Manual revisited; 'How to find things'

Earlier this year I made four video's for some parts of the great series written by Dave Bonta; Manual.
It was time for a revisit and a new addition.

How to find things
Stop searching. Only pre-existing itches should be scratched.
Pull the petals from a daisy, then use tweezers to remove the yellow florets in its eye.
This is the way to perfect your own seeing.
Court sleep as if it were a lover.
When you dream of being chased, stop fleeing—let yourself be caught, killed and dismembered.
Your dreams will be so much better with a new protagonist!
Call your own phone number and say, Who's this?
Have a notary's signature tattooed above your genitals.
If you're claustrophobic, team up with an agorophobic and make love from a safe distance.
(Love-making is dangerous: you can discover too many things at once.)
However quickly you're going, go faster still.
Give each of your possessions a pet name and a safe word.
Work.
Do somebody else's bidding for 50 years.
Vacate.
Watch a log burning in a fireplace on cable TV.
If you want to find God, sin flagrantly to invite divine retribution.
If you want to follow your gut, you must first acquire a gut.
Close your mind and open your mouth to every sweetness.
You are a child of the universe.
Stuff yourself until you resemble a minor asteriod.
Each borborygmus is a message from the other world.

My inspiration and images for this video all came from 'Ephemeral Rift'
He's a very inspirational guy who makes video's to induce ASMR.
Check him out if you are into that or would like to learn about 'the tinglesmiths'.

I like his video's 'cause he's not only paying attention to the ASMR-sounds but has a great visual touch. I wondered if his images would stand out without the sounds they're made for, and they do.

I re-edited a few of his video's to a combination of 2 tracks I made earlier and added Dave's reading of the text.

The result works quiet well and fits the earlier 'Manual-video's' I made in atmopshere, spirit and imagery perfectly.
So here it is

Manual: How to find things

Words & voice: Dave Bonta
Camera & inspiration: Ephemeral Rift
Concept, editing, music: Swoon

Top Five Men of the Cities

Some of you might know by now that Qarrtsiluni is a great place to discover great poetry and good readings. As it is I have made several videopoems already using that source.

The next one comes from their series 'Fragments',  this time I picked out:

Top Five Men of the Cities

I
His tight nylon jacket
zipped to the neck, sheathing
the hues of his tautness
from the world—the
sandaled blond feet
and shaggy mane—
the only invitations to
join him at the gallery.
II
For soccer, he waits
with friends and beer,
straight from work,
the pub chair matching
pound for hard pound
the pressure of his weight,
clad in the perfect ratio
of dress-cloth gabardine
to bracing athletic flesh.

III
The glisten of his flushed skin
caught by the light
of the single, naked bulb,
his eyes as dark as
nothingness,
his lips trembling
with unintelligible
whispers, his native tongue
dangling as on a string.
IV
Towering tree of a boy,
apologizing in hard “R”
English—so
softly, gently—
for the lateness of
the food, and
secretly, the inaccessibility
of his heart.
V

His unwashed hair,
alluring beneath the woolen
workman’s cap, like
a revolutionary in tribute
to his forebears,
a ceramic doll in tribute
to the wretched
and unbathed
of the cities of the plain.

The poem and the reading are by Brad Fairchild.
From Qartsiluni: "Brad Fairchild is an artist and writer living in Atlanta who wants to point out the lonely beauty in broken things. He wants to pay tribute to these inanimate souls by rendering them into something new and accessible to others. He is descended from a pirate, and that is somehow fitting."

I wanted a soft, ghostlike atmosphere for the images and the soundscape.
Layers of slow moving shades, images of hands, eyes,... a constant flow of appearing and disappearing figures and shapes. (Credit to Ephemeral Rift for the use of his face!)

Starting out with this track:



I ended up with this piece:


Words and Voice: Brad Fairchild
Concept, Camera, Treats, Editing & Music: Swoon