The art of collaboration

Photographer Tim Platt had already created the time-lapse imagery of flowers for his upcoming show Botanical Opticals at The Crypt Gallery, in Norwich, as well as an app to process it.

Then a chance meeting with Benedict Braund, of Global Overground, an audio-visual installation creative, added an extra level of innovation to what was already on track to be a notable exhibition.

‘Strangely enough I met Benedict, in Benedict Street in Norwich!’ says Tim Platt. ‘I was distributing flyers to promote my relaxion iOS app called Moodlapse. Walking past a pub, I spotted Benedict wearing a t-shirt advertising his company Global Overground’s cinema screen hire.’

‘I knew that I needed to look into screen tech for my Botanical Opticals show so I stopped to ask him about it. I talked to him about my app and he downloaded and called me the following morning to say he’d love to collaborate on the show.’

‘It turned out to be a very serendipitous meeting!’ says Tim, an acclaimed photographer who has recently explored new creative directions and developed a body of personal time-lapse video which will feature in the exhibition.

The result of the creative teamwork is an immersive multi-media art show which uses cutting-edge technology to create a spectacular show. It uses light projection, music, video and photography to explore the secret world of flowers as they grow and bloom.

According to Tim the exhibition will be ‘Very much the same, but quite different!’ as a result of the collaboration. ‘I will still be showing a series of large static images as framed exhibition prints but the audio-visual content enhances the imagery, intensely.’

‘With the use of his immersive tech I will really be able to further deliver the thought process and approach to my works. Ben says he's taking my vision and displaying it for all to immerse themselves in and interact with.

Working as a collaboration has huge benefits. ‘Ben has raised the game a great deal. I have created the video content and a dedicated app to process it, but he will bring it to life with a combination of cutting-edge projection mapping techniques and the use of 3D spatial audio which will travel around the gallery space via multiple speakers for a truly immersive effect.’

Ben, who runs Global Overground with his business partner James Bradley, has a background in the music industry as a highly experienced sound engineer. He will remaster the music Tim has commissioned for the show using state of the art Dolby Atmos™ technology to create the spatial effects. James is also involved in the project, in particular the private view launch for the event.

Ben who has enjoyed national chart success with the track Rocket, championed by Pete Tong, Thomas Bangalter (Daft Punk) & Fatboy Slim, as one half of the band Braund Reyn-olds, had recently moved to Norwich.

He is also known for his score for Playstation’s Central Station, collaborations with leading music artists including Stereo MCs and a performance alongside Adamski at The Saatchi gallery’s Sweet Harmony:Rave an immersive exhibition about rave cul-ture.

‘I realised very quickly that Ben has had a great deal of experience from corporate product launches for the likes of Playstation to touring his chart-hitting, Virgin-signed band 'Braund Reynolds'. He is at heart an artist but knows his technology inside out,’ says Tim.

Tim still runs his own photography studio in London and has 25 years of experience delivering international advertising campaigns for blue-chip companies such as Unilever, P&G and Samsung.

He has lived in Norwich for 15 years and developed his personal body of time-lapse work from a small studio in his garden while his London studio was closed during lockdown.

The Botanical Opticals exhibition will feature large prints of kaleidoscopic abstract patterns created from photographs of flowers as they bloom, a high-resolution video installation and immersive, ambient soundscapes.

‘Combined with time-lapse videos of flowers and ambient soundscapes, the 3D pro-jection-mapping digital technology will create an immersive multi-sensory real-world experience,’ says Tim.

‘It will connect with adults and children alike in a fun, new and immersive way and we’re excited to bring it to Norwich.’

‘Ben understands the dynamic nature of “putting on a show” and it is his grasp of the technical complexities demanded by both sound and vision, combined with a flair for old fashioned stage-craft that gives him a unique skillset,’ says Tim,

‘A polymathic skill-set that seems to run in his family: His grandfather, Allin Braund exhibited his fibreglass sculptures, which was a cutting-edge technology in 1954, on the British Pavillion at the Venice Biennale with Moore, Freud, Paolozzi & Bacon,’ says Tim.

Botanical Opticals will be held in The Crypt Gallery, Norwich, 1 -15 October 2021. Free entry, open 10.30am to 4pm, closed on Sundays and Mondays. The exhibition prints will be for sale and unique to the show, although Tim’s prints are also available via his new online shop at Tim Platt Fine Art and MOODLAPSE can be found on the App Store.

The benefits of collaborating with an artist who works in a different medium…

• Collaboration leads to innovation and ideas. Working as a team can lead to innovation and extraordinary creativity – especially when you collaborate with an artist who works in another medium such as audio-visual. When the chemistry is right, ideas spark and new artistic possibilities open up. ‘We can offer much more as a team than either of us could offer individually,’ says Tim.

• Take your work to a new level. Build the right collaborative team and it can enhance your own creative output. The botanical time-lapse content and the app that Tim developed to create the kaleidoscopic effects represent many hundreds of hours of development. Ben is now taking these to a whole new level of presentation.

• Audio-visual possibilities. Consider adding an audio-visual element to your show. ‘It’s where art and ideas fuse with the most contemporary technologies to create immersive and kinetic sensory experiences. As the technology evolves, it enables the art and the ideas to evolve with it. The only limit is imagination combined with a technical grasp and an understanding of what is possible. A good analogy might be that of the architect and the builder - you can design anything but will it stand up?’ says Tim.

• Motivation and deadlines. Working with others may mean you will need to set deadlines and have other artists depending on you completing work before the project can move forward to completion. If you love this kind of incentive when you’re working on a project, a collaboration may be ideal for you.

• A shared project. Commissioning and collaborating with others will share out responsibility and workload. It can also reduce the solitude of working alone on a project.

• Expand your network. A collaboration will ensure more people hear about your show and visit because you are tapping into and expanding each of your existing networks. The joint potential reach of your show is greater than if you were working alone. A collaboration means the individual artists involved can help raise awareness of each other and the event through their respective social and digital networks.