Video Chat with Jonathan

Just finished my video chat with Jonathan and it cleared out a lot of things that I was worried about as well as made me reflect about some new things for the Interface.

I'm very keen on trying on the documentation and tests suggested where it would involve the user seeing him/herself trying out the application on video. I will need to read more about this in the email that Jonathan had sent Mariana a few days ago.

I will also need to think about what happens if the user zooms onto one of the videos if the interface will revert back to normal after a few minutes or not.

There will be two scenarios at the final show; a busy one right on the opening, and a quieter one after the opening, so I will need to check that my application will perform appropriate on both.

I had already had my doubts about the monitor stand and now that I have spoken to Jonathan I am quite sure that the stand is not going to look right. It might look too blocky and big and hide the slender frame of the screen. I will therefore use a backless plinth and the laptop + cables can be hidden there.

Finally I was slightly worried about the documented paper, however now that Jonathan has cleared it out it should be fine.

The paper should ideally include

1. Final reflection and evaluation of the work.
2. Summary of my work (that can be included next to the project itself)
3. Future development.

Chat Reflective writing and interface updates

Yesterday during the chat, everyone had to critique my project and I got some really good feedback. I was glad that aesthetically the project seemed to be liked, although there was some confusion as to how it would work. This was expected since although I have explained it several times, it will only be 100% clear once I actually get it to work!

I have also received suggestions such as; using a chair to further immerse the audience and get them to stay for longer during the show and also using various monitors to display the interface. I'm thinking of how I can do both however it will be very difficult to use various monitors due to transport from Malta to London. I might also create a stand in Malta; made of planks of wood that can slide into each other, and paint it in London. This might make the monitor look better so it is enclosed in a minimal white space.

Later in the day, Maria, my developer came over and we were looking at different formats of how to export the videos and water colour. After endless tests, including uploading to youtube and downloading as .mp4 (since HTML5 only accepts ogg, mp4 and WebM) we found a good export and codec.

Maria, writing code

Basically we wanted a format that would be of a decent quality but also of minimum file size; basically not more than 50mb. The best solution was to put my original water colour, which was a 720HD, in a new PAL widescreen composition in After Effects. This was then exported as a Quicktime Movie, with an MPEG4 codec set to 70% quality. After this, it was converted using Miro converter, into an .mp4 file. HTML5 seemed to like this sort of file and the quality is quite good so we're using that.

At the moment I want to export all I have using this method so I can carry out a case study / focus group as soon as possible.

Feedback Unit 1 - thoughts

In this post I will be dissecting my feedback from Unit 1 and looking at how I can improve the suggested solutions.


You have developed a distinctive visual style in the way material is presented, although it is still not clear whether the two strands of your work should exist independently or as one. 

I wanted to have some kind of contrast between real life and visualisations, kind of like how we see in films such as Tree of Life and Enter the Void. I thought it might be interesting to see both strands working together in a randomised grid. I'm thinking of having the watercolours as a representation of sound, but this might change.

With regards to chance, there is a need for you to define and delineate exactly which processes will be driven by chance, and how the mechanical processes that drive the narrative(s) actually function. Beware of the illusion of randomness - it is not a panacea, but you have correctly identified the need for boundaries and "structured randomness" that actually delivers an unexpected outcome. It will be essential for you to design a sequencing method for your material, possibly using Markov models or some other weighted probability system. Otherwise there will be as many unsuccessful moments in your work as there are successful ones as far as the audience is concerned.


I am actually using two methods of chance; the natural process - where I had asked people to tell me a story from their life. This is of course dependent of who I choose and how they are feeling at the moment ( + other factors). Besides this there is the way that the randomisation happens on screen, and this happens by randomisation through code. I am currently discussing with my developer the amount of radomisation that will happen at one go. I will be posting this on the blog soon.

Paul Coldwell research paper feedback:
This intelligent essay sets out to explore the challenge to mainstream  film narrative  by the use of chance and a database aesthetic. The argument is well controlled throughout and extensively referenced. There is a real sense of working through a proposition and exploring its validity. The writing is clear and the examples used to carry the argument are well selected. These examples take in a broad approach to the subject, Buneul, Cage and Duchamp along with others but keep the argument focused.  There is potential here to be developed into a conference paper.

Reflective writing on Chat 13/03/2012 + other research & work

So this will be my next purchase:

One of my students who is doing her Thesis on Chance has brought it to college recently and it has some really good essays, so I had a look through and I will be buying it for a closer inspection.

I have also just received a copy of "Empty Words" a new CD release by the Wandelweisser group and kindly sent to me by one of the musicians themselves, Antoine Beuger (also interviewed in my research paper). I have written a detailed review of the pieces and will post it very soon on the blog.

I have had a look at Darren's and Jess' work. Here is what I sent to Darren (since internet at work was down):

"I just had the time to view Darren's linked blog posts. I'm really interested in this project because I'm working with Chance narrative myself so randomness plays a big role in my project. I really like that you are playing around with people's free will.. this should be interesting..

"Maybe people won’t get it, that’s ok. Well maybe it’s not ok actually because the interaction isn’t very fun! I’d like this to look appealing and I’d like the interaction to be inviting and a little fun, maybe so that if you don’t get all the free will and randomness stuff you at least have something nice to look at and interesting or fun to play with."

This is the exact same issue I have with my own project; trying to make something curious, intuitive but fun at the same time. In general I'm really looking forward to see how your project will turn out. I also like how it looks visually."

I had a look at Jess' videos and really liked what she is trying to communicate. I commented on the fact that even though she is communicating a sort of, negative message about how technology is hurting communication between people, the natural sounds and comfortable setting also make it look normal and less dramatic. Jess also had some videos with herself as the protagonist. She commented on how she wanted to put herself as one of the protagonists because she is also being affected by 'loneliness' of technology I suppose. 

 

Reflective writing on chat 17/01/2012 + New Interface Ideas

Today we had an interesting chat about SOPA, content farms and the future of the internet, google and social networks as we know them. Osiris told us how companies like google have around 60% of the content that is generated by 'robots' through these so called content farms. Jonathan spoke to us about how the internet is trying to evolve by becoming more personalised and specifically designed to cater to individuals. I think he called these "wall gardens". We agreed that even though these spaces are safe and can be a teaching aid, it's nice to wander outside of them, and it's crazy to think that one might not be able to do this in a few years time.

Needless to say I am completely against SOPA and believe that censorship and limitation will lead us nowhere. It is true that internet is changing us, but we should evolve and adapt to this new life rather than bring the shutter down for fear of losing control and money.

Jonathan also introduced us to Net Vibes where we can see all the feeds to the MA DA course blogs; fantastic way of keeping track of what everyone is doing!

So that's a little about today's chat. This evening, Maria my awesome developer came over so we could discuss the interface a little bit. I had some issues with the fact that the user would have had to refresh every time in order to be introduced to a new chance algorithm. So we changed it and now each time the user carried out an action (Play / Pause / Drag / Resize) various things can happen. 0 - 3 videos can turn off or on. These videos can be either films or watercolours. (The watercolours will have a music layer attached to them). 0 - 15 chopped recordings might also play / stop. The recordings will not have a visual representation. I will have around 8 videos showing up on screen at one go. We also tried changing the background to black; this is good because the videos look better, like they are floating, but it's harder to see where to grab the handles to drag / resize. Just a quick screenshot of the test Maria did today:

Test videos on a black background using PHP / CSS3 and HTML5

Reflective writing on chat with Paul Coldwell

Festen - Thomas Vinterberg, Dogme 95

So yesterday I had a half an hour audio chat session with Professor Paul Coldwell about my research paper. It started alright - midway I got distracted and confused (the screaming kitten didn't help :)), and I think it ended OK. So here is where I got stuck:

Prof. Coldwell suggested that Cinema is growing and so is the sense of escapism. I wasn't sure about this but didn't know exactly how to back it up. By Chance! yesterday I found a lecture by Professor Jesse Schell about the rise of the need for realism. Some points I observed: In the midst of all this technological breakthrough, people are feeling that they are living in a 'fake' world, therefore yearning for "real" food, "reality" tv, "reality" in games and adverts. (Yet I still think that escapism seems to still be lurking in through all of this realism. It is an interesting mix of both. The safety of going back to something genuine and natural, and the excitement of the surreal. A technological representation of the natural perhaps.)

I then also looked at other points in time when this happened, in art especially - Pre-Raphaelites, the 60's Psychedelia. I still need to see what happened exactly in the film world but essentially it was pretty much the same pendulum style activity. From one extreme to another. Stretching something to the max and returning to something else.

I suppose then that it is in this day and age that going back to the natural seems to make so much sense, since we were never so far away from reality as we are now.

The more technological and virtual/digital we become, the more we want to get back to our roots (It's natural :)).

Jesse Schell specifies that this factor is called the concept of Authenticity, and if it is true, then there was never a better time for chance and database to combine and create filmmaking structures that are more relevant to today's culture.

So... currently updating my arguments, but moreso the conclusion which I still wasn't sure about up until yesterday.

More points to think about (as discussed with Paul Coldwell)
Sophie Calle - Figure to research
Max Ernst series - A woman with a thousand heads
Early cinema - Duchamp
Surrealism
Are people still going to the cinema & escapism

Research paper title, abstract, and some new screenshots

Some new screenshots from a recorded story:

The above pictures were recorded on webcam because the recorded story is about two individuals who spoke regularly online. I just wanted to capture a person chatting online in various different rooms, being as natural as possible - in fact this is my friend Andreas, so it was easy to get him to act natural because we were having a normal conversation online. I still need to film character number 2, but the first part went quite well.

Today I showed my title and abstract to my tutor. He made some minor changes in my title.

From:

Generating meaning in chance. How modular and database narrative structures (in time-based media) provide a more natural, yet engaging experience for today’s active audience.

To:

Generating meaning in chance. How modular and database narrative structures challenge traditional filmmaking techniques, allowing space for the unexpected.

[Changed: got rid of natural & engaging - both very subjective, so I'm glad to have eliminated them]

For now I will be using:

Generating meaning in chance. How modular and database narrative structures challenge traditional time-based media techniques, allowing space for the unexpected.

[Replaced filmmaking with time-based, because I want to include sound but not in a film-making context. This might be slightly unfocused - will have to see how the essay develops]

My current Abstract:


When the use of chance is employed in art and media, intention is bound to take a step back to make space for the unexpected. In essence, chance is lack of conscious design. Almost certainly, the author will have to give up a certain amount of control over his/her work, and leave it in the hands of natural or mechanical processes. The question is; why should authors sacrifice their creative expertise for something that might result in disorder, lack of aesthetic appeal, and failure? How does this come across to an audience, who to this day, is still presented with films that follow a formula that is more than two thousand years old?

Reflective Writing on Chat Session - 11/07/2011

Today's chat was extremely helpful. I thought it would be much harder to formulate a (decent) research question, but with all the guidelines our tutor forwarded to us, it should be quite an interesting process.

I am intrigued by the idea of planning my essay around selected works or key figures. At first I thought David Lynch, Michel Gondry and Chris Cunningham would be interesting to look at altogether. They have many things in common amongst themselves and also with my project. Moreover I'm a big fan of their work so it would be easier and more natural for me to write about them.

The title could tackle disengagement, surrealism, non-linear narrative, dream-like sequences etc...
I do wish to somehow include the philosophical ideas of John Cage in the picture, and also references to the Beat movement. This is something I need to think about. The Beat movement would be easy to incorporate through the essay, however John Cage's idea is more about the openness of an artist, and his works are much more minimal - although I do see a connection with the other figures somewhere.

Something else I wanted to research was the concept of closure in film and animation - not sure where this could fit into the research question - perhaps it could just be a sub-title somewhere, rather than a main focus.

Either way, these were my thoughts after today's chat - hopefully in the coming days/weeks I will be developing and finalising my research question.

Reflective Writing on Chat Session

Slightly late chat reflection but none the less, the discussion was about making art from found media; music, videos and art from the internet. This immediately got me thinking about sampling. I found this website called 'Thru You' where various musicians on youtube are sampled together to make up one song. Click on any of the images to be directed.

MPR evaluation

(Warning: long post!) Firstly I would like to say that I am really happy with the feedback and analysis that I got from the MPR (so thank you to all of those who contributed to the comments). It was actually quite time consuming to go through all the comments but based on these comments, I have managed to come up with a list of things that I will need to consider regarding my project:

1. I need to redesign a timeframe, to which I need to strictly stick to.
2. Figure out a new testing method to analyse how and why people are linking visuals and recordings. Additionally analyse their reactions to seeing the same visual twice with a different recording / audio in the background. 
3. Design an interface for the visuals and elaborate on how everything will be displayed in random format.
4. Decide on the style of filming and editing.
5. Decide whether to include some kind of performance, and whether the person telling the story should make an appearance in the videos or not.
6. Length of the stories.

More Details / Answers to my Questions:

Everyone agreed that people will most probably link videos and recordings.  This would be a great outcome because I want the viewers to be able to experience perhaps the same story with a different meaning. What I need to test now is see how I can see how the viewers are linking – identify patterns.

Everyone agreed that there should be focus on interaction. This is also something I felt would make the project more engaging – which is why I need to brainstorm how this is going to happen.

Everyone agreed people will probably be interested to hear someone else's stories, depending on how interesting it is.

There were mixed opinions on the subtitles. I think I will simply have to include something for the user to be able to turn them on and off.

Overall I found the general reaction to the work done so far to be positive.

Key Figures, works and books to check out:

"Devotional cinema" by Nathaniel Dorsky, suggested by Mariana who also quoted this from the book:

"If we do relinquish control, we suddenly see a hidden world, one that has existed all along right in front of us. In a flash, the uncanny presence of this poetic and vibrant world, ripe with mystery, stands before us.”

Nam June Paik, suggested by Madeline and previously also suggested by a friend of mine but I still haven't looked into his work in much detail.

'Thomas Beale Cipher' an animation by Andrew S.Allen, and works of Laurie Hill, suggested by Jedrzej.

Eva said one of my experiments reminded her of 'The wanderer above the sea of fog'
by Caspar David Friedrich

Here are the answers to other questions asked by my peers:

Mariana: How many conceptual videos from the stories?  I am also curious to know how do you ask people to tell you their stories, are you guiding them to either eerie or dreamy stories? 

I will be translating half of the videos into visuals – either video, animation or both. This really depends on the stories. As for the stories, all I’m asking people to do is to ‘tell me a story’ anything about their life or someone else’s. I’m keeping it as vague as possible and trying not to influence them in their choices. As for the dreamy and eerie, this is how I usually work so it will obviously emerge in my interpretations of the stories, whatever they are.

Osiris: I Think recording & editing 100 stories will take a very long time. What time frame will Moira need to reserved for this?

This is true, although I already have around 20 stories so far (some people tell me more than one story, although if I have time I would like to have 100 stories from 100 different people). This doesn’t really concern me as much, I’m a fast worker ☺

Eva: I am interested in the documentary format? possibility of this work alongside the 'random' result element of the practice. 

Perhaps if I have time, however I'm not filming every person I am recording (due to some of them feeling uncomfortable in front of a video camera)

  

Osiris: I say Yes people will try to link videos. Is this a problem for you ? 

Not at all, I’m just interested to see how will they try to link them, but I still need to find a good way to ask this question and gather results.

Mariana: When you talk about continuous randomization, do you mean that the conceptual stories, audios and visuals will appear randomly with out a predetermined order. So I guess a system will determine randomly what is the next thing the viewer will see. 

Yes, there will essentially be a random code (either in Actionscript or Processing, depends which one I use). 

Olympia: I was wondering whether Moira noticed any overlapping in the stories - and if so what was the percentage

So far, I’ve noticed people tend to want to tell me funny stories, but when they get more comfortable, the stories get more serious.

Madeline: The interpretation is personal just ike the people telling their stories 

Yes, and this is not a problem, however I wanted to work on a concept given to me by someone else – several different concepts which keep changing.

Mariana: I like very much the artists that are currently influencing you. Gregory Crewdson uses great settings and lighting, are you thinking of producing your conceptual stories taking into consideration with such importance those visual elements?   

Eva: Gregory crewdson mirrors filmic scenquences a fantasy I am wondering how the film stories could be translated into a crewdson esque errie visual?   

It will be impossible to get a polished result like that of Gregory Crewson, I was looking at the concept and the story behind the pictures rather than the aesthetic (even though he is quite well known for the aesthetic). 

Claire: I wonder if Moira might want to develop / strengthen the concept of narrative, particularly of this genre, e.g. suspense etc 

Yes I suppose this is important and will need to be taken into consideration before filming and editing.

Eva: experience as interaction is about the viewers perception how will you be able to get this perspective if you are filming?

This is no longer the purpose of my project, this was the title of my previous proposal.

Claire: it may be good to think of a performance video also i;e; someone interacting with the work   good as a backup also

This is interesting – will need to think about it.

Osiris: How long can 1 Story be ?    

I wanted it to be a minute, but so far they are all between 2 and 5 minutes, so some heavy editing is needed – I do not wish to bore the viewers.

Madeline: Can the viewer not somehow ineract and slect the stories they want to hear?  

Yes I thought about this, however I still want the visuals and music to be randomised, therefore selecting the same story twice can give it different meanings.

Louis: so many projects want to rely on RANDOM, but is it truly random or random within a defined set?   

Olympia: there is no randomness infinity proves that at some point there is perfect coordination 

Eva: could this randomness be choice on some subconsious level

Louis, I’d like to think that the project is not relying on randomisation, but is merely using it to assist with my testing of the project, and as Osiris specified randomisation is always within a defined set – in my case there will be 100 stories, I wish I could do more but don’t think I will have time ☺

Olympia: Yes it would be interesting to see whether the puzzle will come together at one point and a lucky viewer will witness it!

Eva: Randomisation cannot be choice in this case since I will be using a random code / system to mix and match the media. This will remove all control from beyond my hands and into the hands of the machine.

Reflective Writing on Chat Session 31/01/2011

After yesterday's tutorial - I found I need to be able to test my project on a separate audience rather than just students and other lecturers - just to have a series of people who are not necessarily creative. I also need to think about how exactly the audience is going to interact with the visuals. I will be conducting this research this weekend and reporting.

On another note, one of the fine art lecturers where I work gave me a link to some works of artist Wangechi Mutu - which I have found mesmerising, and of great inspiration to my work.

"Much of Mutu's work to date has been concerned with the myriad forms of violence and misrepresentation visited upon women, especially black women, in the contemporary world. Her paintings and collages often feature writhing female forms, their skin an eruption of buboes, mutant appendices like gun shafts or machine gears sprouting from the sockets of joints, their bodies half human, half hyena. They offer a glimpse at the perversions of the body and the mind wrought by forces active in the oppression of women. 

Mutu commonly works on paper or Mylar polyester film. Manipulating ink and acrylic paint into pools of colour she carefully applies to her surfaces imagery sampled from disparate sources- Vogue, National Geographic, hunting, motorbike and porn magazines. The resulting works are a rebuke to the conventions of aesthetics and ethnography and eroticism that underpin such publications, offering instead an existence that is riotously free of biological determinism or psychological conditioning. " (Victoria-miro.com, 2011)

a dragon kiss always ends in ashes, 2007

Non, je ne regrette rien, 2007

Interactive Films and Documentaries

This is a Reflection on Chat 10/01/2011 about Interactive Films and Documentaries.

Findings

Today a very interesting chat and discussion developed with the starting point being Katerina Cizek's Highrise.

Click Image to be Directed to Trailer

Highrise is a 360 degree, interactive documentary about people who see the world through highrise windows; people who live in urban places.

“What we were trying to do was replicate or mimic this feeling of when you visit somebody’s home and you get to know them in a non-linear, fragmented sort of way," director Katerina Cizek says. “You’re talking about one thing, but over the shoulder you see something, and you say, ‘Oh, can I ask you about that photograph?’ And then that leads to a piece of their history."

“The overall Highrise project is not about architecture and urban planning. Primarily, it’s about how people live. The attempt is to peel back some of those stereotypes." (Gerry Flahive, producer)

I like this idea:

“We always think non-linear storytelling is somehow new, that it goes against the grain and is driven by technology. But, in fact, it’s not. It’s very much the way we tell each other our stories in person."

When video tries to mimic real life, hand-held – non-linear – it's experimental but actually it is more faithful to real life than mainstream films. The idea of communicating with someone and jumping from one subject to another – there’s a starting point – and then a journey towards a completely unrelated ending. No buildup towards one story – I guess the beauty of what happens in everyday conversations.

How cities are changing: the idea of a megacity – more people are living in cities - this reminded me of a recent National Geographic youtube video I had seen:

I think the idea of interactivity more successfully connects the viewer with what they are watching - which is why it is an excellent idea for campaigns. Take this interative video on children in Britain living in bad housing,

Click Image to be directed to video

'Trapped' guides the viewer through a story of a low-income British family who need to move in order to find better housing in England. At the end of each chapter, the viewer has the option to choose what they would do if they were in the place of the family. At one point the son seems to be having problem with the mould in the house so the viewer gets the option to either move out, clean the mould or call the doctor.

I'm not sure whether all the choices lead to the same path but mine lead me to the family having to move to a small hotel which is far away from the children's school and the son gets bullied. Eventually the family try to appeal for a better house but they have to stay in the waiting list or get a loan for a new house. I finally got the option to "Do Nothing" or email the council to help these kind of families. It is very hard to "Do Nothing" after choosing the story for this family - which is of course no story at all but is a very harsh reality for a large number of British Families.

Youtube have recently added the option of interactive video where users can click on the video after it is done to be directed to another video. This was of course followed by a number of 'choose your own story' style videos. The above video especially interested me because it dealt with social issues and after choosing various endings it communicates the message that little decisions can sometimes make the world of a difference.

Discussion


After discussing several videos and exchanging links, we started talking about the pros and cons about interactive videos. Are interactive videos the future or simply a gimic? To they enhance film or distract from it. It was quite interesting to see everyone's preferences come through the discussion. Osiris questioned as to why something like Highrise would not be open source - and we proceeded to discuss how it could be a new Google street / a new more dynamic facebook.

Louis felt that interaction distracted from the narrative - however Mariana, Kay and several others agreed that there needn't be a story - in fact the essence of Highrise lied in the fact that the non-linear and loosely structured nature of the video made it seem more like occurrences that happen in real life. A discussion on possible privacy issued followed as well as a question on whether or not privacy still exists and how much control we have over it.

I feel that for an open source project to be successful it cannot be controlled as much, since it's unexpected and open-ended nature would let it evolve into something unknown - now whether positive or negative we are definitely going to learn something from it.

How it links to my Project


Open Source is all the rage right now but I don't think this is going to be a part of my project since I want to focus more on augmented reality at the moment - however I'm not ruling out anything. On the online application it would be perhaps possible to get users to post their own visuals which could change when interacting with a target - of course the visuals submitted by the users might not stick with the theme of the unconscious - but since I said I will let my project be open-ended that won't matter.

As far as the interaction goes - I am a great fan, which is why I will be including interaction in my project. I think nowadays, to just have a screen or painting or projection on the wall in front of an audience is simply not enough - unless it is exceptional. People get bored quickly - more people want to be able to be a part of the work not just to see it. I think it even makes them feel a bit important; more on the same level as the artist, where the artist his/herself is letting them mess about with his/her installation and putting them at the centre of attention.

Reflective Writing on Chat Session 03/01/2011

Thoughts about the proposal and the final installation...

- How about augmented reality?

At first I was thinking about having people touching the projections for interaction, but now I'm thinking about using webcams and having some sort of interaction in flash where the mouse over would be associated with a target in the webcam, i.e. the audience...

- Must carry out more research on augmenter reality - was trying to avoid it because it seemed so out of range, but now I'm starting to get interested.


Definitely work looking into: Philip Worthington

What is Interaction?

http://hci.sapp.org/lectures/verplank/interaction/

Had my first one to one tutorial with my tutor today and what followed was a manic research session on 'interaction'. So the first thing I did was go on wikipedia and typed 'Interaction' and proceeded from there. Found many sources and listed down a couple of annotations and topics which I thought would be of interest to my proposal:

Augmented human interaction - The Wii, the Kinect, constantly evolving so might feature in my research - however my project will not be based on this. I want to focus on aesthetics as well not just interaction.

Interaction as an experience - This will definitely feature in my research as this is what I want to create.

Human computer interaction

Donald Arthur Norman - wrote 'Emotional Design' a type of Affective Interaction Design - but he doesn't really focus on aesthetics. He puts emphasis on the needs of the user (User-centered design).

Affective Interaction Design - A type of Interaction Design used to influence positive emotions / reactions from users - great! Except I want to do the opposite - can this type of Interaction therefore, be utilised to get 'negative' responses from the user...

My title has developed into "Can affective interaction design be employed to influence a user-directed Dionysian experience?"

User-direction has now taken a new meaning in my project - I want the user to have more control. I'm looking at my project as a 'Responsive Environment'. I do not want the user to merely do something with the program. I want the program to adapt and change depending on what the user does. So if the user chooses a type of experience, the program will react in one way, and if the user chooses a different experience, the program will react in a different way. This will also lead me to research HCI. Today was a heavy day for my brain - but also very exciting. I'm eager to see where this is going to take me.

Some sources I have looked at today (need to look at some of them in more detail)

http://www.id-book.com/chapter1.htm

http://arielwaldman.com/2010/08/23/a-semantic-exploration/

http://www.dubberly.com/articles/what-is-interaction.html

http://www.boxesandarrows.com/view/introducing_interaction_design

http://www.orangecone.com/d3_2010_information_is_a_material_0.2.pdf

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Human-computer_interaction

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Emotional_design

http://www.designinginteractions.com/interviews

http://www.interaction-design.org/encyclopedia/

http://hci.sapp.org/lectures/verplank/interaction/

Reflective writing on Chat Session 22/11/2010

Yesterday we resumed with chat sessions. After watching Madeline's video we all got talking about memories and whether or not the past is such a valuable element after all...

Osiris brought up an intriguing subject; saying that the best way to be open to new experiences and ideas is to start on a brand new page, and therefore forgetting all about the past and look solely at the future. I believe that the past is too important to be ignored, but it can be a means of preventing an individual from   exploring new ideas. I also believe that memories and nostalgia have the power to evoke very powerful emotions in individuals, sometimes perhaps even extreme emotions which might not be accessed given that one only looked into the future. These extreme emotions in turn can be a means of inspiration for an artist. I'm starting to see a subtle battle of art and technology, digital and traditional, logic and emotion through the weekly chats, and it's very exciting.

Andy proceeded to email us a guide to our new proposal which is due in about a month. During that time (and even after the due date) I shall be creating around two sketches a day based on the idea of intoxication - the sketches will signify both the ups and the downs of the effects of intoxication. I will try to keep up the daily sketches in order to try and create a developing journey of thoughts, dreams and ideas which will hopefully evolve and lead to some interesting creations.

Reflective Writing on Chat Session - 08/11/2010

So I will start today's post by posting two photographs of Cildo Meireles' installations (Suggested by Kay Johns :) ) I have been researching his works this afternoon and I must say he's got some pretty inspiring works. Although his themes are not related to my theme, his installations are interactive and he also uses audio in his works so I'm gonna have a closer look.

In last Monday's chat session I had a chance to receive and share some comments on the proposals that my peers and I are doing. We started with Eva Sykes:

Eva is looking into virtual words and environments, I'm really interested  to see what she will come up with because it is something that is getting more and more realistic and people seem to be getting more involved and I guess, more addicted to such a space. This is why the first thing I asked Eva is whether she thinks there are more advantages or disadvantages to virtual environments. Eva said she doesn't know as of yet and it makes sense since this is her research question after all. 

Questions I was asked

I was up next - the great thing about the questions that I was asked is I hadn't thought of any of them before; this is why discussing and brainstorming in group is so great. Mariana asked me whether the choice the user makes would affect their experience (this ties in with what Mariana is doing... a story which changes depending on their brain activity). I said that yes the experience will vary but I haven't done much thinking about this so I have much more brainstorming to do about this.

Olivia asked whether the unconscious has similar qualities to what we experience the first time we see an artefact. What an interesting question; this question has motivated me to create visuals which will look 'new' to the user - a great challenge but I will try my best. Osiris asked me whether I will do any practical experiments by taking toxins myself - would be extremely interesting (however illegal, so I won't give any other details :) ). Osiris also asked me about the beat generation and whether I would be looking at it in an analytical or practical way. I said both but mostly it would be analytical - I want to - as much as possible, free my mind and let it open to raw dark experiences in order to create the visuals.

Alexandra asked whether I believe that negative emotions are more powerful than negative ones. I honestly think they are but I have never studied psychology (and never intend to) having said that I will have to look into this particular matter. Either way I think it would be much more interesting to take the audience through a negative experience. I guess what inspired me to do this is the fact that all my students are currently exploring subjects which are positive and which might improve someone's life, or help them... and I thought why is everyone trying to be so good and positive? Why not go on the 'evil' and 'dark' side once in a while.

Next up was Mariana:

Project Presentation - Mariana Tschudi from Mariana Tschudi on Vimeo.

I must say Mariana's was my favourite presentation. It shows so much thought process and brainstorming and she looks like she seems genuinely interested in the study and project she is undertaking (not that the others don't) I just thought this presentation was delivered in such an effective manner. Mariana's project is based on the medicinal plant Ayahuasca, used in the Amazon. I asked Mariana what sort of audio she is planning to use for her project and she said she will be using natural sound, trances and chants. What I would love see is how Mariana will manage to carry out her final experimental project of letting people see different footage depending on their brain activity.

Louis will be illustrating the effect of technology in the American Pop Art movement - I asked Louis how he thinks technology is affecting contemporary artists. Louis said that technology is merely a tool to help an artist communicate his/her message. This contrasts heavily with what Osiris is looking at - micro-casting and it's exponential increase. I asked Osiris whether he feels that future artists will need to know code, and he feels that they do - he also expressed that knowing how to build your own tools will definitely enhance one's projects. 

Symposium 1 from Osiris Roost on Vimeo.

I have more questions to ask Osiris in next Monday's chat - I am very interested in his project because I have tried coding but still feel that I have much much further to go. Nonetheless I have decided to embark onto an interactive project which will challenge me to investigate code- but also give me space to be creative.