Posts Tagged ‘intermedia performance’

Kinetic Cinema had a merry time with the Merry Makers last Sunday, February 26^th at Fort Useless.  The night involved video and performances by Jessica Flannigan, Kate Taylor, and the Merry Makers Rachel Sattler and Elizabeth Burwell along with their filmmaker Ethan Duff. Though quite different from one another the three acts were tied together by elements of nostalgia, parody, and feel good comedy.

During the screening of their film “Adventures In Anytown,” Rachel, Elizabeth, Ethan cued us in on their battles with freezing temperatures, venue changes, time cues, costume design and crunch deadlines.  They shared clips from films that influenced the formation of their stage and screen personas including segments from Annie, Moulin Rouge and Lavern and Shirley among others.

To hear of the Merry Makers process from start to finish was inspiring.  It also reminded us of what we already know but sometimes forget, which is that when it comes to art New Yorkers are by your side to make it happen.

Join us for our next Kinetic Cinema event with Marta Renzi on March 22^nd at the Gibney Dance Center.

For more information about the Merry Makers, visit them on Facebook at http://www.facebook.com/MerryMakersDance?sk=wall

National Conference
Pavilion Dance, Bournemouth (UK)
8-10 September, 2011

Digital Futures in Dance is an opportunity for artists, promoters, producers, venues, academics and creative and digital companies to come together to discuss future possibilities for dance and technology. With an increasing growth in interdisciplinary practice, Digital Futures in Dance investigates how new digital technologies create new conditions for choreographing and presenting dance. The conference is structured around three interrelated themes explored through presentations, workshops, performances and installations:

The Expanded Stage: Stage, screen and bodies – What will be the stages for dance in the future?

New Body Intelligence: Body data as raw material – How will new intelligence of the body influence choreography in the future?

Social Interaction: Mobile and interactive technology devices – How will increased interactivity influence the creation and reception of dance in the future?

The programme will feature international artists and researchers across the dance, technology and media spectrums including Jonah Bokaer, Billie Cowie, Marlon Barrios-Solano, Harriet Macauley | Pair Dance, Johannes Birringer, Renana Raz, Mark Coniglio, and Marina Tsartsara.

See the full programme here.

Today at 4am USA Eastern Standard Time, and 6pm in Brisbane Australia, the interactive Waterwheel platform will launch with a crew of collaborators and audience members from around the world converging online in real time. Waterwheel is an ongoing interactive, collaborative platform for performance, presentation and exchange exploring water, as a topic of politics, science and metaphor. The brain child of Brussel’s born Suzon Fuks, a media artist, choreographer and director, the project developed out of her growing interest in global water politics and the richness of the topic for artistic expression.

Last week as the site was in its final stages of tweaking, Fuks gave me a tour of the platform and showed me all the things it can do. Along with her team of technicians and artists Fuks has created a very sophisticated site, one that works as well or better than most social media sites or online conferencing platforms. With years of experience designing intermedia and live networked performances, Fuks knew what she wanted, and what was needed to achieve the intentions of the site. Each section of the site is modeled to emulate some function of water, with the net result that it “flows” together seamlessly, and feeds and regenerates the overall experience for everyone who uses it.

When you first encounter the site on the homepage there is a beautiful wheel with 40 concentric rings that ripple with the latest media content that has been uploaded to the site. From there you can explore the raw media, or you can enter one of the “Taps” which are highly sophisticated real-time spaces to hold networked performances, presentations, workshops, or exchanges. All of the media up-loaded to the Waterwheel by users is available for real-time mixing and integration on the Taps as well as live video, audio, and drawing tools.

Another component of the site is a map showing “Fountains” going on all around the world. A Fountain can be anything flowing from the Taps (ie current or up-coming Taps), or they can be events about water that users submit to the site. These could be a performance or presentation, an exhibition or conference, a book launch or a film premiere. The Fountains are the place for users to promote their projects or events, or find other similar projects of interest and upcoming events happening nearby or around the world.

While the Waterwheel is focused on water, the platform itself is incredibly facile and could be useful for any group that wants to converge around a specific area of interest. I asked Fuks about whether she would be making more platforms like this in the future. In her reply, she emphasized that exploring water topics remains her primary motivation, however she does see the marketability of the platform they have designed and they are considering commercializing the technology as a means of funding Waterwheel.

The success of the platform is in the hands of the people who use it, so dive on in and splash around in the beautiful liquid world of Waterwheel.

Details of the Launch Event:

On Monday 22 August 2011, the new Waterwheel project and website will be launched at the Judith Wright Centre of Contemporary Arts in Brisbane from 6pm, and online on the Waterwheel website with a program of free performances.

Kinect Installation at Singapore Dance Fest

When Microsoft unleashed the Kinect last fall as an add-on for Xbox 360, hackers and geeks the world over were chomping at the bit to break in and figure out what it can do. That’s because the Kinect is a $150 piece of equipment that contains a super sophisticated camera that can detect depth (3D), color, speed and motion, as well as stereophonic microphones that can place sounds in space. As a result it’s basically a rudimentary brain that has both sight and sound senses and can capture and respond to the world like a sentient being (almost).

The list of Kinect hacks has been piling up since it was released last November, and it will keep growing thanks to Microsoft’s new Kinect Developers kit for Windows (apparently a Mac kit is in the works). Among the coolest developments is motion capture software like Jasper Brekelman’s Brekel that enables anyone to create their own mo-cap animations using the Kinect. Here is a preview of “Under the HUD” by Triangle Productions, an animated series using Brekel and Kinect’s motion capture capabilities. Although the choreography is not so impressive, they give great insight into how they are using the technology.

The sensors on the Kinect make it a powerful tool for intermedia performance. Amazing live interactive animations like those of Chunky Move’s “Mortal Engine” can be obtained using the Kinect for a tiny fraction of the cost and technological know how. Here is an example of an artful performance with live video projections using a Kinect developed by the media and design firm 1024 Architecture.

There have been many technological precedents to the Kinect, but for a much higher price tag. In the dance world this kind of technology was formerly only available to universities and world class dance companies with loads of funding. The prototype of Kinect’s camera and microphone alone cost $30,000! How can Microsoft charge only $150 for the same technology? Well the answer is in the popularity of the device, which has already sold 10 million units and counting.

The fact that this device is called Kinect and was designed to track the motion of the human body seems to be a dream come true for dance artists and movers. I can’t wait to see what artists and geeks will come up with next.

To learn more and see loads of videos about hacks for the Kinect go to: Kinecthacks.net

Movement Media is delighted to have Doug Fox as a guest blogger for this week’s posting.  Back in February 2009, Doug presented several movement-based animations as a guest curator for Movement Media’s Kinetic Cinema program.   Click here to read our blog posting featuring Doug’s Animation program at the screening.

Doug Fox’s Picks for Dance and Movement Animations

One of the captivating elements of dance and animation is the diverse range of forms it can take. Among the animation techniques that can be employed to represent the body in motion, whether in a more concrete or abstract manner, include:

• 2D
• 3D
• Stop motion
• Live-action and animation hybrids
• Real-time animated graphics using motion tracking
• Visualization overlays
• Special effects
• ASCII-based animations
• Digital puppetry
• Cut-out animation
• Motion-capture based
• 2D/3D lasers
• Rotoscoped
• Virtual worlds
• Pre-cinema era animations

For Doug’s round-up of some of his favorite dance and movement animations he made selections of each of these different types of animations.  A few videos chosen by Doug couldn’t be embedded onto our blog for your viewing convenience, but we encourage you to take a minute to check out these great videos, to learn about the many types of dance and movement-based animated videos artists are creating. Enjoy!

Rotoscoped Tango dance scene from “Waking Life”:

Gabrielle Lamb’s “Quizas” mixes 2D animation and live-action footage:

“En Tus Brazos” is a narrative-based 3D animation about a tragic accident that besets a famous Argentinean Tango dancer:

Also enjoy an ASCII-based animation “TextField” by Chirstinn Whyte and Jake Messenger:

http://www.jakemessenger.plus.com/textfield-h264.mov

The Converse music video “My Drive-Thru” is based on the cut-out animation technique:

Oren Lavie’s “Her Morning Elegance” is a stop-motion music video compiled from thousands of photographs:

The “Prodigy Warrior’s Dance” combines stop-motion animation and puppetry:

The Recoil Performance Group’s “Body Navigation” uses motion tracking and projectors to general real-time, interactive graphics in a performance environment:

“Trash Dance” features 3D animation and motion capture:

Lastly, Doug offers us “Anima Istanbul”, which re-creates the feeling of the pre-cinema era zoetrope effect:

http://motionographer.com/theater/if-2009-zoetrope/

Movement Media appreciates Doug sharing some of his favorite animated videodances with our readers.  As you can see, artists are making some extraordinary animations, and there will certainly be more exciting works in the future, as more artists are combine animation with dance and movement.

Doug Fox is the founder of Great Dance, one of the first dance blogs. His blog and speaking programs have primarily addressed how dance-makers can embrace the Internet and digital tools to enhance their marketing and promotional efforts. He is an active member of the dance community and serves on the Dance/NYC Advisory Board.

Doug began to study and research all forms of animation, especially as they relate to dance and movement. This research led to the creation of his dance animation educational program, which he was delighted to introduce at Movement Media’s Kinetic Cinema. Doug is continuing to expand this screening program and workshop and it will be shown on August 16th at the Hong Kong Science Museum presented by the City Contemporary Dance Company.

Doug can be reached at doug@greatdance.com and through his Great Dance website: http://greatdance.com. You can also follow his Twitter feed: http://twitter.com/dougfox.