Grant Davis and his innovative VJ productions are stretching the visual art world beyond typical confines.

VJ artist Grant Davis (aka. VJ Culture from Dimension 7 and Lumens in San Fancisco) regularly uses his EDIROL products, including the V-4, DV-7PR , PR-50 , PR-80 and EDIROL's latest performance product, the CG-8.

Grant Davis maximizes VJ culture by using light-based art into nightclubs, concert tours and festivals nationally. Davis also produces and curates audio/visual events such as VJ Battles, Video Riots and VJ festivals like AVIT and a monthly gathering in San Francisco called Video Salon. Light Rhythm Visuals, Tokyo X-Ray, VJ-TV and VH-1 have all worked with Davis.

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This vast amount of experience was the backdrop for EDIROL's parent company, Roland Japan, to request that Davis be THE VJ to create some content for the new visual synthesizer, the CG-8. Grant explains: "John Broadhead, Directory of Technology for EDIROL, called and asked me to create a few sample patches for the new CG-8. For me this was a new approach to creating content. I had to conceptualize still frames of video put in motion. The CG-8 takes still images and creates full motion video from a single image.

First, John and two engineers from EDIROL Japan made a special visit to the Dimension 7 studio. They worked with me for two days showing me all the possibilities of the CG-8. Then I decided to extract single frames of video from my library of video content in addition to going out and shooting stills with my digital camera. I chose this method because I wanted to be able to use the V-4 and mix my still images with the original video clips. The CG-8 can also take alpha channel stills in a .png format called, "Stamps". For those I asked my partner Xarene Eskandar to create images in Illustrator and build stamps that overlay on top of the jpegs. This opens up a whole new dimension of effects."

Davis continues raving about the CG-8: "I was amazed at the quality of the video coming out of the CG-8. I haven't found a VJ product that compares in quality and reaction time to triggering. The CG-8 has given me another approach to the creation process in addition to hours of new content. You see, VJ's are always looking for new content; when you work a 6-hour show you want to be able to deliver fresh content that is relevant to the event and the music you are working with. Instead of creating 2 hours of content in a video editing application, I can create 48 still images and mix with them for hours in a live environment. It's great for events with themes. Besides VJ's, I think the CG-8 will be a hit with artists that have a photography background. They can simply drop their library of images into the CG-8 and they are ready for hours of live mixing."

Now that Davis is done with his CG-8 content creation, he can get back to other projects such as video art installations like the "Bay Area Gas Pedal Video" which was shown in LA for an event with the theme of "Freeways". With this creative video project, a person will be in an "immersive environment" to simulate their own paced drive as three EDIROL DV-7PR Presenters are controlled via the "gas pedal" to dictate the speed of the video. Just by sitting in a cube screen setup surrounded by a seamless loop of video footage from all sides, the journey starts on the Bay Bridge through San Francisco, over the Golden Gate Bridge to Marin County and eventually back to the pay toll plaza of the Bay Bridge.

Grand scale productions such as the type that Davis tackles aren't created without an occasional snag. Davis recalls "World Spirit" with Alex Grey in Oakland in 2004 as one of his most challenging shows ever. With the mandate to have three screens sync up to create one large landscape image, using Macs for editing the content, working with very fine detail in Grey's paintings and getting the images a week before the event, three straight days of work blew up in smoke when the Mac's hard drives crashed and the production crew lost hundreds of gigs of storage. Patching together segments of Grey's work, the audience was none the wiser but the toll on Davis was huge as was his disappointment in not producing a show with its full potential. Now that the EDIROL PR-80 is here with Direct Linear editing and instantaneous playback, Davis has switched intense projects such as this over to the PR-80.

Davis has been using EDIROL gear ever since he streamlined his production setup by leaving his Panasonic MX-50, SVHS decks and laptops and portable DVD players at the studio. When asked what Davis likes about EDIROL equipment, he responded: "They never crash, they are easy to use and I can create long high quality clips that can be easily triggered. Currently, you can't do that with a laptop."

Never ceasing to expand his clientele, Davis was at the Olympics in Torino where he escalated the excitement of the Olympics with his visuals. Check out the VJ Culture blog.

Within Dimension 7's mission statement is the commitment to live visual performance artists, time based visual and CG artists, experimental filmmakers and installation builders. Promoting technical experimentation and their community's aesthetic development, Dimension 7's contribution to the VJ scene is huge. Grant Davis and his innovative VJ productions are stretching the art world beyond typical confines. Because of Dimension 7's unique viewpoints, his viewers engage with their surroundings releasing their new perspectives into the world.