When reading The Electric Kool Aid Acid Test, I was intrigued by excerpts that mentioned liquid between glass being projected onto walls during the Acid Tests themselves, and after doing more research I've found out that not only was this a movement of psychedelic visuals that started in the 1960s and was popularised by Keesey and The Merry Pranksters using these in their shows, but this continued well into the 1990s, with a community of creators still active now online who still do this for a living.
My understanding of this so far is that glass plates or what look like large Petri dishes are put on top of overhead projectors, with different oils and dyes put inside to react together, forming these shapes and colors through the reactions. As these dishes heat up they start to bubble, and they are also set up on a turntable which creates further movement.
These can also be combined with different mediums such as film, including scratching on it, as well as different ways to incorporate illustration into the process. As seen on the left, one artist online used this method to combine these lightship techniques with broken glass and fingerprints.
It seems quite common to have several Petri dishes going at once to be able to cut between them and even layer these effects in real time.
Online I have found a couple shops that sell equipment for this, including https://www.liquidlightshop.com , however the equipment is very expensive, with the Petri dishes being sold for 44 pounds and a set of dyes going for 100 pounds. This will probably not be feasible budget wise, but from what I've seen online there is definitely a possibility of finding similar equipment for quite cheap, just not from a specialised shop.
Once I started looking at this I've realised that some of my previous work has incorporated visuals that are quite reminiscent of liquid light shows. For example, over COVID I made a video out of found footage of ink being dropped into water and other inks being moved around, I actually made this with projection for viewing in mind, and also used footage from the same free-for-use creator for my V2 of the Torino animation that I did last semester.
This research has now led me to reading the book Wheels of Light by Kevin Foakes, which has a history of Liquid Light shows and the creators of them, including the industry of selling this equipment as well as other forms of projection shows that were popular between the 1970s and 1990s. I'm hoping that further research into this book will give me a better perspective not only of how these shows are made practically but what their possible inclusion in my own film would mean conceptually and in terms of the history behind them. I will also be looking into more videos of these performances from the time and looking into interviews with people who were active in this.
In terms of feasibility of using this as a medium for my own film, I honestly still don't know if this will be possible at all. Once I know what kind of equipment I can access and the timeframe of actually setting this up and becoming familiar with the medium, then I will be able to decide if this is a concept I'd like to pursue further, since I am already doing animation in my final work which will already be quite time consuming and I do not want to sacrifice too much of my time animating for this. I am also considering the possibility of finding a potentially Glasgow- based liquid light creator or even someone further away who is open to collaboration. I have considered the possibility of found footage but I would rather only include this as a motif if it is something that I am completely involved with the creation process.
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