A hybrid city—corridor
Walking along the corridor, what do people feel? This video performs a suppressing atmosphere with various transitions between corridors. Corridors, open spaces located between different exits and joints of surrounding environments, usually long and narrow. Unlike a room, corridors are merely an access for walking through and reaching destinations. It is worth noting that a long and narrow space triggers people thinking, rendering a sense of orientation both on their thoughts and walking.
Regarding the story plot, this video is not a documentary, which introduces the function of the corridors and the heritage culture exclusively. Instead, the story is set in the protagonist’s dream. The transitions of numerous corridors produce a mysterious atmosphere, reflecting his/her loneliness and isolation. Over a few years, Covid lives along with us and this is the reason the scenes of the mask and alcohol sanitizer appear in his/her subconscious mind. At the first glimpse, the protagonist feels curious and frightened of the transitions so he/she keeps rubbing the eyes to confirm the places he/she are standing at. Yet, on closer examination of the video, the protagonist feels scared of being alone and this also explains the memorization of playing ping pong with friends, barbecuing and celebrating the birthday. At last, the protagonist opens the door and enters the room, indicating he/she desires to escape the anxiety and self-isolation.
Methods of conducting the research and producing the video
This video is filmed at numerous places—Tai Kwun, Pedder Street, Main building, Hawking Wong Building, Chi Wah Learning Commons, Sheung Wan MTR station. Places are selected for some considered factors related to hybrid elements, including modernity and traditionalism, and the embedded culture of Chinese and Western.
Part of the heritages in Hong Kong are revealing colonialism and collective memory of the older generation. The mixture of Chinese and Western styles characterize the uniqueness of Hong Kong. Particularly, hybrids in Hong Kong’s urban heritage of conservation shows that those styles and the conservation also combine some modern elements into the historical architectures. For instance, the installed lighting system and the material of the wooden windows and doors. Tai Kwun shows the corporation of business and heritage conservation. In the corridor, restaurant signs are hung near the ceilings. Moreover, the Chinese and Western architectural characteristics show in corridors as well. Published articles demonstrate that western architectural characteristic is open, able to capture everything in a glance and the main impression comes from a positive direction and Chinese culture usually has enclosed walls and various depth of the bright contrast via the location of constructed windows.
As for the settings, a cloudy day is chosen for the filming section in order to produce a suppressing and self-isolated ambience in the video. With a view to pretend to be a human’s viewpoint, the camera angles are set horizontally and the screen shakes when the protagonist is running with extreme anxiety. The camera sometimes ‘raises his/her head and looks down to the ground’ and therefore the visual elements of a building, like a complete structure of the corridor and the floor, can then be captured.
With the enhancement of the feeling of loneliness and anxiety, any sound effects are not added to the video and the audience can only listen to the sound of footstep with the weight of steps and the speed of walking pace reflecting his/her emotions. With the use of getting access, people seldom gather in the corridor for multiple activities. Thus, corridors are quiet most of the time. Background noise can also clearly be heard, like a shouting baby and chatting sound, revealing a silent place, i.e. corridors, in an urban city.
Concerning the silence and noise, research reveals that noise can be any form of interference and unexpected and meaningless sounds from a subjective perspective. Usually, listening to the noise is also a way to understand the world on a day-to-day basis, people should discard some pre-interpretation and those ignited irregularities, movements or interruption also feature the urban city characteristics. Scenes of ‘corridor’ at Pedder Street and other corridors in various buildings show the contrast between the noise and silence. Central should be a hustle and bustle, yet Tai Kwun renders a little quiet corner of Central. The comparison of noise also perform the impact of Covid associated with the sound.
The message
Urban characteristics can be viewed from different perspectives. Corridor constitutes the structure of a building and it also symbolizes the dynamic of urban cities in my opinion. The intention of producing this video as a story is the ignition of thinking in accordance with the linkage with human beings, community or even the urban city you live in.
–Yeung Po Ying, 3035923940
Elizabeth Ho. “Heterotopic Heritage in Hong Kong: Tai Kwun and Neo-Victorian Carceral Space.” Humanities (Basel) 11, no. 1 (2022): 12.
Lau, Stephen Siu Yu, Zhonghua Gou, and Yajing Liu. “Healthy Campus by Open Space Design： Approaches and Guidelines.” Frontiers of Architectural Research 3, no. 4 (2014): 452-67.
Patriotta, Gerardo. “Cities of Noise: Sensemaking, Sensemakers, and Organized Worlds.” Academy of Management Review 41, no. 3 (2016): 557-70.
Tritto, Angela, and Wei Lit Yew. “Embeddedness and Hybrid Organisations in Malaysia’s Urban Heritage Governance.” International Journal of Public Administration, 2021, 1-15.
Wu, Xue Ping, and Yue Xi Zhou. “A Preliminary Compare of the Chinese and Western Architecture.” Advanced Materials Research 255-260 (2011): 1523-526.
The theme of the video is clear with different corridors shown in the perceptive of pedestrians. Also, this theme of investigating corridors is inspiring as this is an important yet underrated element in the built environment. However, some parts of the video can be improved. E.g. bgm/ narration can be added to the video to give element other than visuals to audiences. Narration can also convey the messages clearer.
I really like the way that you connect the architectural structure of the corridor to the concept of the hybrid city. Corridors are usually ignored in the city as they are not a living space. People only use it to transport from one place to another. However, it is still possible for us to slow down and appreciate it during pandemics. Furthermore, I enjoyed how you specifically chose a cloudy day to film. I can feel the “suppressing and self-isolated ambience” that you tryna produce. Overall, I think there’s some improvement that could be made on the editing of the clip, but the explanation is pretty promising.
Shooting the video in first person point of view was undoubtedly a good decision on visual design to convey people’s loneliness and emotions in this pandemic. I appreciate how you included diversified corridors of different architecture styles to portray Hong Kong as a hybrid city as well as utilizing sounds of the original footages which were well incorporated into the video. For instance, the hustling of vehicles in Pedder Street, the sound of escalator in MTR station and laughter in the background of the corridor in our school campus, which all fostered their unique atmosphere hence convey the protagonist’s feeling of being lost and confused. I also like how you incorporate the idea of corridor into our actual lives, in which we fear yet also anticipate what would be ahead of us at the other end of this corridor of life.
I appreciate your video. Your video is quite impressive. Through this video, I can understand the improtance of corridor which connects one place to another. Also, by showing multiple corridors, I can see how you use muoltiple corridors to explain contras which can be observed in Hong Kong such as a mixture of Western and Chinese style of architecture. You are successfully emphasize and deliver a feeling of loneliness and isolation by excluding bgm. However, if there is narrative subtitles, it would be better, since some people may have difficulty in understanding this video.
It is so interesting that your video uses the view of animals to see the world, The curved lens particularly vividly mimics the animal’s point of view. The two different scenes are contrary, one is from the human perspective, and one is from animal. The power of human is destructive, as the peers(animals) of the city are under the control of human. It is reflective that whether the superiority and domination of human are ecological or not.
I appreciate the creative approach and the visual design of the video. The video does produce a sense of anxiety and alienation. However, the element of research on the corridor as a site is not as strong or clear. For example, you included some research information on the corridors you selected, but they do not really fit into your research question of how they make people feel.