The pilot event took place on the 5th of April 2011 with the following thinkers:

Imran Ali, Herb Kim, Jonathan Lindh, John O’Shea, Tyler Moorehead and Benedict Phillips.

Tech Yurt was developed as a collaborative project between Pete Eyres and Dave Lynch, whilst attending the Artimelt Academy funded by the Arts Council.

Working with Benedict Phillips and Glenn Boulter, we developed Digital Media Labs [digitalmedialabs.org], a process whereby a residential media lab creates a new way of commissioning digital art.

The idea was to give 10 nominated artists (nominated by regional art institutions, commissioners and festivals) who weren’t necessarily from technical backgrounds the time, equipment and space to experiment with technology.  This term of play is to happen in a dedicated residential environment supported by a team of inspiring teachers, experts and speakers.

Only after this week of experimentation is over, will the artists (and only these artists) be presented with a brief for the commission.

The first lab took place in Hull in 2010 centered on the use of touch screen technology – see below for more details. we are now in the final stages of the production of the commissions.  The will be installed in September 2011 for the launch of the Wilberforce Health Centre.

The Lab in Hull

About the Digital Media Lab

Digital Media Labs offered ten chosen artists a week-long residency as part of a commissioning process for a touch screen art work for the new multi-million pound NHS Hull Wilberforce Health Centre. This commission and Lab will be a key part of their innovative and ambitious arts programme for the new city centre multi-use building.

Future Everything, FACT, Folly, MAAP, Hull Film, QUAD and Hull School of Art and Design were asked to nominate up to three artists, from this selection ten artists were selected by the DM Lab team and the NHS to participate in our residential Media Lab, where they explored new ways of working with touch screen technologies. The residency was led by the Digital Media Labs team and the awesome Ben Dalton – an expert in the field of visual arts and digital technology.

About the Digital Media Lab and Commission

The residential Media Lab brought together a mixed community of artists, designers and programmers in a dedicated environment. The focus of the residency was on experimentation and exploration. It provided time, space and equipment for resident artists to be able to learn, develop and experiment with the technology. The intention was to give the artists 7 days hands on, research and development with the support of professional technologists leading to the interim exhibition showcasing the results of the lab.

The culmination of Media Lab gave the opportunity for the artists to present and discuss their work at a dedicated presentation. Following the presentation of works the participating ten artists, and only these artists, were presented with the commission brief for a site-specific touch screen artwork and invited to submit a proposal.

It is key to the philosophy of Digital Media Labs that the actual presentation of the commission brief will not presented to participants till the period of lab and experimentation had taken place.

The exhibition is a project initiated by Micheale Spessa & Dave Lynch in collaboration with Bent Architect.

Ten Internationally submitted audio visual artworks  exploring stories formulated from the fractal nature of bipolar mania.  The curators are interested in how a hybrid of curation, film programming and proximity broadcast can embody the multiple cognitive processes of mania.  Simultaneously projection of the ten works onto the courtyard facades of Temple Works interwoven location based pockets of FM transmitted soundtracks will allow the viewer to discover the audio by movement; either syncing to the original, re-scoring the remaining 9 works or creating an interference of multiple soundtracks.

The ideology behind the uses of these technologies was to enable the audience to become the integral part of the programming.  Each audience member or group was to be given a FM radio with which they could wander the site and actively choose which sound track to listen.  Due to the nature of the short broadcast, some streams were only available in a small 2 metre radius, whilst others spanned the whole site, other national radio stations, such as Radio 1 (BBC) or Classic FM were along side the local radio stations which could be serendipitously stumbled upon or mistaken for the films score.

Due to more technical difficulties on the night, we were unable to document the works how we would have liked and  the FM broadcast technology let us down so we could only broadcast on 1 fm channel effectively, we decided to curate the programme once as in a traditional film screening.  We then used this programme for 3 experiements:

1.  The 10 films playing simultaneously with the soundtracks.

2.  Playing the films individually set in their locations on the building.

3. The films each taking the full 40 metre span of the largest part of the building.

The following photographs have been taken by Phil Slocombe.  We also hope to get further documentation of each of these experiments.

Thanks to Light Night Leeds, Lumen Arts, Jonathan Khan and Robert Sharples

Involved artists

1. Chinese Wedding Dancer – Neil Ira Needleman [USA]

2. York 9 – Lorenzo Madge [UK]

3. …the only time i feel totally free is… Joanna Byrne [UK]

4. Compressive/ Percussive – Scott Stark  [USA]

5. Neolithic Science: V to I – Edmund Goubert [UK]

6. Ubiquinone – Will Simpson [UK]

7. On and On – Blake Shirley – [USA]

8. Cancionero – Joaquin Gasgonia Palencia [PHILIPPINES]

9. Pasja – Michal Brzezinski [POLAND]

10. Terese Machine – Paul Wiersbinski [GERMANY]

Chinese Wedding Dancer – Neil Ira Needleman [USA] – A lyrically rhythmic optical-audio experience with constantly changing graceful and/or violent patterns–all concocted using video footage shot at my son’s wedding in China. Through editing, I’ve imposed new patterns and pulsating bursts of movement on a folk dance performance.

York 9 – Lorenzo Madge [UK] – YORK 9; The milestone where I nearly died, I found you after 40 years, now I can visit the place and control the traffic, I can stand there and it can’t touch me and when it’s not looking I can run across the road, this time it won’t hurt me.

Compressive/ Percussive – Scott Stark  [USA] A double projector video installation. The imagery is taken from a double decker interstate freeway a few blocks from my current residence in Austin, Texas. The sequences are all randomly edited. It is a frenetic, bi-polar, yet oddly meditative.

…the only time i feel totally free is… Joanna Byrne [UK]
Erehwyreve dna ereht ereh
Ereh erehwyreve dna ereht
Ereht ereh erehwyreve dna
Dna ereht ereh erehwyreve
Erehwyreve dna ereht ereh

Neolithic Science: V to I – Edmund Goubert [UK]
The film, which has a shortwave soundtrack, unfolds beneath a motorway bridge, narrated by a list of ‘mental disorders’ taken from the ‘bible of modern psychiatry’: the Diagnostic Statistical Manual (DSM). The film exposes a maniacal psychosis at the heart of psychiatry, camouflaged by the ‘rational’ language of science.

On and On – Blake Shirley – [USA]
This video, as in life, contains moments that seem to be clear, if only fleeting, while resounding of uncertainty. Fragmented moments of everyday scenes, distorted and shifting scale relationships and the emphasis on fractured narrative demonstrate this. This video serves to exemplify these parallels with our own infinitely layered existence.

Ubiquinone – Will Simpson [UK]
Made with 5000 still images taken over 5 years out of shear frustration during a creative block back in 2006.

Cancionero – Joaquin Gasgonia Palencia [PHILIPPINES]
Exploring dichotomies in gender, religion and cultural stereotyping, Cancionero uses the backdrop of Christendom’s Good Friday observance in the small town of Vinzons, Camarines Norte in the Philippines, to lay open and tease out, layer by layer, the undercurrents of a culture superimposed, of a nation bound by the chains of religious zeal and questionably placed superhuman devotion.  Cancionero presents the Philippine psyche as well as its reflexive mirror, the Pygmalion of religion that has shaped this country of victims and supplicants, eternally, endlessly hopeful for
blessings.

Pasja – Michal Brzezinski [POLAND]
I would like to say that all my activity is on the rudimental level connected with process of reconstruction, or/and de-construction of the identity in the visual culture (mainly identity is based on language, so recontextualisation in the visual art language is the something between re- and de-construction in this case).

Terese Machine – Paul Wiersbinski [GERMANY]
Refers to Worlds First Fully Functioning Organic Computer [mania story from extra submission
information].

“When I was taken to St James’ to see a doctor I realised that not only could I absorb huge amounts of information from television or books through taking photographs with my eyes – in essence I was filming the pages or pictures for visual recall later. I realised that I could control the channels being shown on the TV screens with my mind. It dawned on me that I was evolving into the worlds first fully functioning organic computer. Later on that day I became concerned about how I was going to switch myself off..I was overheating. I remember asking at the nurses station for a solution and a nurse suggest that I restart…..brilliant.”
—
When terese encounters the machine she has to deal with its human qualities. In a world of constant technical innovation, terms of interaction and control become blurry.

Call for submissions

We are looking for 10 films or audio-visual works that explore the fractal nature of bipolar mania.  We are interested in how a hybrid of curation, film programming and proximity broadcast can embody the multiple cognitive processes of mania.  Using a 100m of courtyard walls, we aim scale up beyond the viewers horizon, interwoven location based pockets of FM transmitted soundtracks will allow the viewer to discover the audio by movement; either syncing to the original, re-scoring the remaining 9 works or creating an interference of multiple soundtracks.  The exhibition is a project initiated by Micheale Spessa & Dave Lynch in collaboration with Bent Architect.

Definition of Mania by Medterms.com http://www.medterms.com/script/main/art.asp?articlekey=4271
Mania: An abnormally elevated mood state characterized by such symptoms as inappropriate elation, increased irritability, severe insomnia, grandiose notions, increased speed and/or volume of speech, disconnected and racing thoughts, increased sexual desire, markedly increased energy and activity level, poor judgment, and inappropriate social behavior. A mild form in mania that does not require hospitalization is termed hypomania. Mania that also features symptoms of depression (“agitated depression”) is called mixed mania.
Mania is the Greek word for madness. It is derived from mainmai, to rave in anger. The Maniai in Greek mythology were the Furies who pursued those who had done unavenged crimes and drove them to madness.

These works will form a projection exhibition and will be presented simultaneously by forming part of 100m projection (using 4-6 projectors) with the audio being broadcast using FM transmitters.  This exhibition will form part of Leeds Light Night on October 2010.  There is also potential for further commissioning with the work forming part a theatre piece devised by Bent Architect from which the original inspiration for the exhibition.

Temple Works
Once the largest room in the world, Temple.Works.Leeds has reopened as a cultural venue. From music to theatre, art and film to corporate events the three-building site is coming to life. www.templeworksleeds.com
Please see supporting information on the following page for 5 examples of mania.

Supporting information:

Below are 5 stories from the bipolar mind during mania.  Please feel free to respond to one of the stories below, although we are also open to works which respond to mania in the more general sense.

TV Tapping
During a certain period of my life I became aware that my TV was tapping into a special channel that was giving me access to an alternative, elite level of society.  One very special night I watched an episode of the Bill that was specially for me.   Another time I watched the CCTV feed from a reality show and realised that it was showing me a glimpse of another, higher section of society that I was soon to become a member of.

Chinese Bench
When I was in hospital I used to really like spending time in the garden – I used to like going there to smoke a cig in the fresh air as the smoking room in the ward was a bit fetid and they rarely opened the French doors.  The non smoking common room seemed to always smell of sick.  The garden was enclosed by 4 glass corridors and had a fountain in the middle filled with coins surrounded by benches – some people liked to sleep out on the benches if the weather was warm – my favourite bench had bamboo behind.  It was my favourite because when I sat there I was able to speak and understand Chinese – is bamboo Chinese?

Worlds First Fully Functioning Organic Computer.
When I was taken to St James’ to see a doctor I realised that not only could I absorb huge amounts of information from television or books through taking photographs with my eyes – in essence I was filming the pages or pictures for visual recall later.  I realised that I could control the channels being shown on the TV screens with my mind.  It dawned on me that I was evolving into the worlds first fully functioning organic computer.  Later on that day I became concerned about how I was going to switch myself off..I was overheating.  I remember asking at the nurses station for a solution and a nurse suggest that I restart…..brilliant.

Switch
After a particularly long period of blackness I woke up one day very feeling suddenly better – almost like a switch had been flicked.  It was a fresh sunny morning and I had to get up and do something with the day – during this period I resolved to make up for lost time so I stayed up for 3 days and was very busy as I am sure you can imagine.  One of my many achievements during that period was that I wrote a new language.

Heat Sink
I became convinced that I was like a ‘heat sink’ for the ward.  I was capable of taking the heat out of a situation – it seemed to me that every time the head psychiatrist and his panel were doing their rounds that everyone got over excited and agitated.  In these instances I would liken them to rich foreigners arriving in a deprived country and us to the beggars surrounding them.   Anyway – when I used feel the situation get too heated I realised that by drinking near boiling water I could ‘take the heat’ out and calm the situation.

Exhibition catalogue copy
Kay’s Catalogue‘s old workers canteen at Temple Works lights up with a 100M audio-visual projection exhibition based on the fractal nature of the bipolar mind.  Inspired by Bent Architect’s new theatre piece - The wonderful world of… the show investigates the multiple rapid cognitive processes that signify bipolar mania.  By showcasing 10 nationally submitted artworks through simultaneous screening and proximity based FM broadcast, We invite you to take our radios for a walk along the projections walking through or tuning into the fading pockets of soundtracks.

Video description

Beginning slow and subtle as spring, blooming from the monochromatic to vivid colour, whilst slowly growing from the the tower’s base. A single flowers simplicity to a meadows glorious complexity. Finally flowers mellowly cascading from the towers apex, bursting with yellow, orange, then red; violet and blue, intertwined and underlayed with green clovers. Then all at once the flowers and leafs echo their colours, streams, waterfalls of vibrant colours trace the tower, then slowly they disappear one by one holding an orange and yellow before fading to back to the beginning.

The Coldstones Cut combines the curious conventions of a contemporary streetscape with the brute impressiveness of ancient stone block constructions. Perched at a height of 1375 feet above sea level, it can be freely explored by visitors who can walk the street and the various winding paths within and experience the extraordinary vistas which the platforms expose.

Ill have the video up here soon, but till then here are a few images:

Mobile Projections Soho/London from davelynch on Vimeo.

One of the great aspects of Soho were the other rickshaws, finally the rickshaw stopped being the object of observation, this left the projections to be seen by the passing public.

See the horse in motion original film.

There were 3 scheduled performances over the 3 week exhibition, one where the technology didn’t quite adjust to the rickshaw’s rugged ride.  The second involved the wheel nut sheering rendering the rickshaw pedal powerless, just as it was getting dark. The third was smooth, balanced and inspiring.

The projection performance was based on the humble pigeon changing the fate of the town in the 18th century when local people noticed pigeons pecking at salt deposits by a spring south of the town.  This mineral spring brought national recognition to the town giving it the name of Cheltenham Spa.  The projection: which began as a white silhouette of a pigeon then developed into being chased by the running man who sometimes took over so he was being chased by the pigeon.

Video coming soon

This was made possible by a commission for a exhibition at MEANTIME in Cheltenham, curated by Gavin McClafferty,

When the coloured light hits the respective colour on the photographic slide, they are made invisible by the coloured light. The remaining projected image is created from the other two primary colours. As this is a work in progress, I specifically stayed away from a image which would suggest a narrative, instead I developed a perceptual test card where the colour change would alter the viewers perception of an array of coloured blocks. The piece is part of an exploration into projection systems. This work in progress was part of a larger work recreating a zoopraxniscope which uses red, green, blue and infra-red light for the final delivery. This is being developed in 2011.

The circuit board was designed and built by Scott Towler, which uses a solar cell taken from a calculator.

The piece was developed in response to a exhibition called Works in Sunlight at the MEANTIME Gallery in Cheltenham curated by Gavin McClafferty. This has been my first piece developed specifically for a gallery. The majority of my work is created for non-traditional spaces.

Video and more images to come soon.

Long time collaborator Ashley Karrell asked me to create some projections in response to the idea of fantasy for his upcoming art-music video for a Vivienne Westwood shoe collection. The projections were used as part of a production set where the female lead wanders through a maze of surrealist objects and people. I created the following animation using live video manipulation rock the head slowly whilst controlling the eyes in real time to follow the model walking throughout the space.

Below is some more information.

A Personal Collection…Of Vivienne Westwood Shoes.

The art-music video is now showing only at the Barnsley Civic… May 13 – July 17 2010.

A Personal Collection of Vivienne Westwood Shoes; this ultimate indulgence shows how a private collector has built this collection over the last 15 years, choosing them for their innovative attitude towards design and most importantly their passion.

This collection of shoes by Vivienne Westwood, best known as the creator of punk and new wave fashions and for opening the Sex boutique in the 1970s with Malcolm McLaren, spans the decades from the 1970’s and includes some classic examples of the innovation and passion inherent in the designer. The black ‘spike’ SEX shoe, the ‘hammerhead’ trainer, the ‘pirate boot’ the limited edition collection with Nine West and the recent mass market collaboration with the Brazilian company Melissa, clearly demonstrates that she remains the undisputed Queen of British fashion.

Commissioned by the Barnsley Civic, the elements of the video are based on the ideas of beauty, art, fun, fantasy, drama, obsession, cakes & shoes. Set in a warehouse where human toy mannequins come to life for Alice?, the finder of the Golden Tracy Trainers. With a cast and crew of 85, Ashley Karrell was a modern day prince charming producer / director for this shoot, by personally searching the city of Leeds for the dancers, models and performers for the video.

By the end of the exhibition the video will be shown over 6000 times.

An animation of Muybridge’s photographic motion study of a naked running man, a projector strapped to the back of a tricycle, a length of the Thames up to the Houses of Parliament, a group of people looking for a naked voter to chase and an unsuspecting public…

Commissioned by Lumen to design a week long light installation for the launch of Candle House in the centre of Leeds next to the train station. Candle House is 23 storey cylindrical building designed by Carey Jones. The building was named after the candle and tallow packing warehouses that used to reside on this site, as well as the obvious shapely similarity. The brief was to subtly engage the public over a week highlighting different parts of the building. This was to end with a full tower dynamic light illumination.  The original design for the installation can be seen on the video below, but due to some unforeseen limitations, the lateral movement had to be sacrificed leaving the only the vertical for experimentation.

Photos by Tricky

Video of the Installation:

Music: Burning Studios

Visualisation of the initial idea for the installation.

Music: Green Mount Studios

‘A boy walks down a street. We do not see his face. He is the event but we don’t know why. He tells us his likes and dislikes as he passes through the streets of his hometown. Finally we see his face and understand.’

The film won best film for the over 13s at the first light festival who funded the project.  It was great to see the students I taught about film making up on stage collecting an award.  See below

The New Official Music Video for “It’s Not Over Yet” by MIDDLEMAN due for release on August 30th 2010 on Digital Download.

Video directed by Dave Lynch & Will Simpson.
Edited by Tom Robinson.
Make up by Doug Thompson and Aidan Marfleet.

2010 BLIP RECORDS/ABSOLUTE/UNIVERSAL

The performance frees the horse from over a hundred years of being screen static to once again be set in motion. Throughout the performance, the screen or canvas is the constructed from the passing architecture or urban spaces where the projections falls.  This timeless loop running through the urban landscape creates a social engagement to the city, where the viewer becomes a single point in the collective narrative.  The horse in the image appears to be the initial inspiration for the moving image projector, the video projector, a descendant of this technology is now the poetic device for releasing the horse to run the streets as a timeless memory of its own creation.

Video documentation below from 2009

The horse in the moving projection is an animation created from the photographs of Edweard Muybridge in 1887. This was a continuation of his early experiment from 1878 whereby 12 cameras were arranged along a track parallel to the horse’s, and each of the camera shutters was controlled by a trip wire which was triggered by the horse’s hooves. They were 21 inches apart to cover the 20 feet taken by the horse stride, taking pictures at one thousandth of a second. These images lead to the creation of the Zoopraxiscope by Muybridge in 1879, it may be considered the first movie projector. By projecting images from rotating glass disks in rapid succession to give the impression of motion. The stop-motion images were initially painted onto the glass, as silhouettes. A second series of discs, made in 1892-94, used outline drawings printed onto the discs photographically, then colored by hand. The device appears to have been one of the primary inspirations for Thomas Edison and William Kennedy Dickson’s Kinetoscope, the first commercial film exhibition system.

Original image.

The image below is constructed below from the Art for Prostitutes performance in the red light district of Leeds and will be available in a limited edition A3 print of 100 in early 2011.  After each performance of the horse a limited edition print or flick book can be commissioned.

Video below from original performance in 2008.

Since these initial performances from a camper van, I have modified a rickshaw for mobile projection and exhibition installation.

Image by Benedict Phillips

A deep space light installation @ Temple Works in Leeds.  Working with Stuart Childs, James Jelliman and Scott Towler.

I lost my last post about this so heres some pictures in the mean time!

[flickr album=72157622809053707 num=30 size=Small]

Wired Wood sought to create a dialogue around the lack of green spaces in Longton Town Centre and surrounding neighbourhoods.  A series of interventions took place in different locations around the town centre that adopted a flash mob approach of appearing in different places for a short amount of time . The installations consisted of a group of 5 x 8ft, 4 x 6ft x 4 x 4ft and 8 x 2ft trees made from wood that appeared unexpectedly in very public places.

The interventions illustrated a deepset existing conversation between the local residents about the understanding of the wider implications of green spaces. Besides the aesthetic nature of green spaces, residents understood that the increase of the footfall in the town centre would lead to the reinvesting of external businesses and the increase of social pride in the shared regenerated spaces.

Wired wood and the other buzzes commissions created a platform of public address, that seeded a catalyst for social change by reuniting the townsfolk with the belief that the art interventions of the Longton Buzzes project have set in motion direct actions to be realised in the coming months.

[flickr id="4157857504" thumbnail="medium" overlay="true" size="medium" group="" align="center"]

[flickrset id="72157623158186506" thumbnail="square" photos="" overlay="true" size="medium"]

The wood made an appearance at the Impression Gallery as part of Forest, an educational space to run along side the Ben Rivers exhibition.

CHOPS, Manland No. 5 (2009) from Ben Halsall on Vimeo.

Myself and Mark Cameron were  long listed for the Mirror Pool project in Bradford. The 300k project involves a permanent interactive new media public art piece woven into the fabric of a building as its built based around living projections.  We teamed up with Benedict Phillips to develop a ongoing conversation into interactive architecture, we were unsuccessful this time, but we have a multilevel approach that can be adapted for future application for interactive buildings.

Recently a close friend and collaborator Peter Bamford AKA Pistol Pete passed on to the great circuit board in the sky.  After his funeral we used the Graffiti Research Labs L.A.S.E.R tagging software to do a tribute.  Go get em Pete!

I came across this story as part of my AuthentiCity project in 2007 – a site specific animated fictional history of Leeds from public submitted stories.  It was originally intended for mobile projection but health and safety prevented the performance at the last minute.  7 months later we retraced the underground route of the dolphin as close as possible on the surface in the mobile projection campervan of Re#.

See the myth below

Dolphins below the City

I have been reliably informed by a friend who used to work at the ‘Underground’ bar, below the Town & Country Club (now Creation Night Club), that in Victorian times the building was sometimes used to host Circuses, & with this in mind, tunnels were built from the cellars to the Station, so that dangerous animals such as tigers could be transported there without putting the public at risk.
I have also heard that, on occasions, the tunnels were flooded with water, which allowed dolphins to swim, underground, below the city, & emerge to give displays within the building.

The background was created completely from text, the objects in the background were created out of the physical letters which made up the name of the object.

The 23 minute piece featured a bedroom scene with subtle movements of objects in time to the verse.

The project was Included in a presentation given by James Hill at the International Downtown Associations global annual conference in New York on the 15th and 16th of September 2006 – ‘Big Dream, Bold Ideas’.

‘Leeds has been invited to present about Light Night as a ‘model of good practice’, and it seems to me that your project serves as an exemplary illustration of that good practice.’

James Hill (Arts and Regeneration Dept, Leeds City Council)

VIDEO COMING SOON

In June 2006, Ben Halsall and myself took the opportunity to collaborate on a piece of interactive new media using a Windows based PC and an Apple Macintosh running OSX.

The project’s aim was to create a conversation between these two platforms and to investigate the possibilities of interactive digital software in creating live interactive environments.

The installation used two cameras, which individually collected visual data; this is streamed live to the Mac running MSP. The colour and movement from the live moving images is processed to create two lists of numbers. These numbers were then relayed to the PC and translated into the rotational movement of a 3D cross shape by attaching one set of numbers from one camera to the Z axis and the other camera’s set to Y axis in 3D space. The live moving images were transferred to the PC and mapped on to each of the planes of the 3D cross.

The software:

VVVV (i)

‘ VVVV is a toolkit for real time video synthesis. It is designed to facilitate the handling of large media environments with physical interfaces, real-time motion graphics, audio and video that can interact with many users simultaneously.’

‘ VVVV uses a visual programming interface. Therefore it provides a graphical programming language for easy prototyping and development.’

+

Maxmsp and .Jitter (ii)

‘ Max/MSP is a graphical programming environment, which means you create your own software using a visual toolkit of objects, and connect them together with patch cords.’

‘Jitter, a set of matrix data processing objects optimized for video and 3-D graphics’

When visitors stood on pressure pads placed on the floor circles of expanding colour with semi tonal sounds were triggered on a projection screen placed infront on them.

Up to 16 clips could be triggered at once with different types of overlays allowing the colours to mix creating different shades and tones with the sound creating a off key melody as if playing the black keys on a piano.

The project was created using Vjamm and the Midi creator kit and with friends Will Docherty, Paul Emery.

]]> http://www.blog.davelynch.net/art-link-west-yorks-installation/feed/ 0 http://www.blog.davelynch.net/james-rennie-residency/ http://www.blog.davelynch.net/james-rennie-residency/#comments Mon, 18 Jun 2007 12:05:13 +0000 Dave http://www.nicelysliced.com/?p=63

Commissioned by Creative Partnerships and the Ashton Group, myself and Pete Hamilton spent two weeks researching the application of interactive, sensory new technologies to create immediate audio-visual expression for use within the disabled community.

The project is based at James Rennie special school in Carlise working with children with a range of mental and physical impairments across an age range from Key Stage 1 to post 16.

Using existing hardware in the school in conjunction with new software to create a base of technological possibilities that enables teachers to create new projects specific to students and spaces. Thus enabling the students to express themselves in a custom created and ever changing environment.

Over the two week period we connected sound beam (a invisible laser beam which when broken could send a midi signal) to Vjamm (VJ software). This process allowed students at the school to trigger visuals via movement.

There were 2 main applications of this process.

Collective story telling – The students of key stage 2 each created and painted a character, object, these characters and objects were then used to create a story with the help of a teacher.  The paintings were then scanned and cut out using photoshop and placed into Vjamm over painted backgrounds.  When the story was read aloud the students broke the beam and their images were projected in front of them.  By the end of this process the students had created a short film to fit their story.

Real-time reflexive learning – This process involved the use of blue screen techniques to create a environment whereby the student could place themselves in a visual situation (i.e. jumping down the toilet) and perform the action (the jumping) then immediately review the action (themselves watching themselves jump down the toilet).  My self and Pete wrote a paper about this process available to read below:

Play Ground Tactics – real-time reflexive learning

The following is a collaborative paper with Peter David Hamilton

(a) Abstract

This paper explores the application of augmented reality as a tool for reflexive learning in playful environments. Augmenting Expectation in Playful Arena Performances with Ubiquitous Intimate Technologies by Bayliss, Lock and Sheridan proposes the ‘Performance Triad’ (PT) model as a method for the analysis, deconstruction and understanding of performance in playful arenas. In the cited example, the PT model (See Figure 1.) operates in a specific cultural and social context, but when we apply this model to an education environment, particularly with regard to special needs, then it can be used as a tool for reflexive learning.

Figure 1

Figure 1. Performance Triad Model (Bayliss, Lock and Sheridan, 2003)

Background

Dave Lynch and Pete Hamilton were commissioned, by The Ashton Group Theatre (1) on behalf of Creative Partnerships Cumbria (2), to train staff at James Rennie School (3), a school for children with Profound Motor Learning Disability in Carlisle, in animation software and video production.

The idea was that as much of the school should take part as possible right across the age groups and that the project should be inclusive of:

• The Inclusion Programme; a partnership with local mainstream schools.
• The Comenious Project; an exchange project involving James Rennie School with similar schools across the EU.

Address the deep learning agenda, in particular three areas:
• Learning to Learn
• Assessment for Learning
• Student Voice.

…[We] felt that given the essentially reflective nature of the Deep Learning
Agenda (DLA), film and new media skills would be really useful tools for the
school. Film has the capacity to be re-wound, re-watched and analysed.
(Ashton, 2007)

The project ran for two weeks in July 2007 culminating in a presentation of the work of staff and students to the school. A preliminary visit revealed that the school was already using assistive technology in the classroom; Intellikeys (4) boards and trigger buttons were used as durable alternatives to standard computer input devices like the mouse or keyboard. There was also SoundBeam (5), hardware which uses midi signals and movement sensors to detect proximity, which we combined with live performance video mixing (VJ) (6) software called Vjamm (7) to create an interactive environment.

As part of the training remit, we experimented with a video feed to create a live composition using a ‘blue screen’, a process very similar to that used in television weather reports to superimpose foreground elements onto a dynamic background. Weather reports require meteorologists to
choreograph their movements in direct response to the changing weather patterns behind them. In our experiment, students performed scenes from stories they had written in the classroom. A camera was positioned in front of the screen on a tripod and was connected (8) to a computer running
VJamm. With the facilities at hand, we were able to superimpose the performer into a scene from the story.

Applying the PT model

We have used the PT model as a basis for investigation. While installing our ‘bio-feedback mechanism’, we addressed several technical issues relating to the performance of the equipment. The hardware limitations caused a visual hysteresis (9) which allowed one person, the participant, to become an
instant observer of their virtual performance. In this instance a black curtain was erected in the school hall behind a table and a crash mat placed on the floor in front of that. We were then able to key (10) out the background.

In the virtual space, the story required each of the children to jump down an animated toilet, to travel to Chocolate Land in search of buried treasure. This was a real-time performance environment where the child was engaged as performer. In the physical space they played the role of participant and were directed to jump down on to the mat. Once they had landed, they were able to look up and observe themselves seconds earlier making the jump within the virtual environment. The rest of the children in the hall completed the triad as observers who would eventually become the participants and virtual performers.

Using the PT model as a basis for research allowed us to dissect the performance into sections and investigate the benefits of using this process in a school environment. Operating simultaneously within a virtual and real space with a delay in feedback creates an environment where the students
can explore and react to themselves. We suggest that further research into ‘out of real-time’ immersive learning environments could create a tool for reflexive learning at all levels of education.

Terms

(1) http://www.ashtongroup.co.uk

(2) http://www.creative-partnerships.com/Cumbria

(3) http://cms.jamesrennie.cumbria.sch.uk

(4) http://store.cambiumlearning.com/ProgramPage.aspx?parentId=074003405&functionID=009000008&site=itc

(5) http://www.soundbeam.co.uk

(6) http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/VJ_%28video_performance_artist%29

(7) http://www.vjamm.com

(9) The phenomenon in which the value of a physical property lags behind changes in the effect causing it.

(10) http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Keying_%28graphics%29

References

ASHTON, R. 2007, Here, Now and Then: A media, story-making and
performance research project for James Rennie School. Unpublished

BAYLISS, A., LOCK, S. and SHERIDAN, J. G. 2003, Augmenting
Expectation in Playful Arena Performances with Ubiquitous Intimate
Technologies, in Proceedings of Pixel Raiders, Sheffield.

Fitzpatrick, G., Husbands, P., Jungmann, M., Lutz, R. and Villar, N.
Exploring the Boundaries between Perception and Action, Lancaster
University, Infolab21 and University of Sussex, Department of Informatics
and Artificial Intelligence.

LESH, N., RICH, C. and SIDNER, C. L. 2000, Collagen: Applying
Collaborative Discourse Theory, Mitsubishi Electric Research Laboratories.

PECS – Picture Exchange Communication System [online], CALL Centre,
University of Edinburgh, Available from:

http://callcentre.education.ed.ac.uk/SCN/Level_A_SCA/Using_Symbols_S

CB/Hot_PECS_News_HTA/hot_pecs_news_hta.html [Accessed: 01.07.07].