Back to basics

Part 1 of 2

Given the task of creating an instrument from a cardboard box, I saw everyone approach it hands on and just go for it, armed with scissors, glue, knives and whatever else they could get their hands on. In my usual methodical approach, I had to sit down and think about it for a while and jot down some ideas. I think everyone else had the right idea, especially when the project was compared to that given to pre-schoolers and in that sense, I thought about how pre-schoolers would feel less inhibited, allowing them to fully unleash their creativity and see what comes out. Perhaps this is the approach required if I am to experiment with more risk taking.

As it was, I found myself sitting surrounded by an assortment of film canisters, metal and plastic strings, metal hooks, balloons and, of course, glue and scissors. Taking the basic anatomy of an instrument, the cardboard box acts as the amplifier or resonating chamber. Beyond this, I found myself fairly uninspired at first.

After brainstorming various methods of creating the various features which make an instrument, I decided to take the more hands on approach and learn by doing, and just explored the potential of the shapes and textures made possible with the film canisters. I also experimented with some metal wire which had been a spiral binding for a note pad and experimented with the pitch given when uncoiled to different lengths, and with some plastic wire stretched out with metal hooks and a styrofoam bridge, I used film canisters as movable bridges. This resulted in varying degrees of success in terms of sound, the most successful of which was the metal wire.

I found it hard to work with the cardboard box as I found it hard to present something that wasn't visually refined; every time I looked at it, it was to me still just a kettle box with film canisters stuck to it. It was important to try remember that this was still purely experimental and not meant to be a refined final product. Essentially, it was where were all at anyway and like with my experiences, we were all at varying degrees of success.

Through presentation we discovered that we had all experimented with not just the potential, but the limitations of the cardboard as a material. Some had established that their designs would work better with a more rigid material such as wood, but others found that the limitations gave it a new shape or other unexpected result which they wouldn't have thought of but gave an overall successful outcome. This reinforces the experimental approach as the best results can be unplanned, then taken to be refined.

To add another aspect to our instruments, we constructed contact microphones simply by soldering wires onto the required plates and plugs which were provided. The purpose of adding these was to pick up sounds and vibrations we might not be able to hear other wise, enhance and otherwise alter and projects the sounds in a different way. I didn't use the potential of the cardboard box too well as an amplifier, so it didn't work too well acoustically but the microphone amplified the sounds and gave more of a distinct tonal variation between the different sized film canisters which was distinguishable acoustically. What I would be able to improve on is to experiment with different tool with which to play it to give more interesting variety of sounds.

Overall what we got out of this activity is an initial understanding and basis for what is and isn't successful for creating sound from our own experiences and each others' presentations. From here, I believe this will serve as a basis to develop on and experiment with for the sonic objects which we will design, build and perform. I feel I've definitely learnt from it as music and sound isn't an area I've extensively studied in the past so this next brief will be a challenge but I am looking forward to the performance aspect.

Bullet

I've always been interesting in expanding beyond the constraints time and space of a single photographic image. What we experiemented with yesterday as our warm up activity was perhaps another sort of way of thinking about these aspects in relation to film and viedo, which is essentially composed of a multitude of single still frames which, when combined create movement. Inspired by the likes of The Matrix or an ad by Toshiba, we were to create our own bullet effect by setting up a series of cameras to go off in sequence around a moving figure.

Even though I'd been hoping for a group activity for a change from the individual but our group of a dozen or so proved to be a little difficult to co-ordinate. We began by attempting to find a way to set up a dozen cameras spanning across a spectrum of brand, quality and models, no two cameras alike. We went into the logistics of timer, resolution, zoom, aperture, focus and the like before decided to just go for it and give it a go. We quickly abandoned using multiple cameras in favour of one SLR shooting on burst. initial ideas including everyone in a chain moving around the camera to emulate the movement of the camera but this did not have the indented effect.



We only managed to deviate even further from there from there with everyone having their own vision as to how we could approach. After experimenting and tossing around ideas as bit more, we simplified it back down with the single camera moving around a single figure, rising up from a crouch, perform a movement to return to the crouching position by the time the camera had completed a half circle around him.

As usual, artistic license and individuality came out in our chosen movement which we would then attempt to weave together into a video. I was perhaps a little too ambitious and managed to strain my legs a bit. Each individual persons' segment went something like this:

I thought it would be quite funny to put these together as some sort of cheesy superhero team , but then ended up attempting to shoot a playground as my setting in which to place the people. I used the same method to moving around it while my camera was on burst to give that sense of space and perspective so as to not lose the effect of the movement of the figure when the original background was chroma keyed out. I chose a playground as the movements were quite playful and it would provide different elements and levels to place the figures.

This to was abandoned due to my not having taken enough shots to create a fluid enough back ground and simplified it down instead to the figures starting outside a paper box which would then close on them and when it reopened, it would be a different person inside. If I chose to develop this further, it would be fun to play with different timings so as to have more than one box at a time and having people almost teleporting from box to box.

The overall effect was quite rough as a result of the original images with jagged transitions and the background not entirely keyed out. It was an interesting effect which could be interesting if controlled and worked for the nature of the relatively simple one day activity to introduce an idea. I personally would want to keep my images more crisp and refined but I do like the simplistic sort of stop motion effect of composing the images, which again relates to the content of the video. Even if this can't specifically be integrated into the next studio project, the concepts will undoubtedly have potential to carry over.

Destructive Technologies!

Tuesday's project was not one for anyone self conscious as we were presented with the task of animating a photograph of ourselves using Animata. Creating a mesh and bone structure which would allow movement then gave way to a myriad of often humorous movements which often resulted in distortion so it was important to be able to laugh at yourself. What began for me as a simple shrug pose, uncertain yet eager then turned into perhaps a dance movement which would send you edging away from anyone ever performing as such.

Where some people liked the distortion effect, I aimed to keep my animation relatively realistic. It was my first time doing any sort of animation but I found it a relatively easy process, only suffering with the lack of the undo function. The common observation was that I look kind of like a genie, so when came time to add a scene, I went with this and the final result I was quite pleased with.



Extra layers were courtesy of stock photography off DeviantArt with credit as follows:
Genie Bottles - TexelGirl-Stock
Hand - marchetoo

Following on from this, we were given Apple IR Remotes and yet another piece of software to create a patch to operate our animations with. This proved to be a lot trickier. It was my first experience with any kind of software like this and where with something like Animata and the Lego Mindstorms software, it was easy enough to pick up visually and make things work. Using MaxMSP I felt a lot more like I was working blind and clung to the basic structure we were given to get us started for dear life.

Ryan and I spent an hour or two trying to figure out how make the length of the animation 'bone' change in length in only small increments. After a long winded do-it-yourself maths lesson we had someone what figured it out. At which point James came in and showed us how to do the exact same thing in a much simpler way in mere minutes. It was however a good learning curve and by forcing myself to experiement and interact with the software, I got much more out of it in terms of understanding than if he'd shown us from the beginning.

It also gave me something to work with to keep going from and develop and after a bit of a late night and early morning and an unexpected adrenalin rush, I managed to create a fluid motion where the bone extended to a maximum value and returned to the minimum and that was an extreme sense of satisfaction from having worked through my technical problems and figured it out. By the time I finished, I could control the waist, arms and knees from the remote in three different types of movements. Success is as follows!The really interesting thing is trying to contantly visually make the connection between the patch, the animation and the movement to get them all to work cohesively. Or at all.

The area between AUT tower and the 3D labs today saw the strange sight of 40 odd students wandering along, each carring a keyboard. Once these were torn open, we began the delicate task of tracing back the pathways to the circuit board to then reprogram. At the 3D lab, we undertook the even more delicate process of soldering wires onto the circuit boards. Again, this was something I'd never done in my life and though we left about 3 hours later and feeling perhaps a little light headed, my wires were soldered on.

Unfortunately, only about 4 or 5 of my intended keys are working so I might have to go solder a few more wires on depending on what I chose to create for my wearable interface. with which to control my Animata animation I am feeling very excited about this project and my first few ideas were either using tap shoes and tap dancing or something with chain mail armour. As with the last project, it will be important to think about how all the elements will come together, that is, how it is worn, the movement which will trigger the 'keys' and the animation and how it moves.

Again I feel it is a challenging project in terms of both the concept and then practical creation and programming and then also with the short time span. After leaving the studio today, I quickly followed up on an idea I had me going out to my work in a photolab and pulling apart some disposible cameras for the circuit boards which control the flash. Not sure if they are at all useful for anything but I sure had fun pulling them apart and trying to figure out how to make the flash go off. The hard part is not giving yourself a shock and seeing how long before your coworkers get annoyed with the constant flashes.

Spin me round, round.

I don't think anyone was more surprised than we were when our robot made it a good 2/3 of the way down the hallway. The mob of BCT students followed Chester the Jester down the hallway eagerly while we trailed behind, confident he wouldn't make it. The fresh batteries must've given him that boost he needed to make it that far at least before crashing into the wall. It was interesting to see how the other groups approached the challenge as no one could really consitently make it to the finish line, even those who has chosen to use sensors. I still think sensors are the way to go but with a little more refinement in the programming and familiarity with the software and the robot. The frustrated mood from yesterday was lightened a bit as we looked at what everyone had created and shared ideas in both design and programming.

I also think we all breathed a sigh of relief upon finding out what our project for today was. This time, our only limit seemed to be time, the pieces in the box and our creativity as we were to construct and program our robot to express the character we had created. In keeping with our ideas of the Jester, we brainstormed circlular pathways to mimic the shape of it's hat and the juggling balls and sound effects or music. In terms of construction, all the really stuck was the idea of a Jester's hat so it was to the internet for inspiration.

Searches for 'Jester' didn't yeild many responses and so we widened our criteria to anything that related to juggling or circles or performing. I again found myself thinking about creating a program which enabled it to dance which brought me to this video which I enjoyed.

We also liked the idea of a Ball coaster but decided it was a little to complex so from here we decided to just start with a base and just modify building onto that. We started with the Striker as we definitely wanted to attach arms so just thought to attach two instead of one. We followed the instructions to build the 3 motor chassis but modified to use only two motors so we would have the third to operate the arms. While the guys got to work with the pieces, I began the programming. I played around with rotations and circles to create a series of rotations and figure 8s.

We faced a few constructional difficulties in terms of making sure it balances, stays upright, rotate the arms in the right direction and so that the arms don't hit anything. We found it was a lot harder constructing from our own ideas as all of these elements had to be taken into account which we took for granted with the step by step instructions. The programing was easier as there was not set path or pattern we had to follow but I had trouble converting over the path I wanted it to take into the programming.

When the programming and construction was complete, Chester danced around in circles and loops flailing his arms wielding two balls. The closest we could get to juggling but we were pleased with him and even managed to have a few laughs.

There is so much more I'd like to be able to do with the programming as researching on the internet has shown that it is incredible what other people have accomplished with the exact same pieces and software. It does make me wonder what the limits of the programming and construction truly are. Rather appropriately, if I may add, the Futurama episode on tonight featured all the robots being activated to destroy humans who struggled to survive not just the attack, but rather also seemed to have more difficulty surviving without their aid. It is incredible how much we rely on machines and they have in fact been programmed to make our lives easier but how little we know about their programming which enables them to operate as such.

Overall, I enjoyed this project more than yesterday's one as I felt it gave us more creative license to create and modify. I'm still finding it challenging using the programming software to convert my ideas into the robot's actions but I'd also like to have a bit more of a go constructing as I haven't done much of that yet. I think that is why the last two days have been frustrating at times as we are not capable to commute our creative ideas over to to technological aspect just yet.

Tomorrow we start our first brief for real and I am eager, perhaps also because it is entitled 'Robo-Dance...'

Trial and error. More so error.

Yesterday was truly a test of everyone's endurance and patience. Given kits of Lego Mindstorm to go forth and construct a robot which would go forth and become our chess piece, we set about excited, reminiscent of childhood days of playing with Lego and the like. As the hoard of colourful and exciting pieces of all shapes and sizes, all hands on deck we got to constructing, with only minor hiccups when we couldn't find the odd piece or where it was mean to slot it. Our creation slowly took shape but when it came time to program it, things got a little difficult.

It was again like the protocol challenge, where we were given the starting point and the destination but our established protocol was challenged by the obstacles created by the walls so today the challenge was to program our robot to reach start to finish moving by protocol. Given a myriad of sensors we could program, my initial idea was to direct ours by sound. That is, in keeping with our Jester character, it would move forward two units and then diagonal one unit. The diagonal direction would be decided activating the sound sensor, moving towards the direction from which it hears noise which would be us clapping, like an audience entertained by the jester.

This proved to be a little difficult to measure the amount of volume which would trigger the sensor so we then decided to map out the journey. After some measuring and calculating, we used the robot itself to measure and record which direction to turn to then be programmed. This again caused difficulties as the path was influenced by many variables, the main one of which was the deteriorating battery life. After many attempts at reprogramming and remapping, we ended up as far as halfway down the hall.

It was a frustrating activity and we wouldn't have lost as much enthusiasm and motivation to keep trying if we hadn't had so much variation in our trials. If we were to keep going, I'd go back to the drawing board and program it's navigation as controlled by the sensors and now after having thought about it, like when we were the subject moving from point A to B by protocol, we still had the ability to make decisions based on judgment calls as decided based on our senses. We too were subject to variables when we made our journey, such as the one hour time limit, the impending rain and the fact that our batteries were perhaps a little flat too. The only way to overcome these variables is with judgment calls which is what we should have programed our robot to do.

Though it was a frustrating project which left us all completely exhausted and perhaps a little short with each other and stepping on some toes, what we achieved is a very steep learning curve in programing. I haven't had any experience in programming before and so what I picked up on was that you have to take into account all variables and be very specific in what actions you program as the smallest tweak can make a huge difference. By programming an element of decision making, it saves having to map out every single 'what if' that could occur along the way.

Onto the intertubes to look at what others have been creating with the same myriad of parts, I looked at discussions of what can be something different to create. Like many of the conversations we overheard and perhaps had ourselves, we joked about our robots smashing through the walls, doing our homework, programming it to program itself, teleporting and other such fantasties. Though these do seem very farfatched and perhaps not completely feasible with the pieces in the kit, it is that same sort of idea of the ability to make judgement calls and think for itself which is what I think is an element of what drives creation, which brings us back to creativity. To achieve new things, we have to think big regardless how ridiculous it might seem at first. Thinking about what else I could program it do, by taking advantage of the sensors, I would want to make it so that the robots interact with each other and move as such, like a dance, but so that they actively seek out each other for interaction. Much like, in fact, humans,

It didn't take this follow robot long to catch my eye so I leave you with a robot that has achieved what for me has only ever resulted in a square hole in the wall. I watched amazed last year as a group of people from my form class every morning would sit and solve rubix cubes. By programming the light sensor to read colour and precalculate the moves, it is able to solve the rubix cube in 60 faceturns.

Now I'm impressed.

Cutting just a few corners.

There seemed to be a mutual consensus that the protocol activity was a little more challenging than the situational shuffle. What came through in presentation was a myriad of interpretations in the initial challenge, to the journey to the presentation and we dug below the surface to think about exactly why we each got to what we had before us on the walls.

Like many other groups, I will definitely admit to perhaps not reading through the instructions as thoroughly as I should have which then made the task a little more difficult when it came time to navigate through the city and we too felt the crunch of the one hour time limit.

Intended or not, I feel that time constraints are often good for pushing creativity and you're forced to refine back your ideas to the best and basic which again brings me to a quote, something along the lines of "a design is finished not when there is nothing left to add, but nothing left to take away." Some of us got a little caught up in all the special abilities we could give our characters as opposed to a simple protocol and method of movement. James made an interesting point that this is something that perhaps comes with our generation of gaming where characters often have a myriad of these special ablilites and so that was what a lot of us chose to immediately bring to the activity.

Some groups chose to present focused more on the route or path, some on the characteristics of their piece and others on what they encountered on the journey. Lots of groups played with the imagery of the chessboard and squares while some removed it altogether. The character my group came up with, The Jester, moved two forward and one diagonal which we mapped out in square photographs and cut out shapes of the building which represented these unites moved, hence focusing more on the path. It wasn't as strong visual impact as it could've been and if I was to do it again, I would've probably chosen a different medium to try move away from something so similar to what we did the previous day.

As a class we discussed the importance of this variation of presentation mediums and scale and choosing what is most suitable for what you are presenting. I found it easy to stick to one of my strongest mediums, that of photography and my easy access to a proper photo printing lab so I have identified this as a comfort zone I need to move out of, perhaps by taking a different role within the group.

We again touched on the purpose or meaning behind the activity and I liked the point that was made relating the protocol of the chess piece to the protocols we create for ourselves in life through our ethics and morals which then define the paths we take and decisions we make. Relating this to my thoughts on the activity, I saw the meaning as an exploration of the infinite amount of possible paths through the city which can then go to say that there are an infinite amount of possible paths to take through life and as we each abide by our own protocol and set of values. Like the chess pieces, these paths often intersect or one's path is obstructed by another . Unlike the chess pieces, it is these interactions which can perhaps change our protocols or way of thinking which can then alter our paths and this again brings me back to the concept of social interaction as means of exploring and creating.

So with our first week of the BCT over, after both some pyscial and mental exercise, I feel the acivities were worthwhile and successful both in the generating ideas and friendships. I think working on the walls of the studios was a very good method of working as it was very hands on and it means that within the shared space, we can go around and interact with the groups' ideas and methods. Within the same space of one week, I've spent a void of time on cramped busses, run a few circuits of the city in rain, shine and howling wind, uphill and downhill, snapped a hundred or two photos (yet I myself only managed to turn up in one) , learnt about 20 names and forgotten half, and somehow managed to injure my knee along process. Imagine what can be achieved in the next 23 more to come!

Jump to the left, step to the right.

In presentation of yesterday's journey, we incorporated colour, photographs, and the sketches and drawings we accumulated at the cards' bidding. We used the cards to map out our path along the wall with the different coloured card to distinguish the different categories of actions. That is, move, rotate, record, wait and 'variable'. This presentation gave a sense of the exploration and movement which was at the heart of our journey.

In presentation, review and discussion of our journeys with other groups, we found that we each had a slightly different interpretation of what had happened. I spoke my ideas about how we were using different elements and senses to explore and interact with the city in a new way. I also found myself later thinking about how I commented that people might've thought we were tourists from our actions and in fact, it is that same concept with which tourists stop to observe things that perhaps those who are more familiar with the area might overlook. Because we are familiar with an area, we are in a way desensitized to it and are more focused on a destination than the route or the things along that way. By removing the element of the destination, we too were able to discover these smaller things.

Another group spoke instead of the roles we each took upon to make the journey happen and the importance of these role and teamwork in any situation. This was something I hadn't thought about and in fact it was an important part of the journey as we were each part of both the journey itself and the documentation.

To build on this, another group saw it as a catalyst for building the foundations required for us to work together over the next three years. Not in just the teamwork of the journey, but in the social interaction along the way. Journeys are often a shared experience, both among those participating and then recounting what happened and what has been achieved. Which is in fact, what we were all doing.

For the next part of the morning, we looked at the simple concept of chess pieces and how combination of their movements allowed for an almost infinite combination of possible games of chess. Creating our own new chess piece and set of movements proved a little bit challenging as we kept thinking too obscurely which would've later proved extremely difficult as we had to then make another journey from Britomart back up to Aotea Square, moving only as this piece would.

Once again armed with only the skeleton of a map, off we went. This time, we had a route and a destination and so focused more on the streets and buildings to navigate and calculate our movements and paths. The purpose of this was to again explore the city in a new way, on a new route and like the infinite possibilities of games of chess, to realise that there are an infinite amount of paths by which one can navigate around the same general area.

This time we were not assigned particular roles but we fell into them naturally, becoming used to working in a team. So looking at the weeks' activities in terms of compound meaning building on each other, it was all about finding new ways to approach the familiar to build new paths of understand, whether in a physical location, amongst our social interactions and also as the attitude and mindset to apply to our approach to the creative projects we will be presented with over the next three years. That was what I personally got out of it anyway. That, and a bit of sunshine, exercise, 'fresh' city air, and ran into some people I know on the streets of downtown Auckland while making some new friends along the way too.

Come Walk With Me

One was left once again to ponder the meaning of the day’s project given only a title – situational shuffle. In relation to the yesterday’s activity, I guessed that it would have something to with reassigning groups and seeing how small changes would affect our data and social maps. I think we were all a little puzzled when given a pack of cards, chalk, and a basic map of Downtown Auckland with only the raw skeleton of streets and buildings.

We took off into in groups of four to follow the bidding of the cards. With no destination and only directions, we walked around blocks, rotated like eggbeaters and marked our trail on the footpath whilst taking note of objects, passing traffic and people, dialogue and objects.

Where it at first seemed like some wild goose chase with no goal nor destination (and to the general public we probably came off as tourists, what with the map and camera), I then thought about it again in terms of yesterday’s activity. When comparing our social maps and geographical maps, they are both formed around some commonality. Our social maps were created around the common interests within a group while excluding the things that weren’t held in common. Geographical maps are generally focused on roads and driving routes while excluding all the other little things. It is that which is left out that is only discovered upon deeper examination, whether through social interaction or physical exploration.

Which brings us back to today’s activity. Stripped of any detail, our blank maps defined only the basic paths for us to fill in these smaller, perhaps deemed insignificant things. We mapped the city not in terms of any particular destination or route but instead in trees, communication devices, machinery and also in that which will not remain constant such as passing pedestrians and traffic, fleeting conversation, information pamphlets and discarded objects.

I defined the purpose of a map yesterday as a group of geographical locations which have been logically collected and compiled to clarify information about a location. So if we keep to this definition, what have we learnt about downtown Auckland and what purpose will it serve? Perhaps it will not help you if you’re trying to find your class for a lecture or somewhere to eat lunch and it could be debated just how ‘logically’ it was collected but it was about exploring the city which some of us know so well, in a completely different way and defining it as such. If one was to follow our map, directions and markings, they too would be on the lookout for these more often overlooked aspects which are in fact, significant. After all, is city is more than just roads; it is compiled of people, cars, trees, signs and machines. Like our social maps, we often interact based on initial commonalities around our interests, likes and dislikes and interests but it is rather when we bring something new; an opposing viewpoint or belief, a different experience that leads to discovery and new ideas.

So if nothing else has been achieved today, there are probably some confused pedestrians wandering around Downtown Auckland City trying to decipher the myriad of chalk scrawls and arrows along the footpaths.

Social Mapping

Day one of the BCT (orientation and administration aside) so the 'social' aspect of today's project seemed apt. It was all very secret yesterday with all to be unveiled only today, leaving one to contemplate over night exactly what social mapping would be. Well, the gears of my imagination were in overdrive anyway.

My first thought was the ever popular social networking sights where anyone can network with people they know or once knew, friends of friends or even friends of friends of friends, as means of sharing photos, stories,
blogs and the like.

And it fact, it turned out to be a similar sort of concept. So we all start as post-it notes and from there we are the center of our own network or constellation if you will, scattered across the wide expanse of wall that we are to map. From ourselves, we branch out into our interests, our likes and dislikes and walks of life which define who we are.

Like so.

It is at this point we stop to think about what we have done thus far. It seemed logical now to link up our common interests which in reality draw us together to complete the network or map. I thought about the purpose of a map and in that it is to understand a greater area than that immediately around us and how it relates to where we are as well as all the places we can go and all the paths we can take. Hence, a similar result achieved through social mapping. On a larger scale besides our favourite TV shows or least desired vegetables, it is our common circumstances and interests which brought us all to the BCT and which will allow us to learn off each other from our diversities to extend our networks and our maps further.

It was on this note, I remember a quote I heard once which seemed to fit this train of thought: "If I give you an apple and you give me an apple, we each have one apple. If I give you an idea and you give me and idea, we each have two ideas."

So with a new colour of yarn we began to visually represent these interests and connect our constellations to reach a final result which was perhaps a little visually confusing and chaotic.

After exercising our creative sides, it was time to adapt it over onto the technological side to visually represent the same information generated through computer software. The purpose of the same sort of visual representation known as network analysis was to collect and clarify a set of date. This again comes back to the idea of a map where geographical locations have been logically collected and compiled to clarify information about a location. What we have achieved is the compilation of data about each individual to visually represent ourselves and how we relate to each other for the purpose of being able to understand and then extend our network and ourselves.

The hardest part of the activity was getting the finished diagram printed.