Landmark Productions

Asking For It

by Louise O’Neill
adapted by Meadhbh McHugh &  Annabelle Comyn
directed by Annabelle Comyn

VIDEO DESIGN
CINEMATOGRAPHY
VIDEO MAPPING

Asking for It is a new stage adaption of Louise O’Neill’s devastating novel, which shines an unflinching light on the experience of a young woman whose life is changed forever by a horrific act of violence. Asking for It had its world premiere as part of Cork Midsummer Festival in June 2018 and went on to perform a sold-out, two-week run at the Abbey Theatre, Dublin in November 2018.
Landmark website

★★★★★ striking production … excellent cast … staggering dance sequence – fizzing with performed sexual confidence and aggression … unsettling and alarming
The Irish Times

★★★★★ It’s hard to watch. It’s necessary to see … projection design by Jack Phelan consistently evoking timelessness and immediacy
The Reviews Hub

Video Design

My work on Asking For It:

• working closely with the director to develop themes and mood for video design
• develop, shoot, edit and post a number of live-action sequences
• develop techniques specially for the play to give a sense of volume / depth / density to the projections
• detailed video-mapping of the set to create the effect that the set was filled with video, rather than being projected onto it.
• plotting / sequencing & automation (projectors, queing) with QLab

Processes, tools, techniques:

• video shoot: Blackmagic Micro Cinema Camera, SID stereo camera
• design: Procreate for sketching, Blender for 3D, After Effects and Fusion for post
• rendering: RenderStreet

Production Photos

photos by Ros Kavanagh

The Process

A key part of the video design was the sense of a medium that changed from the pollen filled airiness of Summer, to denser, darker and more ominous volumes. I developed some techniques that involved projecting images onto CGI smoke and then reshooting this.

Asking For It - volume test from Jack Phelan on Vimeo.