URBAN FIREFLIES

TRILOGY

Video editing:

Montag

Music:

Concealed Identity - The Connection
Hassan Abou Alam - Generative Dialogue
Calibre - Me Myself and I

Movie:

Traffic lights
Vaga-lumes brilhando na escuridão da noite
Malfunction traffic lights
Grave of the Fireflies - Directed by Isao Takahata
ATCpro - KATL Approach - South Approach - Gameplay
Aircraft with green lights, strange
Luzes piscando 4K Descanso de tela relaxante 2160 x 3840

Why do fireflies have to die so soon?

An insect with a green-blinking butt, to me, is the very definition of inspiration, that’s why another trilogy of videos was born (plus an alternate version of the third one).

MIDORI NO OSHIRI

In this first one, I stole two clips of traffic lights (the urban fireflies), one clip of fireflies partying the night away, added the gorgeous The Connection by Concealed Identity, and called it Midori no Oshiri.

In Japan, the green traffic light is called “ao” (blue) instead of “midori” (green) because the Japanese language originally did not make a distinction between these two colors.

Oshiri really means butt, and everyone distinctly knows what a butt is, and if there’s one thing I truly miss in this life, it’s fireflies — the nature’s green butts.

The last time I saw them was while camping in 2019, and there were only two, so I hoped they were a couple and that they would make a million more fireflies.

Setsuko was right to ask why fireflies live so little, but the memory and the message always remain: a firefly always gives you permission to move forward, and a city with only fireflies running all the traffic lights would be forever green.

GENERATIVE GREEN LIGHTS

Fireflies are stars strolling among us, so in this second idea I strolled and borrowed the most beautiful and then the saddest part of the animation Grave of the Fireflies, and I combined it with the stunning Generative Dialogue by Hassan Abou Alam.

According to Hassan, the sampler’s voice is a recording of a friend saying something like, “keep me posteded and we’ll keep each other posted,” and I liked syncing it exactly to the moment when Seita tells Setsuko it’s time for the light show, and then the fireflies burst out following the melody of the music.

So let’s keep each other posted, and when there’s a firefly show everyone will know — that’s why I called it Generative Green Lights.

ME MYSELF AND THEM
ME MYSELF AND THEM (Phosphene Version)

Fireflies don’t know how to stop blinking but they gently know how to land, and for that very reason they look like calm airplanes waiting for their moment on a radar screen.

That’s why I paired a video of an air traffic control simulator with Calibre’s beautiful Me, Myself and I, and the result felt like a quiet workday for whoever it is that works at the airport.

In the middle of this little game, I remembered that many times the best way for a child to realize the importance of something is to let them learn on their own and talk to themselves or, of course, with their imaginary friends—discovering the wonders of insomnia and that natural LSD called childhood imagination.

So I also added the same song with a swarm of green-bottoms flashing, the best imaginary friends I had as a kid, and made the phosphene version.

I called them both Me Myself and Them, without commas, because no child should ever be forced to put commas in the right places—when they grow up, they’ll eventually learn.

There is no copyright infringement intended, the material used in this is purely for entertainment purposes, and it will be removed by request.

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