Walking by Ryan Larkin (1968)

While attempting to find films that include a significant amount of walking or are based around a walk of some kind, I found a short film created in 1968 by an animator named Ryan Larkin which seemed like the perfect start to exploring walking in film.  The five-minute video shows all different types of walking, but not the purpose for walking. The focus is on the movement, usually based on the type of person, such as a child or a woman in heels.  

The representation of the different ways to walk is completely accurate. They actually look like the people we see walking on the street even though the film is clearly animated.  The animation is done using different drawing and/or painting techniques to represent the people in the film. Sometimes they just look like human forms and sometimes the characters are illustrated to show much more detail. The film only uses music that seems to match the walk seen on screen and no voices, making the different walks the total focus of the film.

The film can me seen at http://www.nfb.ca/film/Walking/

The Way Home

Instead of meeting a stranger, I made the choice to walk with a new friend I met only a few weeks ago. I enjoy taking a walk with one friend because it is a great opportunity to get to know a person better. 

 

Once we met for the walk, we just walked without a plan. We started at his residence and I let him make the decisions on where we were going to go and usually this decision came only when we came to an intersection or separate paths.

 

A few minutes into our walk, Taylor found a tennis ball and it unexpectedly changed the walk. Once found, Taylor played with the tennis ball for the rest of our walk and found ways to do this that involved the architecture on campus. The photo documentation of our walk became focused on the tennis ball and what Taylor did with it.

I found myself seeing new and different things about campus. I looked at some of the architecture in a new way because of the way the tennis ball and Taylor interacted with it.

 

 

Particularly when Taylor threw the ball against a tall cement structure.  I hadn’t really considered this structure before, but once he did this I really appreciated the height of the structure.

 

The biggest challenge of the walk was finding a way to leave an imprint. Since there was not a clear way to leave an imprint that connected with the rest of the walk, once arriving back at Taylor’s residence I just drew a star in the dirt outside. After thinking about this, I am considering placing the tennis ball somewhere else on campus for someone else to find and experience in his or her own way.