Although I wasn’t able to get all the dancers in one spot this week, I did have a chance to map some of the movements from one, with my updated mapping code.
Sadly, the room wasn’t large enough to capture every movement with the static video camera, but the following examples will give you an idea of how the data I’m getting looks. Each graph shows (from top to bottom): pitch, roll and yaw of the Wii remote. For these tests, I didn’t hook up the leg controller (although the above code will additionally take nunchuck data if you want it)…
I’m posting this via Alex at ISO50, because I know there are a few visitors to this blog that should really be inspired by it…
Perhaps more than any other industry, learning to be a creative can be tough. You can become quickly disillusioned when you’re starting out and the pieces don’t fall into place right away. There are many, many reasons that this doesn’t happen, but when you invest a lot of yourself into your art, it’s easy to give up if it doesn’t meet your own high expectations.
I’m only just beginning to come to terms with this myself, and Ira Glass manages to say it in a far more lucid way than I am able. Whilst he is speaking about radio and video in this clip, it most certainly applies to anyone setting out to start work in the creative industries…
Dizzee Rascal - Boy In Da Corner. Before it all went wrong and he fell off stage.
Seeing as you all snapped up the Mixed Peas mix like nothing else, I thought I’d put up another old one for y’all: my set from Void in March, 2008.
It was a grime special and whilst the mixing isn’t top shelf, it’s probably one of the most enjoyable sets I’ve ever played. Grime has a special place in my heart – it’s got loads of energy and definitely doesn’t take itself too seriously. My only regret from this set was not having the crowd response recorded as well. I’m not a huge fan of rewinds, but the madness after dropping Wiley – Wot Do U Call It? was priceless. If I didn’t take that one back to the beginning, I’m pretty sure there would have been a riot. Good times.
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I’ve approached this project in reverse to how I would have done things in the past. However, it’s probably more of a realistic workflow when approaching a ‘real world’ job. Instead of starting with images, which are forced into some kind of storyline, I began with a text, which I turned into a script of sorts, before storyboarding and then creating a soundtrack to edit the visuals to.
This probably seems like a pretty obvious method, but as is often the way when trying to pump out uni projects quickly – things don’t always happen in order. Many times, the pre-production work is quickly slapped together at the end of a project, just to get the marks. It’s a fairly cynical, but realistic situation many times during your uni career.
Wonderfully understated sexism from the 1960's. The colours are nice, too. Image: http://retrorenovation.com
After completing the storyboard, I had a think about how I would like the ‘look’ of the images to come across. I did some research into 1960′s homes and found the gem above. I’m a huge fan of the colours and typesetting of this era, and whilst I won’t be using much in the way of type, I’m hoping I will be able to do some colour treatment on my images (if I ever get the photo shoot done) to give them a warm, aged feel.
During the break, I met with the performers, who will be helping me greatly with my project. I had really been sweating on meeting up with them, because it marks the beginning of work really getting under way.
The following is a short video of some of the footage I captured whilst we were seeing what gave a workable output from the Wii remotes. No, the dancers weren’t drunk, but we did discover that using another body to stabilise each other would give a less erratic data stream from the Wii remotes. Very helpful when trying not to accidentally trigger events…
As with all my subjects this semester, ‘Week 07′ is really a week of our mid-semester break. Yes, they decided to call it ‘Research Week’, where we’re able to come in and arrange meetings with our tutors/lecturers, but as anyone who’s ever been to uni knows – academics are hard to pin down at the best of times. Let alone when there aren’t any annoying students around to get in the way of ‘research’.
So, what’s Research Week in reality? It’s another week that UNSW (from now on, referred to on this blog as ‘University Ltd’) has chopped off our ever-shortening semester, to further cut costs. No doubt, I’m sounding like my usual, cranky self, but when you have a look back a few years to see semesters that were 14 weeks in length, are now cut down to just 12 (with a ‘Research Week’, that makes 11) – you can see where I’m coming from. Oh, and before you tell me to stop whining about Uni Ltd, because I’m just getting more holidays – don’t bother. I’m one of those nerds that would rather spend another 6 weeks there, putting all those killer resources to use, than sitting around on my arse for 4 months, waiting for the next session to roll around.
It really blows my mind that I put this mix together in August, 2005. What is even more surprising is that I still get asked about it.
It’s no secret that I’m no longer a part of the Sydney dubstep scene, but back in 2005, myself and Eli were amongst literally a handful of people in the entire country, trying to get this style of music heard. For me, this was when the sound hit its peak – before a glut of bedroom producers hit the halfstep formula like there was no tomorrow. I’m in danger of being back in my ‘grumpy old man’ hat now, so I’ll move swiftly along…
Mixed Peas was a set that I performed at the now defunct Frigid night, supporting Hermitude (and as someone who prides themselves on playing music that no one else has – the pinnacle of my DJ achievement). Over the years, I gave away every CD copy I had burnt and between my loss of interest in DJing and a high incidence of exploding computers (back up your files, kiddies), this is now the only copy that remains. Unfortunately, it’s a mediocre 128k MP3, but hopefully it makes a few people out there happy.
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Bit of a strategic sickie this week for Screen Culture. So unfortunately I missed watching excerpts of the brilliant Dr. Strangelove, as part of the topic of ‘Military History of the Computer Screen’. So instead of doing any of these readings, I took a look at what was on offer for the final essay.
Kubrick using hand-lettered fonts, long before the General Pants cool-set decided it was trendy
Although tempted by the prospect of commentating on Dr. Strangelove, I decided that I should spend time researching in the direction of most of my other university work – Interactivity.
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