Stage Fright
From Medialab Prado
Here you can see a different version of the project exhibited at Sonar 08 in Barcelona immediately after the workshop at the Medialab-Prado. [[1]]
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Description of the project
Interactive piece creating the sensation of flight. The working of human perception is tested through the combination of physical and virtual movement. The piece aims to involve the entire body of the participant in a perceptual exercise. An ordinary swing stands next to a wall. A large vignette of the sky is projected onto the wall. Clouds are moving slowly in it. Audience members are invited to sit on the swing facing the projection. The movement of the swing triggers an exaggerated sense of rising and falling in the footage of the cloudy sky. For example, as the participant swings higher, the video alters to create a corresponding but much more emphasized illusion of rising higher in the sky. [...] An airplane flies past. A balloon rises. A broken umbrella is blown across the sky. But the narrative of the video is forever slightly beyond the perceptual field of the person sitting on the swing, infusing the experience with a sense of futility and doubt.
Technologies
The technical side of 'Stage Fright' relies on Arduino and Processing. The motion of the swing is measured by a flex sensor. Half of the flex sensor is attached to the frame of the swing and half of it is attached to the chain which moves back and forth. An Arduino board reads the value of the sensor and writes this to the serial port. In the Processing application, the data given by the flex sensor is mapped to the duration of the video. Thus the swing becomes a playhead which scrubs back and forth in the video.
The code will be published once they are cleaned up a bit more.
Project's author
This project would not have been possible without the amazing energy and creativity of my collaborators. I merely provided the initial momentum of the piece. The quality of video content produced by some of my collaborators in a very short time is astounding. This process helped me to see this piece more as an experimental framework which is open to very different possibilities. This is the first time I thought more about the structure of a work rather than meaning that's specific or defined.
I'm currently based in Los Angeles, completing a Masters degree in Media Art at the University of California, Los Angeles. Here is my website.[2]
Collaborators
- Carlos Corpa: Swing Structure, Metalwork
- Wendy Ann Mansilla: coding, design, videos
- Laura Olalde: Time Lapse Photography
- Sytse Wierenga: Turning Camera Rig, Time Lapse Photography, Video Production, Setup
- Valeria Marraco: Video Production, Setup
- Gabriel Roman: Camera
- Aniara Rodado: Video Production
- Jacqueline Steck: Helping with video sketches
- Oswald Aspilla Pérez: Developing the sound for the video
- Nuria Quintana Villar: Clouds & flying videos, video documentation.
- Alexander Narváez: Carpentry
- Pix: Code
