Cowboyz II Men
Video, 2023
About the artwork
This is a companion piece to my recently published photography book 'One Horse Landed'.
This 19-second video is a curated compilation of AI shorts, carefully sequenced using photos from the project as image prompts in Runway.
Made in collaboration with film maker and sound designer Sam Walker, the piece is brought to life with his unique field recordings. According to Sam, the audio combines phone recordings of a vagabond discussing his family lineage prior to eying up his prospective Tazer purchase, slowed down cymbal crashes, vintage synths, a fractured broken child’s piano treated with digital delay plus a digital wood block. Mixture of text prompted AI imagery blended with photography in Midjourney, image to video conversion in RunwayML, sequencing in Adobe Rush. Sound design by Sam Walker - the audio combines phone recordings of a vagabond discussing his family lineage prior to eying up his prospective Tazer purchase, slowed down cymbal crashes, vintage synths, a fractured broken child’s piano treated with digital delay plus a digital wood block.
Audio explanation
Listen to Ben Millar Cole discuss this work.
Ben Millar Cole, a photographer rooted between the dynamic landscapes of Glasgow and London, navigates portraiture, social documentary, constructed imagery, and studio-based genres, including a foray into AI.
In his practice, Cole's vision is guided by a quest to reveal and cultivate playfulness and humor in the everyday. Through a nuanced lens, he captures the essence of human experience, weaving together narratives that resonate with the subtleties and idiosyncrasies of life.