Michael Betancourt's Going Somewhere is a glitch-collage movie serial where each episode is 7 minutes long and employs a consistent collection of technical and aesthetic strategies in its construction. Every episode is organized around an archetypal science fiction film narrative schema, one that is immediately recognizable, in order to address the fantasies that these narratives present. They are made with documentary/scientific NASA/JPL documentation, pieces of public domain movies and abstract glitch footage, the episodes also employ a standard title card and an orchestral soundtrack made from Holst's The Planets.

The data stream that is the digital file has been glitched to create a continuous flow of imagery that functions syntactically—eschewing montage and the long take—so that each shot develops seamlessly into the next, morphing from one image into another. The overal structure of these images allows for a consideration of the relationship between displacements (primarily einbau structures) and their capacity to amplify the conceptual-narrative aspects of the science fiction 'story.' At the same time, the conversion of the shot sequence into an ASCii code animation enables a consideration of the distinction between the surface of the image and its internal organization as code. The audience is central to this process: without them, there is no coherence, no organization to this progression.

My use of glitch processes makes us aware our interpretation depends on digital signals, the translation of a machine language whose code is easily alterable, depending on a set of intangible electronic data that is inaccessible to humans: the data stream that is the digital file has been glitched to create a continuous flow of imagery that functions syntactically (by eschewing montage and the long take) so that each shot develops seamlessly into the next, morphing from one image into another. The overal structure of these images allows for a consideration of the relationship between displacements (primarily einbau structures) and their capacity to amplify the conceptual-narrative aspects of the science fiction 'story.' At the same time, the conversion of the shot sequence into an ASCii code animation enables a consideration of the distinction between the surface of the image and its internal organization as code. The audience is central to this process: without them, there is no coherence, no organization to this progression.