I interviewed Tadpole director Diane Catsburrow Linnet remotely after the SXSW XR Experience 2024. See more context in the rough transcript below.
This is a listener-supported podcast through the Voices of VR Patreon.
Music: Fatality
Podcast: Play in new window | Download
Rough Transcript
[00:00:05.412] Kent Bye: The Voices of VR Podcast. Hello, my name is Kent Bye, and welcome to the Voices of VR podcast. It's a podcast that looks at the structures and forms of immersive storytelling and the future of special computing. You can support the podcast at patreon.com slash voicesofvr. So, continuing on my series of looking at different immersive stories from South by Southwest 2024, today's episode is with a piece called Tadpole, which is a 360 video animation by Diane Katsuboro-Lynette. So this interview is broken up into two main parts. The first part we dive into more of the technical aspects because Diane is essentially drawing out a equirectangular flat surface but distorting her drawing so that when it's wrapped around in a 360 video it can look like it's this hand-drawn spatial immersive experience. And so we go through a lot of the technical aspects for the process for her creating that and creating the spatial sound. And then at some point we start to dive into what the actual story is about, which I'm hesitant to recommend listening to that until you've actually had a chance to see it. So highly recommend having a chance to see it before you listen to the full episode. So that's what we're covering on today's episode of the Voices of Yarn podcast. So this interview with Diane happened on Friday, March 15th, 2024. So with that, let's go ahead and dive right in.
[00:01:24.588] Diane Catsburrow Linnet: I'm Diane Casper-Lunette. I am a 2D hand-drawn filmmaker on animation. And I made a 360 film last year, but I don't normally do VR. So this was kind of the first time I was making something like this. And yeah, it was really surprising to get in South by Southwest and get to screen my work. So very exciting.
[00:01:46.303] Kent Bye: Great. Maybe give a bit more context as to your background and your journey into working with VR.
[00:01:51.965] Diane Catsburrow Linnet: So I got into animation filmmaking actually not too long ago either. I started grad school. for animation almost three years ago. And that's kind of where I got started on it. I have a writing and painting background. And then I realized, well, if I do animation, I can do both writing and drawing. So that's how I got into it. So I made several short films and animation in my program for MFA. And then I got curious about the immersive world and I started asking the question of like, Oh, I wonder if as a 2d hand-drawn animator, I could still make immersive content without learning the seemingly really complicated, like 3d builds and programming and things like that. So this project was actually kind of like an experiment of like, let's see if this could happen.
[00:02:46.520] Kent Bye: Right. And was there any VR experiences that you'd seen that gave you some inspiration that this is something that you wanted to dive into and explore?
[00:02:53.567] Diane Catsburrow Linnet: Probably not as much as I should have. I mean, I was working with a professor who had made a VR film and she had worked on like 360 animated films like that. So I was getting mentorship and advice from her, but I hadn't really seen a lot of content. I actually didn't own a VR headset till I was halfway through production because I didn't want to buy something when I didn't know if it would work or not. I did buy it when I realized that, oh, actually this is turning into something and I need to test it on the actual platform that it's meant to be seen in, but yeah, I'm very new to this.
[00:03:28.343] Kent Bye: So this is a 2d animation and you're coming from an animation background and drawing cartoons that are much more static. Maybe you could elaborate a little bit more on your tool set and your process of creating this piece.
[00:03:41.308] Diane Catsburrow Linnet: Yeah, I was actually getting a lot of that same question as I was running the booth. It's like, how did you make this? What did you use? And my answer was just the 2D animation software. It's the 360 video, so you know how it looks when it's unwrapped, like the equirectangular layout? I was working on that rectangular canvas with the grid for the distortion, and I was drawing that distortion in. So it wasn't created in an immersive environment. It was just working from that bridge so that when I popped it into Premiere and told it, that's like, oh, this is a 360 video, then it would wrap it around you. But it consisted of a totally 2D pipeline. And it enabled me to approach the project production in a way, like a pipeline-wise, that was not really different from any 2D short filmmaking that I've done before.
[00:04:35.289] Kent Bye: Okay. And is this a technique that one of your professors had pointed you to, or is this something that you had innovated on your own?
[00:04:41.510] Diane Catsburrow Linnet: So the equirectangular layout was introduced by my professor. This was an independent study that I'd started in, and then I finished making it afterwards really independently. But yeah, she had worked on a VR film and also directed a 360 animated short, and she introduced me to the grid.
[00:05:01.149] Kent Bye: What was the name of the professor that had pointed you to the technical rectangular and maybe just the where they're teaching at?
[00:05:08.811] Diane Catsburrow Linnet: Oh, uh, Mary J Blanchard. She's teaching at Rochester Institute of Technology upstate New York. And she actually has a VR film named swing screened at festivals right around COVID time. So, okay.
[00:05:25.165] Kent Bye: Yeah, because I felt like when I was watching it the first time, it felt like, okay, I'm not seeing a lot of depth. And so it's just a monoscopic 360 equilateral rectangular video. And then it's not really leveraging the stereoscopic effects at all. And then the second time I watched it, I actually watched it flattened. I was like, oh wait, this actually looks very cohesive in a way that sometimes when you watch a 360 video that is unfolded, it can get super distorted. But in this, it actually like looks much more clean in a way that it makes sense now as I hear you, the way that you drew it, that you actually were just drawing it from that echo rectangle to actually do this piece.
[00:06:03.515] Diane Catsburrow Linnet: Yeah, yeah. One of the points of the project was to see if 2D animators could make immersive content using this really brute force approach to it, I guess. Because, yeah, I mean, I do get the stereoscopic and 3D and kind of that feel to it. But I also think it's really interesting to have that 360 canvas at your disposal as a 2D animator, as a person who draws. and be able to use that without necessarily dealing with the hurdles of like, oh, so do I need to create this 360 environment in After Effects or something to be able to do that? I was like, no, actually, but you could try something really simple. And maybe this would be more useful as a pre-production tool than a finished project. But I also feel like indie filmmakers with distinct 2D styles could do something really interesting with this sort of approach.
[00:06:59.365] Kent Bye: I think what it shows to me at least is that, yeah, you can use these really simple tools and get the existing pipelines and workflows for existing animators who are working with animation and that you can really use the medium to explore other narrative dimensions that are focused more on the story rather than on the technology and how the technology can really be a barrier for a lot of people who have something to say.
[00:07:24.827] Diane Catsburrow Linnet: Totally. So, yeah. I hope we get to see more things like this that are a little lower tech, but kind of visually and story-wise interesting in similar ways.
[00:07:36.281] Kent Bye: So maybe you could just elaborate a little bit more on the specific tools that you're using and talk about your process as you draw these cell by cell frames or how you're actually doing the mechanics of the animation.
[00:07:48.210] Diane Catsburrow Linnet: So, I was using Clip Studio Paint, that was the program I was using for all of my short films. It's a primarily drawing, illustration, cartoons program but they do have a few animation functions. But it's very built around the idea of drawing on a computer and I found it really responded to my process because I mean, at the end of the day, animation is a lot of drawing and it makes the process of drawing really tactile for me. And so, I was using that. I guess the biggest technical hurdle actually turned out to be the number of layers because it's 360 and I wasn't really using like a cutting method. The first shot lasted four minutes long and just the sheer number of animated drawings that had to exist in that same canvas. really made a ginormous file that got pretty slow as I continued and continued adding action to it. So that I guess that's the tricky part that is worth considering. I probably should have cut it at some point, but I made it work. I think production wise I was approaching it. I set up the audio first and then kind of let the visuals come in after I wrote the entire script and I recorded a scratch track and I timed it out to the best I could kind of trying to see the action and how long it would take in my head and adding sound effects to cue certain actions. And then I was able to pop in that audio track onto the canvas and then start blocking out the action from the audio timing. Because with a four minutes long animated file, I couldn't afford to move too many things around by a lot. Like if I wanted to add a few frames to this action, I better figure out a way somewhere near that action where I could take away that same amount of time. So I could keep the entire thing mostly intact.
[00:09:48.739] Kent Bye: And after you had gotten out, did you find yourself doing any editing of that? Like taking stuff out just to tighten it up?
[00:09:54.187] Diane Catsburrow Linnet: Not a whole lot. I think there was one point in the middle where I was like, OK, actually, I really need to tighten this part or add a little bit to this part. But overall, I think I spent a lot of time trying to get the audio timing right in the beginning and mostly stuck pretty close to it.
[00:10:12.580] Kent Bye: I want to ask around the sound of the sound design because I watched it with the build that you sent me and I'm not sure if there's just stereo mix or if there's ambisonic sound or spatial sound. And so maybe just talk about the sound design that you did in this piece.
[00:10:26.729] Diane Catsburrow Linnet: Sound was actually where the most tech went into it. That was actually I was working with figuring out how to make it ambisonic because with the visuals I was keeping it as simple as possible to simplify the process and part of the project was to prove a point that you can make through immersive content without learning 3D software, but with sound I did want it to come from the directions of where you would be happening and you would have to move with the image as you look around and things. So yeah, it was ambisonic. I'm not quite sure if it was working in your build because I actually did experience it not quite clicking with certain headsets and things. But yeah, I was using a plugin with the mixing software I was using to pan it to and key it to the image and where things were happening and moving around.
[00:11:19.705] Kent Bye: Okay. Yeah. I think, I think I'll have to try it in some other players because when I watched it on the moon player on the Apple vision pro, and I think it may just be rendering it as stereo, but you sent me an AK build and I was like, Oh, it's eight K. I want to see it in like the highest resolution. I mean, this is a piece that doesn't necessarily need the extra pixel resolution. And so I'll try it.
[00:11:41.233] Diane Catsburrow Linnet: Yes.
[00:11:42.834] Kent Bye: Did you, did you usually play it in the Oculus player then Oculus TV player?
[00:11:46.982] Diane Catsburrow Linnet: Yes. Uh, yeah, he was whatever is the default player. Uh, that was, that was the headset I owned and tested it on and took to South by.
[00:11:56.590] Kent Bye: Okay. Yeah. I'll have to try to get it into the movies folder and then watch it again there. I've used a Reaper as a digital audio workstation to render out ambisonic audio, but what were some of the tools that you use to actually create the ambisonic mix?
[00:12:10.411] Diane Catsburrow Linnet: The mixing program that I learned at school for my grad program was Pro Tools. It didn't have an ambisonic built-in anything, but I did find a plug-in that enabled me to pan it. And so I actually rendered a version of the video with the numbers on it for the angles, so I could track each character and where things were supposed to be coming from and put in that number and key it to pan when they moved.
[00:12:36.794] Kent Bye: When you say you had the numbers, you mean a grid version that had these different numbers. So you have a grid version that is that, was that overlaid on top of that? Yeah.
[00:12:46.024] Diane Catsburrow Linnet: Okay. With a 360 number.
[00:12:49.047] Kent Bye: Okay. So you rendered out a version of the video that had like a guide so that you could specifically put the angles for where the audio is coming from.
[00:12:56.636] Diane Catsburrow Linnet: Okay. Yeah. characters moving and everything and the part that was running that was looking at where each character was at each time and kind of keying that to so that the sound would move with them.
[00:13:07.871] Kent Bye: Okay I guess before we start to dive in too much into the story I'm wondering what your distribution plans are for this piece just so that if you want to do a festival run or if you want to make it available for people to see like what's your plans for what happens next with Tadpole?
[00:13:21.343] Diane Catsburrow Linnet: Um, I mean, I'm not quite entirely sure. I'll be honest. I mean, I've said multiple times, it's the first time I'm doing anything like this in immersive. So even where to put it to, so that people can watch it in the headset. I'm not quite sure. I think I'm going to try to shoot for like a festival run for maybe the rest of the year and then try to make it available. It's currently kind of wide open.
[00:13:43.540] Kent Bye: Okay. And are you okay with talking about spoilers at a certain point or would you prefer not to? Okay. All right. So anything else beyond this point is going to be in heavily spoiler territory. Okay. I'd love to dig into a little bit more of what you were able to do in this piece. Cause it's really quite evocative and moving and powerful. And, uh, I want to have people have their own experience with it before they listen to this. So I think that's probably a good point to stop. So maybe you'd talk a little bit about your process of being someone who's an animator, drawing cartoons and a writer. And so like, where did you begin with this story?
[00:14:22.117] Diane Catsburrow Linnet: So with this story, I guess the tool started before the story. I mean, you know, I feel like sometimes you're like, oh, I need to tell the story and then you find a tool that's the best medium to tell the story in. For Tadpole, it's kind of the opposite. I wanted to try making something in immersive. So that curiosity came first. And then so then I was asking myself, okay, so what kind of story would I need to have to justify its need to be in 360? Because as a filmmaker, the immersive nature of it doesn't necessarily justify any story because I mean, film doesn't need to be in 360 to be an immersive experience. You sit in a theater and you watch a movie and you don't stop seeing everything around you just get so into the film. But I also felt like, well, there are things you can only do in 360 immersive content. I was fascinated by the idea of there being so much information you're missing at each time. It's like 360, it's worth the content. But I mean, I don't know what the exact angle is, but you only see certain sections of it at a time like pie slices. And then everything else, like what's behind you, what's beside you that you're not quite seeing, all of that you're missing. And I feel like it's a big conversation in creating any VR immersive content. It's like, how do you direct the viewer to see the right thing at the right time with audio, visuals, and guiding them a certain really specific path? On one hand, I mean, I feel like, because of the kind of storyteller I am, I was like, well, I kind of want to loosen it up a little bit. Like, if you're missing some things, that's okay. Like the story should still stand. If you're looking at not quite where the main action is happening, you should still get something out of it, like kind of like a choose your own adventure story to have certain things going on that would be interesting. And then I was also like, well, that being the side note, I wonder if I could make the viewer miss something that's important, like something happens behind you. And you could have seen it because the information is there, but you would miss it. So that's where the story idea came from. for something to happen behind you, and then everyone misses it, and you miss it, and then you turn around and you see what happens. And yeah, everything else in the story kind of stemmed from that.
[00:16:51.450] Kent Bye: It's interesting because I've had a chance to see this piece about four times trying to figure out everything. And so it's nice to hear that some of those choices were deliberate, that you were trying to hide information, not necessarily hide it, but have things that were happening off screen. And then it's a kind of a narrative turning point in the piece. And so some of the original provocation is how do you expand beyond just the 2d frame and really have lots of stuff that's happening and then have people look around and Yeah, I guess from there, maybe you could elaborate on this conceit of having like multiple characters or maybe just kind of describe how you how do you describe taphole and what the story is about?
[00:17:30.455] Diane Catsburrow Linnet: Oh, that's tricky. Um, actually haven't had a lot of practice talking about this story because when people were usually asking my usual answer was like, I don't know how much I can disclose without spoiling the entire thing, but yeah, it's an apartment, like a house, where there's multiple versions of the same person living in that same environment. Multiple versions as in like by age, like there's an age 9 version of you, an age 10 version of you, and an age 11 version of you, and all the way up to however many that exist, and they're all living in the same space. Well, most of them. Some of them are off in college. mentioned briefly in passing in the story, but, and they're all kind of interacting with each other. And it's not quite made explicit, like whether this is actual or kind of like in the mind space and which one is real, or if they're all real, or if they're none of them are real. But yeah, that's, that's the premise.
[00:18:29.721] Kent Bye: So just to kind of dig into this conceiter idea, when I when I was watching it, I was like, oh, this is kind of like an interesting multiverse kind of story where you're having these parallel realities all collapse. But rather than the same time and different realities of the same person, it's more of like. all the people over the course of a lifetime all smashed up into the same area. And so I feel like that's an interesting way to do this twist on the multiverse story. But in this case, it is different versions of yourself at different ages, having a conversation with yourself to have your older self and your younger self, which I think is actually really a from a narrative perspective, really quite fascinating narrative conceit that I haven't really seen a lot of other people really explore. I'm just wondering if you can maybe elaborate on some of the inspirations that you had in terms of structuring this multiverse idea, but rather than having the same person at the same moment in their life across different parallel realities, you have all of the realities all smushed into one time slice.
[00:19:34.903] Diane Catsburrow Linnet: Yeah, I guess I was treating it less like a fantasy and science fiction thought, but more like a psychological feel of it. Like, it's kind of like they're all real in the sense that, but only you are real. Like if you are not 2-9, that's the only real person and then they're kind of dealing with their past and their future at the same time. I guess it's a lot about how you think about yourself and your past and your future and you're reflecting on your choices and how much of it is set. And so that's kind of, I guess, the multiverse tapping into it, but also kind of asking yourself, well, if you couldn't really interact with yourself, because you think about like, it's a popular question, like, if you could go back to yourself, like five years ago, what would you tell yourself and things like that? But would you really understand yourself five years ago, when it's been five years later, and you have changed, and you don't always remember everything and how it had been. So if you're all smooshed in in the same house living with yourself, I mean, you would assume that you understand all of them, but would you actually? So those were the kind of the things that I was pushing around and playing with in the story.
[00:20:52.263] Kent Bye: Is there any stories that you drew any particular inspiration or any other type of media that you're drawing upon as you're making the story?
[00:21:03.510] Diane Catsburrow Linnet: I feel like there was something, but I'm blanking out on it. I do know that for Spider-Verse, I didn't see it until after I finished the film. I know it was around and I heard great things about it. And as an animator, I had been meaning to check it out, but I didn't get a chance to actually see it before I finished it. I actually saw number two first and then I saw number one. So there was a whole thing mixed up on it. But I think I was interested. I mean, it's a popular idea. I was interested in the the thought of it and thinking about it for a while, I think.
[00:21:36.742] Kent Bye: At some point, do you kind of reveal that these are different versions of yourself? Except for the very beginning, there's like some people who were not have a number on them. And it's like more of a friend that's coming over. So are those first two characters? Are those roommates of these people? Or is that one of the ages that just didn't have their number revealed at the very beginning?
[00:21:56.280] Diane Catsburrow Linnet: So at the very beginning, the person who comes in is an outsider, is a different person. And so it kind of pushes the thing of like, oh, is this actually real? Or like, how do you deal with this all the time could either be actually seeing what is or having some sort of other implications of like, well, how do you deal with it? Because we see that like, yeah, it's not treated as like something that's totally abnormal, but kind of what you would say to somebody who's dealing with a lot of stuff right now. Yeah, so that's a different person who's coming to fetch one of the versions of the main character.
[00:22:32.887] Kent Bye: Yeah, one of the things that I noticed when I was watching it, and when I watch it again, we'll have to do it with the ambisonic audio, but there were some scenes where there were like the younger versions like talking to each other and then other versions that were talking in a different part of the table. And sometimes it was difficult for me to know who was speaking at a certain moment, especially because there was a certain level of action that was happening all around you and that you're playing with this idea of directing attention in different ways. So there were some animated sequences of younger kids that their mouths are moving, but there was no sound from them after watching it two or three times because I was like, when I first watched it, I was like, okay, who is speaking at this moment? Cause I, I turn over and I see at least like four people speaking and I didn't know exactly who it was. Was that part of the design intention to add some ambiguity or confusion as to where to look? Cause there were some younger versions of the same character at different ages speaking to each other, but no sound was coming out. So just wondering if that was a deliberate detention to kind of like throw people off a little bit.
[00:23:39.867] Diane Catsburrow Linnet: Right. Yeah, a little bit. I mean, audio, the Directional Audio Amazonics was supposed to clarify that a little bit. And for the kids, I considered having them, like, actually, like, hearing them say something, but it would be throughout the entire thing. I don't think I would have envisioned them stopping talking or just kind of like, you know, little kids kind of chattering among themselves. it didn't make sense to add another layer of audio that would have just been too overwhelming, I think. But yeah, I was playing with the aspect of like, oh, this is kind of all in your head, then it's overwhelming in a way, and you're not always quite sure what to focus on, because there's multiple things happening all at once. And whoever is speaking is whoever is speaking, but they're all the same person. So I guess that's, there's that layer of it too.
[00:24:31.619] Kent Bye: So Taylor Swift has her tour where she's talking about her eras. And as I was watching this piece, there's a little bit thinking about different eras that people go through and different either clothes that they're wearing and different phases of their life. And I'm just wondering if you can reflect upon in this piece, how you're trying to tap into these different phases of someone's life.
[00:24:52.269] Diane Catsburrow Linnet: That's a tough one. Um, I guess that's where the title comes in. It's hateful, it's metamorphosis, and with time you change, even if you're the same person. you're really not, and you lose the ability to fully be in your own shoes as you go on forth. I mean, in the interaction where 29 is talking with 17, 29 has gone through being 17, but is no longer quite understanding what 17 is going through. She's forgotten, and she is a different person. So even when it's yourself, I guess my take on it was that you wouldn't, because you're a changed person, you wouldn't understand yourself. And you can only understand yourself as yourself at that moment. And then once that passes, it's just different.
[00:25:47.077] Kent Bye: Okay. Yeah. And 29 is in some ways the archetypal mother character in some ways interacting with the younger selves. And she sends off age number 12 to go gather up the other kids who are off in the gazebo. They're collecting a tadpole. So maybe you could describe the offscreen characters and what's happening there in terms of the gathering of this tadpole entity.
[00:26:10.611] Diane Catsburrow Linnet: I think for that, I was kind of tapping into my own childhood a little bit. There was a little pond in the apartment I lived in and there were not tadpoles, but little like water snails and things like that. And I would often go look at them. Here, the tadpole is, I guess, a little bit more of a symbol. Like it's something that the kids are really fascinated with, but the adults, they don't care. Like even age 10 looks at it and goes like, oh, I don't want to look at this, but it's something age nine and below they like or it's a very age-specific thing that they're really into and then once that's passed, you metamorphosize and you lose your tail and then so you no longer have it and you're no longer able to see the same thing.
[00:26:58.381] Kent Bye: Yeah, and so there is certain moments where you talk about deliberately having things happen off screen, or they're not really off screen, but they're really behind you where there wasn't necessarily a good reason to be looking in that direction. And I watched this piece three or four times. The first time I watched it in 360 video, And I did have that experience of like kind of looking around and missing things and having to kind of find where the action was happening. And then I watched it in the moon player within VR and Apple Vision Pro. You can actually watch it in a flat version where it's actually laying out all the epilogue tingling. I'm like, okay, I'm going to watch it in this version because I found it a little bit easier to track the action of when things were moving and what was changing because Sometimes there was running animations in the 360 video. The first time I watched it, it was difficult for me to understand what was different and what had changed. And I found myself kind of looking around and again, that could have been lack of ambisonic audio that was making it a little bit more difficult for me. And the first time that I was watching it, but then it was easier to see everything. But then even from a narrative perspective, I still missed the thing that was happening, like tracing this other age 39 and just kind of like, okay, what happens at 39? And then. And then I still didn't understand what was happening. And then finally, the third time that I watched it, I kind of understood what was happening. So the first time that I watched it, it felt like someone was taking their life and dealing with issues of suicide. I thought that age 39 had died by suicide because I saw 39 run over and then she disappears. And so I was like, oh wow, did she kill herself? This is a mystery they're trying to figure out. And then eventually when I watched it, I was like, okay, I'm going to keep an eye on 17 when I was in VR and watch it. And then it's like just watching her and then she starts to get over the edge and then the edge breaks and then it falls over. And then I'm like, okay, is that actually looks more like an accident, but yet she's still wanting to jump off. her free will of wanting to do it herself and then the fates of the whole thing crashing and then looks like an accident. So I'm just wondering if you could maybe elaborate on these themes of dying by suicide and this theme that's running throughout. Either it's implied action that people, if they missed it, they sort of deduce that that's what's happening. or if that's something that was more of an accident that it was kind of an interesting thing to explore, but also leaves this question or darkness or implication of it, even if it's not clear.
[00:29:36.263] Diane Catsburrow Linnet: Yeah, one of the feedback I was getting often while I was running the booth at South by was like, it's really cute, but it's really dark. So yeah, I mean, I was thinking of Polly, the main character with the multiple versions, as somebody with kind of like ebbing periods of blues, which I feel like a lot of people can relate to, like they're, you know, the happy times and some of the versions are clearly having a better time than others. And yeah, it's the main question that's the mystery, if you would say, that's addressed in the story is of 39. And why is there nobody beyond 39? And what happens? And they're not quite sure. And they're trying to figure this out. And 39 looks like she knows something. And she probably does have like ideas about like, what she probably has an idea of what would happen, but it's not clearly addressed. And then what actually happens comes from somewhere that's unexpected, that none of the characters expected, because it's never happened before. There's been cycles and iterations in 17. It had never happened at 17. So that was where the cycle was broken, but not in the way you would have expected. And yeah, and I mean, 17 was climbing over the edge, and it breaks so that if you do miss it the first time, you're not quite sure if it was an accident, because at that point, it's already broken by the time you turn around. But you hear the scream, and then you see what happens. So it's kind of, I built the narrative to be seen more than one time, so that you could at least kind of wind back and see what had happened. But you're meant to miss it the first time because even though you could have been looking anywhere, you were looking at something else most of the time. And all of the other characters were looking at something else. Everyone misses it and you miss it too. And even though you could have seen it, but you could wind back and see it again.
[00:31:38.780] Kent Bye: Okay. So it seems like each of the characters of the ages, they're actually are growing and getting older. And so then I'm just trying to like, keep thinking through the logic of the story, because like when I first, my first time I watched it, I thought that age 39 was the one who had died by suicide. And then eventually I found, okay, no, it's actually 17. And then I was like, wait, how, how could there be other ages if 17 was the one who died? Why, how could there even be a 39 in the first place? Maybe you could elaborate on that point.
[00:32:12.731] Diane Catsburrow Linnet: Yeah, so they do grow older each year. So 16 will be 17 next year and 17 will be 18 next year. And so that's how the whole cycle goes. And so up to this point, everything had kind of more or less happened the same way. So everyone's kind of used to that cycle being the thing. And the thing with 17 had never happened before, and that's the reason why everyone disappears. Once 17 stopped existing, none of the ones that are older could exist anymore. I guess, not the same timeline, but they're kind of relying on each other like that. Before then, it was just 39, and then nobody exists after that, and something happens, and then 38 becomes 39, and then something happens, and it kind of went like that. But then suddenly, something unexpected happened with 17, and then you lost that future. So that's the question at the end, the nine is asking 16. So when 16 becomes 17, What would happen?
[00:33:16.316] Kent Bye: Okay. And so it sounds like that there is a recurring cycle that happens and that. Do you think that, I mean, you wrote the story, so you're kind of implying different things, but as you're elaborating on it, you do have this recurrent cycle that at some point, is it always an accident or a death at some point, the kind of just reflecting that everybody's going to die at some point. And then that this person is sort of faded and all the different iterations that they're always going to die. at 39 because there's some variance between these different realities that you're exploring. And so, yeah, I'm just wondering if it's a kind of mystery where they're trying to solve it. So there is a recurrence. So you get a sense that this has happened before and that they're looking at it. And so, yeah, I'm just wondering if either a dying by suicide or just a death that always happenings and they're trying to just figure out what had happened.
[00:34:04.368] Diane Catsburrow Linnet: There's, I mean, there's always a death. They're not quite sure what it is, because 39 never addresses it, and it's kind of a mystery. And that's where most of their main attention is, because that's where it always seems to happen. I mean, there are small variants, but so far, they have never been significant enough to really change anything about the cycle. So it was, they were kind of relying on it, assuming that it would always be the same, and trying to change one thing, but then something else could be different. So I guess, whatever they were questioning of, like, could they change something about this seemingly rigid recurring cycle? It was proven in a way, but not in the way they had anticipated.
[00:34:51.826] Kent Bye: Yeah, I really like that idea of using a piece like this to explore visually this concept of being in dialogue with both your past selves and your future selves and ways that you could send information back to your prior self but also kind of imagine something in the future and so you may be at a certain point where you're younger and imagining yourself out because obviously you're not at the age of 39 years old I would place you more somewhere in your 20s and so you're also through this piece playing with timelines of where people are at in their lives and so love to hear any reflections on this idea of both sending information back to your previous self, giving guidance or information, but also be able to project out into the future and have this dialogue of the whole span of your life and being in conversation with yourself.
[00:35:39.742] Diane Catsburrow Linnet: Yeah, I think it's, I mean, I like to open it up for interpretation. I think different people see it differently. And some people lean a lot more into the, the actual like, Oh, you're actually in this space with the actual versions of yourself. But I think For me, it was more like a self-reflection sort of aspect to it. It's like, at any point in time, you're dealing with everything from your past that has built up to be you and also this idea of a future and what it could be and what it could mean and where you'd be headed to, what kind of person you would become. And so internally, I feel like you end up kind of having conversations with different versions of yourself at different points and different possibilities. And I think this work is an exploration of that sort of idea of how do you deal with yourself and so many versions of yourself and your past and where it could go or where it could not go and the amount of power you hold over these different versions of where to go next or how to deal with your past selves as well.
[00:36:47.957] Kent Bye: Yeah, I think overall, when I was watching this piece, I thought that the animation style was very cute. And like you said, just kind of like inviting in a way that is exploring the story. And then it does take this really dark turn. And I just remember the first time I had really heard about your piece was through Blake Kamenader. who had that similar reaction where he was like, oh yeah, it's a really cute, beautiful, oh wait, actually it's kind of dark and it hit him in a way that was really powerful. And I had a very similar experience where it has this turn and it's like, oh wow, this is really, it's a poetic piece that packs a punch, I would say. And so I'm just wondering, you know, what some of the reactions were from South by Southwest and yeah, just this blending of the lightness and the darkness all contained within this piece.
[00:37:34.707] Diane Catsburrow Linnet: Yeah, I mean, there were a lot of mixed different reactions to it. I think everyone kind of took something different from it based on their experiences or their friends experiences and things they were drawing from as a background. South by was the first time where I was able to show it to and interact with so many people regarding the piece. So it's interesting to hear What they thought about it and some of them were really moved some of them were confused. Some of them. And yeah, I was hearing a lot of like, that was really simple but it works, which was great to hear the simple visuals had mostly been. Coming from a practical standpoint, this was pretty much my solo projects and something I was trying out. And because of the way I was working with the approach of not using 3D build to it, I was keeping the character design simple and black and white so that if it's not quite precisely as it should be, you wouldn't feel it as much. So it was mainly a story-driven piece, I guess.
[00:38:42.389] Kent Bye: Yeah. Yeah, definitely. Definitely feel that. Did you have anyone at South by Southwest who came back and watched it one or two or multiple times?
[00:38:50.956] Diane Catsburrow Linnet: There actually was somebody who just took the headset off and was like, actually, could I see it one more time? And, um, so internally I was like, yes, that's exactly what I was hoping for. So the interesting thing about the way this booth was run was that it was built around 15 minutes slots. So that, cause I was And planning it, I wasn't sure how much time it would take to reset everything and keep things going. But the film itself is six minutes long, so I could technically fit two people into one slot. So for every slot that had a sign up, there was actually a secret slot after it. So that if they showed up at the right time, I could be like, oh, actually, if you waited two minutes, then I could pop you in before the next person shows up. So I feel like I was able to go through more people than possibly any other booth on the floor. I know a lot of the experiences were much longer. I think I feel like I heard one of them being like 45 minutes long. And it's like, I don't know how you would do that. That sounds really tricky. But it was really tricky to see it more than one time, because there were so many people kind of going about. And so there were people waiting a lot of times to see if there would be a time to be squeezed into and things like that. So that was kind of tricky. But in that case, it did work out whether it was the right thing at the right time.
[00:40:12.346] Kent Bye: So he was able to see that part again, was able to get pick up more of what had actually happened.
[00:40:18.914] Diane Catsburrow Linnet: Yes. Yeah. He wanted to see what had happened at the balcony.
[00:40:22.175] Kent Bye: So how many people were able to see what had happened?
[00:40:28.978] Diane Catsburrow Linnet: I'm not entirely sure. Cause I actually didn't, I was hoping to have a setup to be able to see what they saw, but it didn't quite click. So I could only kind of assume with a sound. I don't, I think most everyone missed it. And there was that one person who was able to see it one more time. right away. I feel like there were a couple people who came back and were able to see it again, but I'm not quite sure. So not a whole ton really.
[00:40:58.007] Kent Bye: Okay. Okay. Yeah. I was just, just curious. Yeah. Yeah. As I was looking at your Instagram ahead of this interview, I was noticing that you were making different cartoons, talking about your experience at South by Southwest. Maybe you could talk about that process of translating different moments of your life into these little cartoons that are describing a moment, but really trying to elaborate on that in the caption, but also as a way of kind of documenting your own experiences.
[00:41:24.814] Diane Catsburrow Linnet: Yeah, I've been doing that for, geez, like two years now, I guess. I started it as a way of kind of staying in touch with people, which is kind of an odd thing to say, but I move around a lot and I'm leaving people behind all the time. And it's hard to keep in touch with them and keep communicating like, oh, like, this is what I'm up to. What are you up to? So I started making these cartoons and uploading it twice a week to just little slices of life. I try to make it funny. or anything cool I'm getting into and kind of making cartoons out of it. And so I guess there are multiple versions of me living in those cartoons and existing on the same canvas. But yeah, I like to document it for the people around me, for myself. I guess capturing little pieces of myself as I continue doing things. And it's sometimes there's too many cool things that are happening and it's hard to choose. Sometimes I say like, oh wow, the past four days I've just been working on my film in my room all the entire time. So what do I draw about? But yeah, it's been a fun process. Yeah.
[00:42:27.898] Kent Bye: And as we start to wrap up, I'm curious what you think the ultimate potential of virtual reality and this type of immersive storytelling might be and what it might be able to enable.
[00:42:37.905] Diane Catsburrow Linnet: Oh, that's a tough one. I mean, I, like I said, wasn't in this medium for a long enough time. So I don't know if I know enough to really be able to speculate. I know the technology is, it's advancing really quickly. And there are a lot of cool things that are, we're able to do with more things that are being developed. curious to see where that goes. I guess I think it opens up a lot of narrative possibilities, like the idea of something being all around you and the interactivity. I also hope that more filmmakers get interested in trying something out with this, like even if with low technology, even I was getting a lot of actually suggestions about different programs I could check out to make immersive content in the immersive environment, which I'm curious about, too. I also feel like there is an opportunity that's not talked about as often of just using the equirectangular grid and keeping it really simple, but being able to try making something without really having to come in with any free knowledge really. So I hope 2d animators, especially, and artists of different genres to take advantage of that and try things out and see what kind of new perspectives they can bring into this exciting new media.
[00:43:56.257] Kent Bye: Great. And, uh, is there anything else that's left and said that you'd like to say to the broader immersive community?
[00:44:02.161] Diane Catsburrow Linnet: Ooh, I think you covered most of it. Yeah. You even touched on my Instagram. So I think, I think you've covered it. So Yeah, I mean, to everyone who came to South by Southwest to see it, well, thank you for coming to check it out. Yeah, I'm not quite sure where Taphole is going next, but if you keep tabs on YouTube or Instagram, I am planning to try to put some things together, like the work in progress or behind the scenes a little bit. So please stay tuned.
[00:44:31.053] Kent Bye: Awesome. Well, Diane, thanks so much for creating this piece and coming onto the show to help break down both your process of creating and also the story that you're telling here. Like I said, that's really a poetic piece in a lot of ways of really provocative ideas, but also packs an emotional punch when it comes down to it. So that was really effective use of the medium and playing with directing attention, but also having things happens. sort of off screen of things where you're not expecting it and having that take a narrative turn that I think is both interesting for how the story is told, but also all the other depth psychological implications of these multiple versions of ourselves and this dialogue across time of our past selves and future selves. So lots of really interesting ideas and just really appreciated the opportunity to see it and to have a chance to talk to you. So thank you.
[00:45:17.584] Diane Catsburrow Linnet: Well, thank you. Thanks for having me.
[00:45:19.697] Kent Bye: So thanks again for listening to this interview. This is usually where I would share some additional takeaways, but I've started to do a little bit more real-time takeaways at the end of my conversations with folks to give some of my impressions. And I think as time goes on, I'm going to figure out how to use XR technologies within the context of the VoicesOfVR.com website itself to do these type of spatial visualizations. So I'm putting a lot of my energy on thinking about that a lot more right now. But if you do want a little bit more in-depth conversations around some of these different ideas around immersive storytelling, I highly recommend a talk that I gave on YouTube. You can search for StoryCon Keynote, Kent Bye. I did a whole primer on presence, immersive storytelling, and experiential design. So, that's all that I have for today, and I just want to thank you all for listening to the Voices of VR podcast. And if you enjoy the podcast, then please do spread the word, tell your friends, and consider becoming a member of the Patreon. This is a listener-supported podcast, and so I do rely upon donations from people like yourself in order to continue to bring you this coverage. So you could become a member and donate today at patreon.com slash voicesofvr. Thanks for listening.
