Islands of Glass by Rob Clouth

Rob Clouth ‘Islands of Glass’ from Polynoid.

Enjoy the next week with “Islands of Glass,” Polynoid’s new music video for Leisure System artist Rob Clouth. You’ll see how blood red lasers shooting across a lab desk like in a CD player. Ghostly LEDs pulse erratically and unpredictably, creating a visual minefield of piercing lights, computer generated broken glass, and even a beating heart.

Polynoid director Jan Blitzer explained to StashMedia that the process behind creating “Islands of Glass” was a fluid one: “While plowing through some 7,800 frames of animation with only a predefined table of mirrors and lasers, the characteristics of the final video developed throughout the process of creating it. Nothing was pre-planned, designed or thought-through in advance.” The footage itself was captured in a single, continuous shot using Softimage. The team then rendered the images with Solid Angle’s Arnold software and finally composited it in Nuke.

Polynoid is the design / storytelling loving collaboration of Jan Bitzer, Ilija Brunck, Csaba Letay,
Fabian Pross and Tom Weber.
Founded in 2007 as a creative platform and playground for our own films and experiments,
Polynoid today is using that same spirit but combining it with the resources of a
production studio. On a project we can get involved at any stage of the creative process,
ranging from concept, direction and art design to the actual production and finishing.
Our narrative technique combines new forms of storytelling with a shared interest in progressive sound design to create a minimalist, photo real and abstract sensory experience.