time-slice
TOWARD A FUNDAMENTAL THEORY OF PHYSICS
Experimental short film, 13', 2025
Available in both 2D and 3D versions (3D recommended)
Shot on 16mm film using a handcrafted Time-Slice camera with 293 lenses—a modern reinterpretation of the original device built by Tim Macmillan in the early 1980s—toward a fundamental theory of physics offers a unique, tactile exploration of time and light as the raw materials and fundamental paradoxes of cinema.
film screenings
2026
14 March - Ribalta Experimental Film Festival - Vignola, IT - 2D
April - Punto de Vista - Pamplona, ES - 3D
More TBA
2025
26 May - Art Cinema OFFoff - Ghent, BE - 3D
8 + 9 October - New York Film Festival (Currents) - New York, US - with Q&A - 3D
7 November - De Koer - Ghent, BE - live edit + concert - 2D
7 November - Light Matter Film Festival - Alfred, US - 2D
15 November - ANALOGICA15 - Bolzano, IT - 2D
30 November + 6 December - Kortfilmfestival Leuven - Leuven, BE - 2D
Dizzying, otherworldly, and truly experimental, toward a fundamental theory of physics deploys a reconstruction of the Time-Slice camera, a circular rig invented by cinematographer Tim MacMillan, that uses 293 lenses shooting simultaneously to capture different points of view in 16mm. Recalling Eadweard Muybridge’s protocinematic experiments in capturing movement, as well as the abstract lichtspiel of intermedia artists such as László Moholy-Nagy, Thomas Wilfred, and Jim Davis, Victor Van Rossem’s 3D film captures three-dimensional light-objects that are at once spectral and tangibly present, a ballet of abstract radiance and undulant color.
While it’s not as ambitious in its use of 3D, Victor Van Rossem’s Toward a Fundamental Theory of Physics is perhaps the strongest film in a mostly excellent group for using it for a single, precise purpose. The visuals in Physics are inextricable from the camera Van Rossem designed and 3D-printed himself. His own variation on the TimeSlice camera, best known for being a sort of prototype for the “bullet time” effects in The Matrix, has 293 lenses designed to run a single strip of film in a simultaneous fashion. When combined with lengthy exposures and the conversion to 3D, the colored lights that Van Rossem waved around in front of the camera flow into one another and into the viewer’s eyes effortlessly. The effect is somewhere in between a Man Ray photogram or if a hand-painted film was made out of light. It’s intensely beautiful, but the charmingly homemade quality occasionally pops up in the form of our filmmaker himself, briefly visible as a distorted image, waving the lights like a conductor who doesn’t call attention to himself.
This is a film that strips cinema to its foundations, examining the ineffable mysteries of physics. At times, quirks in the time-slice will result in jittery motions, or pieces of abstract light formations flaring out in strange projections. Whatever screensaver associations we have with Van Rossem’s imagery are offset by the tactility of 16mm film and the conceptual disjunction of time and space. towards a fundamental theory of physics is a film that qualifies as “pure cinema”, and a worthy experimental film for its ability to show new ways of understanding the moving image.
A filmed experience, that is what Van Rossem has created. As a viewer you are not asked to think or learn anything from this short. You are simply exposed to this beautiful machine at work. Whether or not the viewer enjoys what they see is up to the individual, as toward a fundamental theory of physics is not made for everyone. Having previously studied the sciences, this short experiment is quite magical to witness. To truly understand how it was done, however, is another profound level of thought.
When watching toward a fundamental theory of physics, it feels as though it was made to demonstrate to people around the world what you would get to experience should you have been there in person. The idea to use a 360-degree camera rig to show this exploration of time and light allows the audience to see more of what is being filmed than had a regular camera just been used. That being said, it can become difficult to truly wrap one’s head around the idea of how Van Rossem accomplished. It becomes a requirement for the viewer to decide how to interpret what they are seeing and whether they will truly be able to understand it is a mystery.
But perhaps that is the point. Even though the concept of light and time enters the realm of physics, there is something magical about what we witness. Something that cannot be understood that provides an element of entertainment to this experimental short film. Instead of leaving us alone with light we are given things to think about, should we so wish.
DIRECTOR'S NOTE
—The title is a reference to the “Theory of Everything,” the holy grail of physics—a single law that would unify the theory of relativity and quantum mechanics. A quest in which each step forward also feels like a step backward: to know more is to understand less, a paradox that, for me, also characterises artistic creation.
As in physics, time and light are fundamental to film, and this experiment is a continuation of my research into these elements; a personal mission, perhaps, to unify scientific intent and poetic intuition. Where, in cinema, time and light usually work to reveal and transform the subject, here they become the subjects themselves: time as the sculptor, and light as the sculpted.
This film was created during an artistic residency at Art Cinema OFFoff in Ghent, Belgium, to whom I’m grateful for the time, space, and support they so generously provided.
HISTORY
Back in the early ’80s, Tim Macmillan developed the first Time-Slice camera: a large, circular structure lined with pinhole cameras, all exposing a length of 16mm film simultaneously from different viewpoints. When played in sequence, these images create a tracking shot through time while freezing the motion within—a paradox. With this invention, Macmillan laid the groundwork for The Matrix's Bullet Time effect and many other digital adaptations of this technique. Yet, surprisingly little documentation remains of the original Time-Slice camera—aside from a single short YouTube video.
Victor had long been captivated by these images—not just the technique itself, but also the raw, tactile quality of the 16mm film—when the band Black Flower approached him to create a music video for their song Morning in the Jungle. He took the opportunity to (re)construct a modern version of the device, leading to a first working prototype in 2022.
From October 2024 until May 2025, Victor was as an artist-in-residence at Art Cinema OFFoff in Kunsthal Gent, where he developed a second, improved prototype. This prototype was used to shoot the experimental short film toward a fundamental theory of physics.
The word "toward" implies a work in progress; this short film is only a record of an ongoing search for the true fundamental theory, whatever form it might take.
