Warsaw Hyperlapse – On a Bike

If Warsaw is on your bucket list or you are visiting Poland in the near future, take a look at this remarkable hyperlapse.  Youtube creator MrTiuro got on his bike and, well, the rest is here for you to see.  He starts in the Old Town district, journeys through it and then ends up in the new commercial hub in Warsaw’s Wola district.

You can’t really get a more honest  view of a city than driving (or in this case, cycling) through it.  Warsaw truly has a dual identity.  First, the old town charms with its cobblestone streets and oozes history.  It is difficult to believe that most of it was painstakingly rebuilt after World War II. Then, we reach the skyscrapers of the modern city – impressive.  However, Warsaw did get its first true skyscraper in 1955 with the completion of the Palace of Culture and Science (Pałac Kultury i Nauki), a towering building that remains one of the city’s most recognisable landmarks – and you will see that too in the video below.

I don’t want you to divert your eyes from the buildings, but when I ran through the video a second time, there was one thing that really struck me (I live in London, which looks filthy by comparison).  That is, the streets are spotless.  Absolutely spotless.  I couldn’t spot that many bins for public use (although I did see some in the video), so I have to assume one of two things – or maybe it's both of them!  Either the Poles are a fastidiously tidy people who highly disapprove of littering or the City Cleaning Authority (Zarząd Oczyszczania Miasta, ZOM) is one of the best in the world.  Or both.  Regardless, enjoy this whirlwind tour through the streets of the city of Warsaw. Who knows, maybe in a short time, you will be ambling through them yourself.

Warsaw – City of Ruins

Digital technology has allowed us to play all sorts of tricks on the imagination – the cityscape surrounding Will Smith in I Am Legend is just one example of how the appearance of a city can be changed to appear as it would after a force of total malevolence had wreaked its damage.

Yet many people throughout history had no need of FX trickery to experience apocalypse and that was certainly the case for the people of Warsaw after the Second World War.  Previously one of the most beautiful cities in Europe, a place full of life and culture, the city was all but destroyed by the time hostilities ceased in 1945, its population more than decimated and its buildings and streets in complete ruin.

Yet in some ways black and white photography and grainy film footage can lose its impact over the decades, particularly for young people for whom there is no immediate memory of the carnage.  With that in mind Warsaw Rising Museum has commissioned this remarkable digital reconstruction of the Warsaw as it was after the war - City of Ruins.

The Polish capital is the first city to undergo this kind of digital recreation to show what it had been reduced to only a lifetime ago.  A team of thirty graphic artists contributed for two years to create this five minute reconstruction and Platige Image acted as Producer.

Following the flight path of a US Liberator over the ravaged city this elegant piece of digital art is somehow disquieting and calming at the same time.  It gives us a full picture of just how the city looked in its entirety (if that is the right word for these remnants of cosmopolitan life) and the work that its population had ahead of them in order to raise the city from the ruins.

The Visual Effects Society has recently announced the nominations for their prestigious VES Award for the best special effects in film, television, commercials and games. City of Ruins has been nominated for Outstanding Visual Effects in the Special Venue Project category.

The Warsaw Rising Museum will be presenting the film from 1 August and its Director, Jan Ołdakowski, would be delighted if you could come to the museum and watch the film.

Warsaw: 24 Hour Timelapse

The Polish capital, Warsaw, here gets the timelapse treatment, with something of a difference.  Film-maker Maciej Margas gets up high in the city and shoots his film from buildings such as Cosmopolitan, Złota 44, Marriott, Millennium Plaza, Rondo 1, and the tower of the Saint Augustine's Church.  The result is a compelling portrait of one of Europe’s most intriguing and historic capital cities.