Students at Patagonia Public Schools Step into Beveldom during 2018 Career Fair

Students at Patagonia Public Schools Step into Beveldom during 2018 Career Fair

by | Mar 28, 2018 | News

Mat Bevel Company brought the world of Beveldom to high school and middle school students during the 2018 Rotary Career Fair at Patagonia Public Schools on Friday, May 9. Video excerpts from Kinetic Saturdays and the new TV show Bevel Café amused and fascinated students, who are eager to get their hands on and participate in upcoming Beveldom programs. Students were invited to vote on and earn a chance to win their favorite shirt design from Beveldom. Three winners were drawn and will receive the t-shirt they chose for free. The winning t-shirts designs were….

You won’t want to miss out on these one-of-kind “Desert Saguaro” and “Life is like an Arrow” t-shirts! Get yours today at the Beveldom Store and enjoy the magic of Beveldom and support a great charity. 

Beveldom-WorldBuilding-Educational-ProgramDuring the event, Mat Bevel Company announced The Universe Within, its new educational pilot that builds creative thinking skills by increasing student’s capacity to innovate, problem-solve, and navigate unknown situations. The Universe Within is a grassroots solution that addresses a severe national creative intelligence deficit through original thinking and imaginative approaches to solving problems. Students in teacher Elizabeth McCowin’s 6-8 grade art classes will be part of the educational pilot that runs April 12 through April 24. This program is inspired by Mat Bevel Company President Ned Schaper’s world of Beveldom, a fine-art mechanical land teeming with inspiring characters. Students will participate in a four-part introduction to worldbuilding in which they will construct an imaginary world of their own. Students will also develop and play the part of a central character in their own unique world.
The pilot integrates hands-on activities of journaling, drawing, mask making, and storytelling, to teach students language arts and science lessons. Classes start with a 5-minute inspirational and instructional video where students open their minds to fantastical concepts from the world of Beveldom. Step-by-step instructions are outlined for the day’s activities. After the video, the teacher along with Mat Bevel Company storytellers Paula Schaper and Lars Marshall guide students and provide support for the following classroom activities in which students create their own world: Class One: The Daily Doodle Class Two: Corrugated Headgear Class Three: Storybook World Class Four: Pedestrian Carnival
A showcase of each student’s work, as well as classroom videos and activities, will be on display during a community Fine Arts Gala on campus, May 9, 2018. Students take home their headgear and storybooks, and receive a certificate for their participation in The Universe Within. Students were excited about this innovative worldbuilding class. A high school student was so excited by the idea that she volunteered to help teach the class. For more information contact: Paula Schaper Vice President / Executive Director Mat Bevel Company 520-604-6273 pschaper@matbevelcompany.org www.matbevelcompany.org
Beveldom’s Creative Forces Get Ready For Green Screen

Beveldom’s Creative Forces Get Ready For Green Screen

by | Nov 3, 2017 | Update

Through the Power of Kinetics the sculptures come to life 

In our last update, we reported our progress with Bevelvision. Mat Bevel Company President Ned Schaper has been capturing a mix of footage from three very different cameras.

In the near future, Ned will use green screen compositing to isolate and videotape many of his 52 characters. Called the Creative Forces, these characters will appear in Beveldom as “Junkachinas” who channel the wisdom of junk. In the story, Mat Bevel’s characters are sent into the dumpster culture to liberate the relics of junk and help them find new purpose.

Ned will then place video of these characters into the video footage he’s been capturing of the Museum Of Kinetic Art using the 360fly virtual reality camera, GoPro 5 miniature action camera and the Canon C100 Cinema Camera.

In this next phase of Bevelvision, some characters will begin to develop more. As one example, Jester Physics hasn’t played a big role in the live theater productions. He wears a box helmet that prohibits audiences from seeing his mouth move and hearing his words. With Bevelvision, an important character like Jester Physics will take on a bigger role. Obviously with a camera, you can do a lot of magic with his solid, colorful helmet. And, you may see him at work or making a sculpture. 

According to Ned, “Capturing the characters using green screen and combining them with footage of the museum opens up many more environments for the world of Beveldom. The characters will be placed into the most beautiful variety of backgrounds including micro-footage of sculptures that audiences, up until now, couldn’t experience in live theater productions.”

The Creative Forces locked in the relics of junk are unleashed

What’s next? The key to the evolution of Bevelvision is shooting and combining footage of the Museum Of Kinetic Art with footage of the Creative Forces. Ned is close to establishing Beveldom’s surrealistic setting using his fine-art kinetic sculptures as a spaceship-like backdrop. 

We’re looking for a small space where Ned can green screen Beveldom’s characters. Do you know of a quiet space in Tucson where we can install a green screen and record Beveldom’s 52 characters? If so, please contact Paula Schaper at 520-604-6273 or shoot her an email at: pschaper@matbevecompany.org.

If you’d like to receive monthly updates, news, artwork and inspiration from the world of Beveldom, please sign up for our newsletter The Junk Evangelist.

Three Cameras, One Awesome Junk Universe

Three Cameras, One Awesome Junk Universe

by | Nov 3, 2017 | Update

Update on Bevelvision Productions

Mat Bevel Company is moving forward on technical and creative fronts with Bevelvision Productions. In upcoming videos, you’ll see images that combine a mix of footage from three very different cameras: 360fly virtual reality camera, GoPro 5 miniature action camera and the Canon C100 Cinema Camera. This is helping Mat Bevel Company President Ned Schaper to establish the look and feel of Beveldom through the eye of the camera for a new virtual theater that takes place in a junk universe!

Ned Schaper explains, “The 360fly lets me place characters inside moving sculptures. I can shoot 360 degrees then combine it with a regular high definition video in the editing phase. The three cameras give me multiple perspectives to work with, adding dimension to the world of Beveldom.” 

The lens of the 360fly action camera is spherical, and points straight up into the air. The camera can capture everything happening around all at once, the single eye recording everything in its field of view. The GoPro 5 camera gets up close and personal with an ultra-wide angle view allowing Ned’s characters to interact in close quarters with the sculptures without a camera person. That’s a great benefit since our current production studio is packed with sculptures and equipment, leaving no room for a camera person to move around. The C100 shoots a “normal” live video image and also records the two channels of quality audio for the scene. 

All of this technology is taking us deeper into the Junk Universe of Beveldom! Thank you everyone who has supported Mat Bevel Company over the last three years. Because of you, we’re much closer to capturing the magical world of Beveldom using video technologies.

If you’d like to receive monthly updates, news, artwork and inspiration from the world of Beveldom, please sign up for our newsletter The Junk Evangelist.

Mat Bevel Company is a finalist for ArtPlace America’s 2017 National Creative Placemaking Fund

by | Jun 7, 2017 | News

(June 7, 2017) Today, ArtPlace America announced that Mat Bevel Company is one of 70 finalists for the 2017 National Creative Placemaking Fund (NCPF). ArtPlace’s National Creative Placemaking Fund is a highly competitive national program, receiving 987 applications this year. Mat Bevel Company’s project one of just 7% of the projects across the country to make this cut.

Through this national program, ArtPlace America invests money in communities across the country in which artists, arts organizations, and arts and culture activity help drive community development change across 10 sectors of community planning and development: agriculture and food; economic development; education and youth; environment and energy; health; housing; immigration; public safety; transportation; or workforce development.  

Mat Bevel Company proposed the Patagonia Pollinator Project, a new model of K-12 place-based learning that cross-pollinates the knowledge of 8 to 10 local expert change makers with students. In a unique approach called “kinetic junk theater,” Mat Bevel Company will use theater, found-object kinetic art, hands-on learning techniques, new media arts and digital storytelling to drive educational and youth development outcomes.

Partners for the project include Rachell Hochheim, Superintendent for Patagonia Public Schools, Cassina Quiroga Farley, Director & Program Developer for Patagonia Creative Arts Association, Jose Manule Barraza Santos, 10th grade student and artist at Patagonia Public Schools and Mandy Montanez, Business Manager for Red Mountain Foods, Town of Patagonia Planning & Zoning member and Patagonia Public Schools site council member.

“The National Grants Program is actively building a portfolio that reflects the full breadth of our country’s arts and cultural sector, as well as the community planning and development field,” said ArtPlace’s Director of National Grantmaking F. Javier Torres. “Knowing that these projects, and the hundreds of others who applied, are using arts and culture strategies to make the communities across this country healthier and stronger is inspirational.”

“We believe that these projects, when added to our tremendously strong portfolio of demonstration projects, will inspire, equip and connect members of the arts and culture field, the community planning and development field and those who are working to make healthy and equitable communities creatively across the country,” said ArtPlace America Executive Director Jamie Bennett.

The complete list of the 2017 finalists for ArtPlace’s National Creative Placemaking Fund may be found here.

About Mat Bevel Company
Mat Bevel Company reveals the magnificent potential of resourcefulness using ART—Available Resource Technology. The 501(c)(3) non-profit organization inspires people of all ages to cultivate greater awareness, ingenuity and purpose through found-object kinetic art, theater, hands-on learning experiences and new media arts. The work builds a deeper connection to art, science, education and our culture through the Museum Of Kinetic Art, Surrealistic Pop Science Theater, the School of Intuition and Bevelvision Productions.

About ArtPlace America

ArtPlace America (ArtPlace) is a ten-year collaboration among 16 partner foundations, along with 8 federal agencies and 6 financial institutions, that works to position arts and culture as a core sector of comprehensive community planning and development in order to help strengthen the social, physical, and economic fabric of communities.

ArtPlace focuses its work on creative placemaking, projects in which art plays an intentional and integrated role in place-based community planning and development. This brings artists, arts organizations, and artistic activity into the suite of placemaking strategies pioneered by Jane Jacobs and her colleagues, who believed that community development must be locally informed, human-centric, and holistic.

Media contact:        
Paula Schaper
Vice President
Mat Bevel Company
520-604-6273
www.matbevelcompany.org
pschaper@matbevelcompany.org

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MOKA Virtual Reality Tour

by | Sep 3, 2016 | Bevelvision

Society for Bevel Intentions launched MINISTRY OF MOTION to support the evolution of Bevelvision into an Internet TV show that’s a mix of “Mad Max and Mr. Rogers.” The show will share the Surrealistic Pop Science Theater’s world of Beveldom with inspiring characters, moving sculptures, guest artists and scientists, educational workshops, walking tours and a virtual reality tour. 

Get inside Beveldom with the virtual tour

One of our first steps towards making the virtual component of Beveldom a reality is to develop a Museum Of Kinetic Art (MOKA) Virtual Reality Tour. Using the popular virtual reality technology, our tour will give people a perspective they couldn’t otherwise experience, not even in person. Viewers will be able to immerse themselves inside the museum sculptures and have the ability to look around in any direction. Close-up shots will bring people inside the kinetic sculptures, introducing them to many of the mechanized characters and uncovering much of the humor that’s built into the sculptures.

 

Society for Bevel Intentions founder and president Ned Schaper says, “The tight configuration of the museum actually lends itself to virtual reality technology and content. The cameras will get into tight spaces, opening up a whole new experience for viewers where they can experience the movements, colors and sounds of the museum’s sculptures in 3D.”

We’ll develop a small cart with motorized wheels that our camera person can sit in and drive through the museum path to shoot the video. It’s similar to how the Google car captures its content, only our content will be video instead of still images. Viewers will be able to start and stop the tour and look around.

Schaper continues, “I’d like to devise a way to place the camera rig onto the sculptures so that people can move around as if they are part of the sculpture or ride along with a character that’s moving. This works really well for the museum because it allows me to create a moving viewpoint inside Beveldom with a world of moving sculptures. Viewers can choose which direction they see inside that moving viewpoint. It could get very interactive and carnival like in the future.” 

“What I see with Ned Schaper’s work—the museum, theater and Internet TV—is that it lends itself well to exploit virtual reality technology for digital storytelling and new platforms for digital learning.”  

-Luis Carrión, award-winning videographer and producer, and Video Producer for University of Arizona’s Office of Digital Learning

Greenscreen compositing also opens a window to an expanded Beveldom

One of the techniques the Society will utilize to further develop the look and feel of Beveldom for Bevelvision TV is greenscreen compositing. Beveldom’s characters will be videotaped in our Tucson studio, The Bevelarium, with a green screen behind them. This allows us to isolate the characters and add video or still image backgrounds so they appear to be in other places. Greenscreen compositing gives us studio control during recording.

We’ll be shooting in two locations–inside the museum as part of the virtual tour and in our second location in Patagonia , AZ, called New Beveldom. Using greenscreen compositing we’ll further enrich the environments where Beveldom’s characters appear, both inside the museum’s animated sculptures and in the beautiful scenic landscapes in southern Arizona.

Greenscreen also gives us the ability to add multiple characters to a scene. It’s all very exciting and we hope you’ll support us in this development phase. All gifts, large or small, are greatly appreciated.