Maddie Vassalo

Video/Animation Highlights

About Me

Maddie Vassalo is a multidisciplinary visual and performing artist pursuing a BFA in Interarts Performance with a minor in Computer Science at the University of Michigan.While Maddie has many creative interests she is most interested in film, animation, and extended realityShe is also a co-founder of Naming All the Flowers I Could, a performing arts collective that creates work centering LGBTQ and feminist issues and focuses on the uplifting and platforming of queer and female artists.

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DIRECTING and PRODUCTION

DIRECTING and DESIGN

PRODUCTION / STAGE MANAGEMENT

INTERACTIVE MEDIA

Game Design

Extended Reality

Virtual Production

Experimental

Web Development

Ocean Rescue

In this game you must navigate vast underwater caves in order to rescue your fellow divers. Will you save them all? Or will you run out of oxygen or lose in an encounter with the mystical beasts that inhabit these caves.This game was a solo project, I designed all the visual assets using Procreate and Photoshop, designed the world map, and implemented all the mechanics. All audio is from the Youtube Audio Library.
Made with Unity

SHADOWLAB

In Shadow Lab, a first-person stealth game set in a Soviet laboratory during the Cold War, players utilize spatial audio to navigate their surroundings. You, the lab's beloved experiment, notices some strange events and must escape, or else face death!Contributions to the game: I was in charge of the audiovisual effects in the game as well as the narrative storyline. During this project I learned about and experimented with the steam audio package for unity to implement the spacial audio based mechanics. I also researched historical references for Cold War era soviet labs in order to build a more accurate environment and storyline. I also along with one other teammate was in charge of the level design. Together we created map layouts and the sequence of events that occurred in each level. I then using a variety of modeling softwares, including Unity pro builder, implemented our map designs,
Made with Unity

Speculative Worlds

March 2024

An immersive visual and auditory experience of a speculative human colony on Mars. This project uses the Steam Audio system to create a soundscape for the viewer to explore as they move throughout the world

Made with Unity, Photoshop, and Steam Audio

Ann Arbor Go

A Pokemon go style AR game where the player can plant and protect trees in Ann Arbor MI. Features a custom developed night mode that unlocks new seed types and character models

Melody Grove

Melody Grove is an AR app aimed to bridge the gap in early music education for composition. Composition is difficult and technical, but we strive to make it easy and fun for people of all ages to enjoy. With curated sound packs and immersive AR technology we aim to teleport users into a beautiful melodic soundscape of their own creation.
Made with Unity, the Unity AR Template and the Steam Spatial Audio Plugin.

My contributions: Created inventory system, implemented spatialized audio, implemented custom recording feature

Break Breathe

Written and Directed by Maddie Vassalo
Director of Photography: Catherine Miller
Assistant Director: Callista Brand
Art Direction: Miles Hionis
Set Design: Ren Kosiorowski
Virtual Set Design: Maddie Vassalo
Costume Design: Dana Gray
Audio Supervisor: Patterson McKinney
Cast: Miles Hionis, Coltrane Gilman, Maddie Vassalo

When We Break, We Breathe is an interactive film (similar to Black Mirror: Bandersnatch). The piece was filmed using virtual production techniques.
Edited in Premiere Pro, virtual set built in Unreal Engine, Programmed with Unity in C#.

Supported by: ArtsEngine, Arts at Michigan, SMTD Excel, The Social and Environmental Sustainability Initiative, and the Emerging Technologies Group

The Big City, Lost and Found in XR

Director: Maddie Vassalo
Physical Set Design: Maddie Vassalo
Virtual Set Design: Nicole Salinas, Hannah Kim, Jane (Jing Min) Mei
Programmers: Andy Yao, Jane (Jing Min) Mei
Production Supervisor: Dari Eskandari
Performers/Collaborating Artists: Raymond Nat Turner, Zigi Lowenburg
Musicians: Andy Milne (piano), Kris Johnson (trumpet)

Funeral

Conceptualized by Ontroerend Goed, presented in Redruth, England as part of the Redruth Theater Festival

Devised By: Alexander Devriendt, Aurelie Lannoy, Charlotte Devriendt, Karolien De Bleser
Rehearsal Assistants: Talia Eaton, Maddie Vassalo

Funeral is a collective ritual about the finiteness of things, created by Ontroerend Goed. It shall start, in the dark. We will greet each other and we will say goodbye. There will be singing and pretending. There will be light and room for darkness. We’ll light candles, we will eat and drink and celebrate our lives. And all of that will end. Welcome.

Iphis and Ianthe

Written and Conceptualized by Maddie Vassalo, Miles Hionis, and Rory Hunt
Directed by Rory Hunt, Miles Hionis, and Maddie Vassalo
Director of Photography: Maddy Ringo
Sound: Josh Cheng, SinYu Deng
Composition and Score: Maddy Ringo
Costume Design: Dana Grey and Venus Stanton
Environment Design: Maddie Vassalo

Iphis and Ianthe is a short film that places the Greek myth of the same name in a more contemporary framework.Our film updates this story, questioning the idea that all transgender individuals seek surgery to alleviate their dysphoria. Instead, we discuss Iphis’s process of learning how to accept his body and becoming comfortable sharing himself with another human being.Iphis and Ianthe takes influence from Wes Anderson’s work as well as experimental films, combining virtual production, unconventional script writing, and rich visual symbolism.Iphis and Ianthe ultimately begs the question “how do we discover safely how to share our bodies with our first love?”

Supported by: ArtsEngine, Arts at Michigan, SMTD Excel, The Wellness Initiative, and the UM Library

Set Design and Virtual Production

The production uses virtual production technology. The film was be shot almost entirely in the studio, with a background built in Unreal Engine and synced to the real life camera. We expanded this world through a physical set consisting of variety of fake potted plants in the foreground and mirrors on the ground to represent water.

Trailer

Outfit Of The Die

Interarts Showcase 2023: Look What's Here

Written by Maddie Vassalo, Dana Gray, Juliette Todd, and Aya Galang
Projection Design: Maddie Vassalo and Dana Gray
Motion Tracking: Maddie Vassalo
Audio Design: Aya Galang
Performers: Juliette Todd and Dana Gray
Production Stage Manager: Maddie Vassalo

In Outfit of the Die a cyborg individual is informed by her AI companion that electronic systems could crash, and consequently, she could die. Of course, our Cyborg is most concerned about what she’s going to wear when her system crashes. The piece utilizes innovative motion tracking technology and projection mapping on the body, digital fashion styling, as well as other audio visual elements.The motion tracking was done with Touch Designer using an Xbox Kinect as a depth camera. The projections were edited in Premiere Pro and the audio was done with Logic ProThis piece was produced as a part of the 2023 Interarts Showcase Look What's Here which premiered at the University of Michigan in Fall 2023

IF THE WORLD ENDS TOMORROW ITS ALL YOUR FAULT

Directed by Marta Frank and Maddie Vassalo
Director, Writer and Costume Designer.
Written by Marta Frank, Maddie Vassalo, and Rory Hunt with the cast
Filmed Documentation Producer: Maddie Vassalo

In If The World Ends Tomorrow It’s All Your Fault we explore how the media we consume comes out in us, how it not only ends up influencing how we think or feel but also alters our perception while fundamentally changing the world we live in both physically and socially. The show follows two twenty-something roommates stuck in their room (that limited but also limitless pandemic room). The script was directly taken or adapted from newspaper and magazine clippings of the past and the room itself was made of the script. Monologues guide how this media and interpersonal connection guides our perception, making the shift from a person choosing the stories they consume to now the stories choosing the person.

Supported by ArtsEngine, Arts at Michigan and BasementArts

Circus On! Sonny's Blues

Directed by Stephen Rush
Stage Manager: Maddie Vassalo
A Production of John Cage's Circus On!

A production of John Cage's Circus On! Using the book Sonny's Blues by James Baldwin as source material. This piece uses John Cage's method of turning any piece of text into a radio play and adapts that into a one hour filmed show exploring the life of a black man living in Harlem.

Unexpected Mischievousness at the Queen's Palace

Director: Rose Alybat
Costume and Props Designer/Production Assistant: Maddie Vassalo
Written by Rose Alybat

Reshuffling the Deck is an integrated Film, Television, and Media honors thesis aimed at challenging the gender norms in early cinema through a creative remake of Georges Méliès’ 1905 film LES CARTES VIVANTES.
The project involves a 3D virtual model of Méliès' studio that was built based on surviving historical photographs, drawings, and published accounts.

Illustrations Made for the Set

Set Pictures/Costume Designs

Murakami by the Sea

Directed by Tzveta Kassabova
Stage Manager: Maddie Vassalo
Devised by Tzveta Kassabova with the cast and crew.

Murakami by the Sea is a full evening length devised work inspired by novels and short stories by Haruki Murakami. Placed within a constantly evolving environment of cardboard and broken tires the production bridges the gap between the genres of visual art, music, theater, and movement.

DISRUPTED

Written and Directed by Nicole Denise White
Costume Designer and Creative Collaborator: Maddie Vassalo

Disrupted is a one woman experimental film about the loss of Nicole Denise White’s father to suicide. Through a multimedia collage of 10 chapters, Disrupted navigates Niki’s coming-of-age while remembering and retelling her father’s story. This series of vignettes explore the multifaceted perspectives on mental health, suicide, love and loss.

Legend of Zelda NES First Dungeon Recreation

Maddie Vassalo

Contributions to the Game: Developed the enemies, health system, integrated assets into the main game, designed custom level and created custom lava enemy for the custom level

Made with Unity in C# with assets from spriters-resource.com

Garments and Photography

ANIMATION

One Small Step for Man

April 2023

A short animation that explores the relationship between humanities great technological achievements and war through the lens of the moon landing and the nuclear arms race. Two events caused by the Cold War. This animation uses several styles of animation as well as historical pictures and footage from the space and nuclear arms races.Made with a combination of Photoshop, Aftereffects, and Premiere Pro. Footage and images from NASA and the Atomic Archive

A Visit From an Inter-dimensional Being

October 2022

A rotoscoped animation made using Photoshop. This piece is inspired by the rotoscoped film A Scanner Darkly

It's Only Me and You

November 2022

This animation was made using Adobe Animate and Premier Pro. It was mostly an experiment of what could be done with the software. Each section is explores different methods of animating, from frame by frame to key framing.

Maddy Ringo - Wake Up Woman Marketing

Other Poster Design