russell

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make your own map at: www.modmyprofile.comEducated at the University of Wales with a Bachelors degree in Electronics. A DJ through school and working in a cabaret club doing the lights in his spare time he switched to the laser industry through a connection with a former college buddy who was now designing lasers for clubs and wanted someone who talked the club languageRussell Edwards aka "the Limey" began his VJ-ing career after flying to Switzerland to fix a dead laser (at the time he was still juggling 2 careers as a DJ and a Lighting Engineer). Seeing the projected wild imagery for the club in St Galen being created with the now legendary Fairlight CVI console, it convinced him that this art form was also to be part of his growing repertoire of talents and found good use of it within the next 2 years as the house music scene exploded in the UK.Returning to England and getting a residency and one of London’s newest clubs he was able to convince the cash rich owners to invest in the fairlight along with broadcast quality video mixers and 2 color cameras as well as 2 massive video walls and 40 large TV sets At the time he recalls “ it was the biggest installation of its kind on the UK and at times overwhelming given the complexity of this, the lasers and lights”. About this time house music was on the rise and it seemed natural to do visuals to the beat of the music especially in this first generation MTV age when every band had a video and yet house music, mostly being produced by a couple of guys in a studio ,did not.Moving on from there he started his involvement with the burgeoning rave scene doing visuals for these events along with dj's who are now household names.By the early nineties, tired of the scene he moved to Florida to start a consulting company, but a bad deal with a partner resulted in the company going belly up, which led to the move to Toronto.By this time visuals were starting to become big in Nth America and with the docks set to open its doors he was lucky to be in the right place at the right time. “I met the then soon to be owners of the docks 2 weeks after I arrived , 2 months later and I was designing everything from the dj booth to lighting booth to helping with bar designs and of course the lighting design and video systems.”The first system at the docks was basic too say the least 3 barco crt projectors and 3 draper screens a vhs deck and a color camera and a 4 way switcher.Gradually they increased the budget every year to incorporate more equipment and by heavy use of his home computer and video camera and vhs. editing he managed to pull off shows but not in real-time, unfortunately everything at that time had to be prerecorded.Not so any more, since the docks has been open the equipment list has grown staggeringly.Today with the 2 DVDJ X1’s the brash console his PC , 3 cameras and the new Arkaos 3.5 Midi running on his Mac powerbook with an M audio ozone as a controller. And all mixed down through 2 videonics mx pro mixers He is able to manipulate anything he wants at will.I still create DVD’s usually from original footage or occasionally something small , maybe a ½ second clip in a movie or a music video will catch my eye and I think , wow that would make a great video loop. So with my own footage available to scratch on the x1’s my slides and banners available the PC, the 3d world of the brash and the hands on loops of my arkaos I really am in heavenWith performance credits that read like a who’s who of the DJ world Russell has performed visuals for the likes of Danny Tenaglia, Chus & Ceballos, cevin Fisher DJ Vibe, Tiesto, Carl Cox, Paul okenfold, DJ Sneak, DJ Dan, Bad Boy Bill, D Fuse, Armand Van helden, Eric Morillo, Tall Paul, Crystal Method, Roger Sanchez, Mark farina, David Morales, Richie Hawtin, Eddie Halliwell and Fatboy Slim to name but a fewHe has also produced visuals for corporate clients such as Benson and Hedges, GM, Ford, Mazda, Labatt, Bacardi, Smirnoff and various others Inspiration comes from watching and observing from Television to Films. To life out in the street. I always have my digital camera with me as I find anything interesting or humorous I take ideas from there. Secondly, what inspires me is the challenge of seeing a visual effect or image and thinking up a way of creating that look but with my personality on it My work has over the years into more complex visual plays and away from the repetitive fractals and computer animation of yesterdayCombining his wealth of experience in the areas of the club industry his comprehensive understanding of new technologies and his desire to push conventions, Russell is constantly evolving and developing his ability to visualize and create innovative concepts"So I go in, I shoot the people in the club, and then play back the best of it at the next event, then I may combine this with colorized soft porn layered with the infamous squirrel eating a nut (crack addict) mix them all up and hype them all up and up and up as much as possible, and that's what gets me excited and passionate about VJing. You know: if a famous DJ can take them so high, then I can add that little extra bit where you've gotta scrape them off the ceiling!" I have done my job.The creative possibilities that the Pioneer DVJs open up are astonishing. At first glance you think, 'Oh, yeah, I can scratch music videos’, But once you start approaching the DVJs the way you would, say, a pair of CDJs, once you start looping and layering, once you've got yourself out of the mindset of playing beat matched music videos back to back, its like your decks explode with new directions.". “Sometimes it’s really nerve-racking,” admits Russell. “When you’re in front of 5,000 people and you’re about to push this one button, there’s that initial rush in case it doesn’t work. But it works. And after that, it’s the most fun you could have.”Video scratching, says Russell, is “a really cool performance tool that’s all about motion. Your clips mostly have either very pronounced character actions or horizontal, action-based motion. Then you manipulate and cut just like you’d do with a record, pitching them to line up with the music.” For a VJ I Think the artistry comes from a collage of talents. “I wear several hats,” he says., shoot and edit video, create original content, do remixes, direct shows and perform live Even after it’s crafted, however, a Russell show is a fluid thing. “A VJ has to deal with issues of timing and spontaneity that directors of music videos don’t have to consider.We are getting to a point where the music is enhanced by the images....does it make the stimulus of the performance more enriching, There are so many factors at play in getting the vibe right, vision mixing is about traveling with a certain idea during the trax, being able to change the atmosphere as the trax moves on and working the lighting and laser operators so the environment is entertaining for the clubber. But in general the audience rarely remembers the visuals, they only remember the over stimulus of the night.... especially if the images are abstract it’s difficult to describe what you are looking at when you’re sideways... Considering that this is only part of my Job as I am still responsible for the entire Technical operation, it may be tiring, but honestly I am having the time of my life.Since this was written the Docks has saddly closed to be replaced with a live venue I have moved on to Peter Gatiens new superclub CiRCA
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