As Trippy Videos Go, Kouhei Nakama's Makin' Moves Is As Wild As They Come

There are trippy videos and then there's this from Tokyo-based visual art director Kouhei Nakama titled 'Makin' Moves which sees a bunch of people's dance moves warp and bend into seriously freaky visuals. Kouhei, who works at WOW Inc., has combined various animation techniques to turn the human form into bizarre but mesmerizing geometric mutations in 'Makin' Moves'. And the end result is what you would expect. Trippy.

But it's no surprise, because Kouhei Nakama is known for producing trippy videos using CGI and generative techniques to distort the human body. In a previous video he made called Diffusion, Kouhei imagined what humans might look like if they had chameleon-like changeable skin.

"This work begins with my encounter with mathematical formulas, Reaction-Diffusion Systems." Nakama told BSOmultimedia.com about Diffusion. "It is reported that patterns generated by the systems have similarities to natural patterns of animals, insects and plants. It is also pointed out that this pattern could be the basis of the morphogenesis of an organism. Just after the encounter with the formulas, I had a question in my mind. Why isn’t human skin covered with patterns? As I researched, I found that human skin is also covered with the pattern, Blaschko’s lines. The stripes are ordinarily invisible with the naked eye, because they are very vague. I consider that there is the possibility that people could obtain patterns like animals in the future."

Trippy Videos, Biomorphic Themes & Makin' Moves

Makin' Moves continues those experimental, biomorphic themes, as dancers suddenly multiple and swim in all directions like a shoal of fish. Or swirl in the air, twisting out of shape as though they were being pulled through a portal. Other figures glitch and wobble, while others' bodies separate in half, another version of themselves popping out of their waist to lift up their upper body.

If it all sounds a bit frightening, it's anything but. Instead it's all done with a great sense of fun, playing with motion graphics with a truly inventive spirit.

Check out some stills from the video below. And see more of Kouhei Nakama's trippy videos at his website.