This post brought to you by A-SYNC

August 31, 2022 8:22 PM

It all started with a found footage video [9m13s] that since early January has gotten over 38 million views. Purportedly discovered in 1996, what starts out as friends goofing around with their video camera turns into an exploration of strange yellow corridors and something lurking therein. Just a few days later, a second video, this time from 1988, showed some kind of scientific test [1m48s] going on that does a something... Shortly after that, First Contact [1m57s]. What is going on?

The Backrooms [YT playlist] is what is going on. A creation of love and an exercise in Blender skills, this video series is by Kane Pixels. Kane is 17 years old (!) and taught himself Blender and created some fun with it. The videos sort of speak for themselves, but if you want the whole thing explained to you in thorough detail, here is Wendigoon's A Maze of Terror - The Backrooms Series Explained [1h20m]. It's not a completed project, and more videos have been posted since this analysis, so stay tuned.

Like all really great mythic creations, this particular one was fertile ground for many imitators or innovators to expand on the project. But Kane originated the project. So what is his story? What is all of this? Well, Wendigoon once again comes to our aid, with the only interview that Kane Pixel has done so far. An Interview with the Backrooms Mastermind - Kane Pixels [1h57m] is an audio interview running overtop of the backrooms videos, so it's mostly a podcast. It's a really interesting interview, probably gets most of its best material out within the first hour.

One thing mentioned in the interview is Kane's music [Soundcloud link], which are not songs, mostly just various soundtrack-ish atmosphere bits.

posted by hippybear (37 comments total)

Love found footage nonsense!
posted by Windopaene at 10:14 PM on August 31, 2022

Ha, one of the assets is a model of a skip from a kiwi waste management company. We have the exact same skip at work, and I had a distinct "Wait, what?!" moment of disbelief and horror when I saw it. Labyrinthine hallways stalked by eldritch monsters are one thing, but reminders of the dayjob are the true spooky.
posted by colin.jaquiery at 12:11 AM on September 1, 2022 [14 favorites]

The camera movement is extremely realistic and I would love to know how he achieved it.
posted by popcassady at 3:16 AM on September 1, 2022 [2 favorites]

It's a pretty genius idea to turn "I barely know how to make basic 3D scenes in Blender" into pseudo found footage horror by hiding mistakes and amateur skill with post-processing video effects. They clearly had a vision and a story to tell and just went for it as best they could.

Sure, my snarky analytical brain started looking at the little mistakes and barely-rendered scenes cleverly hidden behind and between post-processed video effects.

But this is still a very impressive project and I'm giving a standing ovation to both the idea and the execution. Just A+ work all around. Hopefully someone in Hollywood (using that colloquially) takes note and this kid can explore and expand their visions in fun and weird ways with a proper budget / salary. Or maybe I hope they just do that shit on their own, cause Hollywood™ would ruin them.

I don't know. But standing ovation all the same.
posted by revmitcz at 3:22 AM on September 1, 2022 [3 favorites]

Odd that the explainer vid never mentions the very obvious clue of the research company's name being A-Sync...or, Asynchronous. Yeah, it’s probably something a lot of people will recognize immediately. Still, given the time-shift aspect of his theories, it seems like that would have been something he’d have pointed out right away.
posted by Thorzdad at 4:06 AM on September 1, 2022

Oh, this is what all those TikTok live things are from.
posted by Etrigan at 5:09 AM on September 1, 2022 [1 favorite]

I've seen this! I liked it. But for those of us uh, familiar? with VHS, it is obvious it isn't VHS footage.
posted by tiny frying pan at 5:25 AM on September 1, 2022 [5 favorites]

(I find it kind of quaint that young folk might be fooled though)
posted by tiny frying pan at 5:26 AM on September 1, 2022 [1 favorite]

Very impressive, and all the more impressive that it was made by a high school kid. Reminds me of "The Navidson Report" part of House of Leaves...I wonder if Kane has read it. Genuinely creepy, and for me that's something I find hard to find these days.
posted by zardoz at 6:07 AM on September 1, 2022 [6 favorites]

Zardoz, you beat me to it by one minute. My first thought was proof-of-concept for a House of Leaves movie.
posted by Ben Trismegistus at 6:08 AM on September 1, 2022

This definitely explains why I don't like those huge vacuous backrooms of buildings. I don't like parking garages either, so if anyone does this sort of thing with a huge vacant parking garage, I will watch it and feel my phobia is entirely justified.
posted by Kitteh at 6:21 AM on September 1, 2022 [1 favorite]

Loved being creeped out by it (just watched the first one), gives me the same vibe as early Neill Blomkamp vids.
posted by Iteki at 6:38 AM on September 1, 2022 [3 favorites]

I think this FPP is mostly about this creator, but just for completionist sake, here's a recent article on the Dirt newsletter about the rise and fall and rebooting of The Backrooms internet urban legend.

Love hearing about internet urban legends (like Slender Man...hopefully no real-life murders happen as a result of this one, though.).
posted by msbrauer at 7:08 AM on September 1, 2022 [6 favorites]

But for those of us uh, familiar? with VHS, it is obvious it isn't VHS footage.

Oh, for sure. The biggest overall “tell” is the typical conceit that VHS=Janky, low-quality images. The obvious drop in image quality between the “real world” video the kids are shooting in the first video and the video the kid is shooting after he falls into the Backroom, for instance. There’s also the very obvious texture-mapping on the walls that screams “video game.”

The video also falls into the “dude being chased by evil thing somehow still manages to shoot good video from eye-level” mistake. I mean, if that truly was a ‘90s-era VHS camera the kid was using, the thing would have had a hefty handle (or a hefty carry strap) on top which, if you really were running for your life, you’d simply grab and start running, with any resulting image being pretty much a hip-level blur.

The first clear look we get of the creature walking is pretty telling, too. It’s not grounded or has any appreciable gravity/weight to it, and seems to kind of skate along instead of solidly stepping on the floor.

Please note, these are all tiny nitpicks. I’m loving the world-building in these videos, and really applaud what he’s achieved here.
posted by Thorzdad at 7:19 AM on September 1, 2022 [2 favorites]

This is a sterling example of a kind of MeFi post I truly appreciate: Interesting Thing the Kids Like Presented with Context That Is Helpful for Olds.

Much appreciated!
posted by DirtyOldTown at 8:07 AM on September 1, 2022 [13 favorites]

For me it's the obvious looping in whatever program puts the "VHS noise" over the thing. VHS didn't have a looping scratchiness to it - it was random and usually not that present, unless the tape was super old or worn out.
posted by tiny frying pan at 8:15 AM on September 1, 2022 [3 favorites]

wait, are we supposed to think this is actual VHS footage? I just tore through the whole series and absolutely loved it, but like, loved it largely because I can't cope with actually playing video games and this gave me a lot of what I'm missing out on with them . . . the graphics are super impressive (especially given this whole thing is made by a high school kid) but I feel like I'm missing the part where you're supposed to think it's real?
posted by cabbage raccoon at 8:20 AM on September 1, 2022

That would be the part where it was found in 1996. Representing it from that time would mean "found footage" from VHS recording - and the stylizing on it is definitely VHS inspired.
posted by tiny frying pan at 8:23 AM on September 1, 2022 [1 favorite]

Oh, and the blue screen at the beginning.
posted by tiny frying pan at 8:24 AM on September 1, 2022

sure, yes, but like, it *evokes* VHS wonderfully, no? at least I (child of 1990) think it does a good job of getting across the idea it's VHS, even though it's clearly computer animated... I'm just a bit confused because some people in this thread seem to be reacting to an idea we're not supposed to view this as deliberate, recent art, and I'm not finding anything in the way the videos are presented that suggests we're supposed to think they're actual found footage and/or were created on VHS.
posted by cabbage raccoon at 8:30 AM on September 1, 2022 [3 favorites]

"I'm just a bit confused because some people in this thread seem to be reacting to an idea we're not supposed to view this as deliberate, recent art"

Who?

"I'm not finding anything in the way the videos are presented that suggests we're supposed to think they're actual found footage and/or were created on VHS"

When someone goes to the trouble of making something look like it was filmed on videotape, or if they put fake dust and scratches on film to make it look old, we just go along with it. We're not "supposed to think they're actual found footage". We just play along with it. If this were set up as some kind of prank, then I guess we are supposed to believe it.
posted by jonathanhughes at 8:54 AM on September 1, 2022 [1 favorite]

I can watch horror movies all ding-dong day, but this really got to me for some reason and I had to stop -- oddly enough, the only book that ever actually scared me was House of Leaves, and now I'm wondering if I've got some hang-up about unnavigable and shifting interior spaces that I really need to unpack.

I'm watching in the default YouTube configuration on a laptop screen, and it all looks pretty good to me? I'm sure sharper eyes and keener minds are picking up a lot of discrepancies and AV issues, but in a screen that's about 25% of the real estate of a laptop I feel like it's super solid. And terrifying!
posted by Shepherd at 9:08 AM on September 1, 2022 [3 favorites]

Oh! I always assumed this type of video was meant to fool someone. Otherwise, why all the subterfuge? Even YouTubers go along with analyzing these videos as if they are real, maybe that's part of the fun, pretending it is?
posted by tiny frying pan at 10:12 AM on September 1, 2022

It has a title card near the beginning that says "A short film by Kane Parsons." I don't think he was trying to fool anyone, just give a vibe for the sake of the story.
posted by DirtyOldTown at 12:05 PM on September 1, 2022 [1 favorite]

My experience of these comes from analysis from I think...Night Mind? He always treats these types of videos as if they are real. Definitely this stuff is creepy regardless.
posted by tiny frying pan at 12:18 PM on September 1, 2022

When someone goes to the trouble of making something look like it was filmed on videotape, or if they put fake dust and scratches on film to make it look old, we just go along with it.

We can choose between suspending disbelief for the sake of immersing ourselves in a story and sitting outside it recognizing it as fiction but admiring the craft regardless.

I think there's something wonderful about the fact that for a well-crafted story we're not only able to do both, but switch back and forth to whatever we happen to want.
posted by mhoye at 1:27 PM on September 1, 2022 [3 favorites]

Also definitely inspired by Stranger Things and SCP.

As for the VHS glitches, yes, they are rather overdone but it is possible to have a VHS recording be that artifact-y. If, for example, in circa 1985 you recorded The Terminator on an already much-used VHS tape and then proceeded to watch The Terminator, oh, say every other day followed by, say, every other week for a year or two, the quality would indeed deteriorate and degrade like the videos seen here. Just sayin.
posted by zardoz at 2:03 PM on September 1, 2022 [3 favorites]

Reminds me of "The Navidson Report" part of House of Leaves...I wonder if Kane has read it.

Backrooms is one of those 4chan --> reddit memes, so I would assume he's getting it from people there who have read House of Leaves and/or its wikipedia page.
posted by betweenthebars at 2:08 PM on September 1, 2022

It does degrade...just not like seen here, where the same degraded glitches show up rhythmically. Maybe the software will get better with time too.

(I still like this sort of thing!)
posted by tiny frying pan at 2:22 PM on September 1, 2022

The interview is worth listening to and has answers to many questions in this thread.

• His main background in world building was Big Little World, and his main inspiration for everything was Portal.

• Blender lets you do walkthroughs like it's a videogame (it was going to be a videogame engine at one point, I think), and that's how he got the camera movement.

• There's a deeper story if you watch all the videos, and he has plans to develop it further.

• He's okay with others using his idea but doesn't like a lot of what it's turned into.

• He creates all the sounds and music and directs all the live actors in the videos.

• He's gotten himself freaked out a few times doing his project.

Lots of fun factoids and I listened to the damn thing twice before posting so, yeah, it's a good interview.
posted by hippybear at 4:54 PM on September 1, 2022 [3 favorites]

Oh, and almost certainly a nod to Jeff Vandermeer's Annihilation trilogy. Government wonks trying to deal with The Weird.
posted by zardoz at 9:44 PM on September 1, 2022

msbrauer's link had some interesting stuff about the origins of this in a single image with creepypasta text. And this:

“You guys ruined the Backrooms” began a Reddit thread in July 2021, continuing, “the original concept of The Backrooms was the idea of isolation, and the idea of slowly going insane from seeing the same walls, rooms, and halls everyday without change.

I agree that original concept might be more creepy to think about, but a lot harder to make into compellingly creepy videos.
posted by straight at 11:38 PM on September 1, 2022 [1 favorite]

A-Sync? You bet!

... Wait. What?
posted by charred husk at 9:58 AM on September 2, 2022

Also definitely inspired by Stranger Things and SCP.

And Portal, it seemed to me.

If you like this sort of thing (and video games), give Control a try. Its take on the Backrooms is a fantastic set piece.

if you really were running for your life, you’d simply grab and start running, with any resulting image being pretty much a hip-level blur.

True, but this is also why the Blair Witch Project is more annoying than scary.
posted by snuffleupagus at 8:05 AM on September 3, 2022 [1 favorite]

I find all of this stuff mesmerizing and fascinating. Something best captured in this format and not a short story or something. Although I'd watch a feature-length movie of it, even without the monster, of an endless liminal space.
posted by BlunderingArtist at 9:54 AM on September 3, 2022

One of the more respected "third party" creators is A-Sync Research, and their videos are very much in the vein of Kane's work, and involve a lot more exploring than Kane's output thus far.
posted by hippybear at 10:01 AM on September 3, 2022 [1 favorite]

A-Sync? You bet!

The first of, at least, 14 similar projects.
Justin Timberlake might be a cryptid.
posted by otherchaz at 5:04 PM on September 8, 2022