thats like saying what Sex is better? Quickies or All nighters.... THEY ARE ALL GREAT ;)
Each has its own positive points with Short shows forcing you to really concentrate your content and come on strong from the very start, where as long building sets give you a chance to gather momentum over time and really explore the connection your creating between sound and image.

With the availability of software like Resolume and your own software project OpenTZT the technology that was once prohibitively expensive to all but dedicated enthusiasts is now available to the masses, much like with music production software. This is a double edged sword in that it will surely increase the number of VJs out there and thus the exposure of the art but could also bring down the overall quality of the scene. With visuals it is harder for the untrained eye to sort the wheat from the chaff, what are your thoughts on this development?

Hmmm interesting point, to be honest there is always going to be some substandard stuff out there. I guess it comes down to beauty being in the eye of the beholder (or beer holder in many cases), so often what is considered perfect by one person can be anothers idea of complete rubbish. That said new VJs could do alot worse than teaming up with existing names in the scene to find their feet (especially technically, which is where I see alot of let downs).

OpenTZT is a fairly big undertaking – is this something you're developing because you see a niche in the market or is it more of a tool that will afford you what you need to be the best you can?

Well OpenTZT started life as a VJ app called TransZendanT by a Japanese developer by the name of Triplet, I discovered it was really an untapped (atleast in the west) application compared to the more well known VJ apps. When Tripet decided he wanted to discontinue developement I co-ordinated a project to buy and Open source the codebase.
Developement is driven by the users and is more of a case of for VJs by VJs so all functionality, features, etc are driven by users, myself included, so it gives me the chance to be closely involved in the actual developement of the tool to produce what I need for an event.

Can you talk us through the software – it's strengths and how it compares with the likes of Resolume or any other competing systems?

Well for starters I see  its greatest strength is thats its Open Source, so we can benefit from ideas and contributions from all over the world. Also we try to keep the UI nice and simple, when your performing you have to be able to look @ the sceen and change/access exactly what you want without fiddling around. We also make sure everything is accessible with Mouse, Keyboard & Midi so you can chose your own performance tools, and we keep all our Key-combos grouped functionality wise so they are nice and easy to remember. Its very much focused on being a performance application in a live sense.

The internet has in recent times played a major role in the development of the music industry with the advent of MP3 stores, what has the internet done for VJing and how will it affect it in the future?

The internet in the early days allowed for communication between VJs all over the world, which was pretty amazing as lots of ppl thought "I'm the only person doing this" but with things like the Eyecandy list ppl were able to reach out and contact other VJs worldwide and swap ideas and support. More recently with broadband internet it has allowed more actual content/material sharing.

With VJing most of what we see seems to be projections or screens that are 2 dimensional images - how far off do you think it is before VJ migrates from 2D to 3D though use of holographic projections or lasers or even split projections and screens?

I think there will always be 2d works around, just like sculpture never replaced painting. That said many ppl are experimenting in 3d projection and holography (eg. the gorillaz @ MTV music awards) but I feel it will be a long time before these things reach the mainstream. Projection onto 3d sculptured screens or 3d constructions of LED panels etc are currently more viable and I have had the good luck to work with that sort of thing on the odd occation and I'm always happy to work with a promoter that wants "something a bit different" from the normal fastfold screen setup.

What other avenues do you pursue as a VJ, what tricks have you picked up over the years that give you your edge?

Now that would be giving away trade secrets ;) Mainly I just try to keep it fresh, always try to keep the connection to the music to the fore of the mix. I also dabble in other areas such as music video production and experimental stuff to keep the creative juices flowing. Finally loving what you do is essential, being passionate about visuals, when you stop enjoying it, its time to move on.

To up and coming VJs or wannabes what advice would you give, in an attempt to try and keep the quality levels up?

Firstly I guess is to realize there are others out there that have been doing it alot longer than you so don't go pronouncing yourself as the Ducks Nuts the minute you get your first gig out of your bedroom. One of the best ways to learn the ropes is to apprentice yourself to an existing VJ. That way you will not only learn the technical aspects of setting up a gig but also the relationships involved. Also co-operation between VJs rather than undercutting and backbiting helps us all in the long run rather than devalueing or work so networking with other VJs is essential.

And finally, your favourite gig of all time and your ultimate gig of all time (one you haven't done but would love to do even if it's hypothetical)

Favourite gig of all time.... wow thats to hard to pick, Field day is always fun, Future music festival last year was also amazing, but for colaboration with other VJs Gatecrasher Summer Sound System in '01 (I think it was :P ) was awesome, 8-9 of australias best VJ crews tag teaming over half a dozen stages with one of the best international line-up australia has ever seen. On a personal note VJing for Public Enemy on their last australian tour and getting to perform on stage with the band and hang out with Chuck and Flav after the show was pretty amazing.
Ultimate gig..... now thats something I can barely speculate on with each year being bigger than the last. This year I'm off to Asia and back to Europe again so who knows who I will have the pleasure of working with. That said if Easy E can back from the dead to do a performance with the original lineup of NWA, that would complete my old skool rap set (Public Enemy, Naughty by Nature, De La Soul, Ice T)

Thirsty for more?

Morph's website

Some VJ Show Reels by Morph

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