Category Archives: Experimental Interaction – G5

The Telegarden Review

The Telegarden – Directed by both Ken and Joseph, is a telerobotic garden displayed through an online platform that acquiesces users to interact and connect with the garden. Inspired mainly by the internet, through a small screen, one will see what looks like an industrial robotic arm who takes your biddings.

The interaction is a mash of old technology versus the new – in other words, it means saying goodbye to the traditional agricultural style of plantation where farmers are required to keep an eye on their plant 24/7. Imagine, observing your biennials through the eye of a camera. Its main aim was to foster a strong sense of social interaction and community through intercommunication in the virtual space.

Now, it might not seem like much judging from the advancement of our technology in the current era, but back in the 1990s where internet practices were considered scarce and remote, this is the project is a quantum leap.

The art installation took it preceding commencement over at the University of Southern California. The directors of this project anticipated a challenge to the notion of the internet and post-nomadic community, where the continuance of life is highly dependable on teamwork/synergism.

Over the years of its launch, over 9000 participants were involved in this cultivation project. It was then the location of the installation took a switch and moved from online to live – lobby of Ars Electronica Centre in Austria.

In retrospect, K.Goldberg’s conception on allowing multiple people on control to contribute to online streaming will always remain relevant and tantalizing.

Telematic Embrace – Adobe Connect in class

 

I spy with my little eye… something bright.

Your smile. AYYYY.

I had my very first Adobe Connect experience in class yesterday. I never knew it could it so much fun to be doing a live webcam with my classmates! HAHA, now I can spy on them without having to fear that I will make any accidental eye contact. First and foremost, I experienced first-hand how efficient Adobe Connect works. It facilitates hosting, sharing and collaboration from anywhere, anytime, even on mobile devices!

Okay now, my most favourite part of the activity. I really enjoyed this segment a lot. During this time, the instruction was to flash any photo from our image gallery.

This is what we ended up having:

A screen full of bits and pieces of everyone’s life.

Each frame has a story to tell. And behind every photo, it holds a close depiction of one’s personality or interest. It could perhaps be a snippet from their everyday lives – which I found really intriguing. It has only been 3 weeks since class started. Through these images which were carefully selected from all of their photo album, I get a chance to peek in at what goes down in their life.

Second Front, Grand Theft Avatar (2008) Review

 

ABOUT:

Founded by Linden Lab who first launched Second Life in 2003, it has pioneered to become a virtual world where many transacted millions across this platform. Second Front (2006), a team of 7 live performers, were the first to perform in the online virtual world of Second Life. The main source of influence mainly derives from Dadaism, Fluxus, and many other geneses of contemporary performance artists like Laurie Anderson herself. Second Front continually pushes the notions of conventional performance and the culture of immateriality.

 

OVERVIEW: 

One example of a live performance by Second Front is the Grand Theft Avatar (2008). Being hosted in the virtual world, this is a presentation of a robbery case where the group posed as the currency liberation army and eventually made an attempt to escape by riding on a bomb, diving into the sunset.

 

THE THIRD SPACE:

The third space is a fluid matrix of potentiality and realizable connections to the most far-reaching remoteness.Randall Packer, The Third Space (2014)

A definition from the web: It represents the fusion of the physical and the remote 
into a third space  that can be inhabited by remote users 
simultaneously or asynchronously.

Unlike performances that were set in the real world, the artificially simulated dimension provides infinite opportunities for them to work their magic, a hyperspace where traditional laws cease to exist. This notion acts as a blur between the real world and the virtual through distributed existence. The possibility is endless, and the benefits of virtual reality are just the tip of the iceberg.

The Tale of Two Cities

Posted by Balachander Prashanthi on Sunday, 21 January 2018

 

Bringing you live today: The Tale of Two Cities

What kind of city, you ask? Its City hall station and City Square Mall, the location where the both of us were lived at. The main aim of this video is to match each other to someone/somebody that fits the criteria given by each of us. Alongside me we have our spontaneous teammate, Bala!

Then, we’ll begin searching once the live video starts. The challenge comes in where the both of us have to find someone suitable within a span of 15 minutes, which makes it really tricky – its a race with time! Apart from the whole finding the “Mr Right” thingy, we will be posting them questions that relay back to the criteria set out by my teammate.

For instance, Bala’s Top 3 criteria she looks for in a man is:

1. Tall (above 1.75m)

2. Sense of humour

3. Witty (Can be tested from the way he interacts with the questions posted)

cr: http://www.modearea.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/02/1486437588_maxresdefault-1280×640.jpg

We conducted a street style interview together with our “potential candidate”, and before the interview draws to a close, a final question will be posted to the guy – “Will you swipe right on her on Tinder?” If the answer is YES, then it’s a match! Simple as that. Both of them have a form a heart with their hands in the middle of the split-screen. We thought by conducting a street style interview, it would heighten the engagement level, bringing in an extra element of surprise to the video content.

Indoor VS Outdoor setting:

While Bala conducted her interviews within the area of an indoor shopping mall, I did mine along the Singapore River. It was a contrast between indoor and an open-air area which I thought would make a pretty interesting juxtaposition in terms of ambient noise and the kind of scenery we can observe floating by in the background of the video. This would be an interesting point to note during the running of the clip.

Summary of Reading by R.Packer & S.Vaidhyanathan

Summary and Reflection? Here we go! To kickstart the topic, I have included a video which may clarify anyone’s doubt on the idea behind Open Source concept. The explanation is simplified into a straightforward yet uncomplicated comparison to the notion of LEGO building.

 

Open Source, as the name suggests, is referred to as a program whose source code is readily modifiable for developers to reconstruct and enhance due to its accessibility. Known as ‘Free Software’ or rather, Socially Responsible Software, it gives people a higher degree of flexibility and control. Open Source Software boasts transparency since the idea was conceived as the progress of your idealisation, is readily accessible.

During my time of using OSS, I found that peer to peer interaction made the creative process more inclusive in terms of idealisation of my concepts as I was able to understand and reference how my peers conducted their idea developments. (click to find out wiki’s definition of peer to peer interaction) In the world of media art, the focus is being shifted away from traditional forms of art creation which heavily involves individualistic qualities, to embracing the ideas of a community and sharing of ideas.

With the advancement of technology, it gives artists another avenue to explore and reach beyond the limits of their creativity. It is becoming increasingly common for artists to incorporate the use of some form of technology in their artworks, especially in the field of media art. From the use of micro-computers to react to the audience by adapting the space in the form of sound, visuals and even smell to accommodate the viewer. However, this poses an additional problem when we compare it with more traditional proprietary modes of art creation. The use of technology can be a double edge sword as we have become so dependent on using technology as a tool to fuel our creations that we are unable to proceed without it.

Being labelled as the most successful model of peer production, revision and peer review, the article by R. Packer wrote, Marc Garrett describes peer-based practices in the arts: “The process is as important as the outcome, forming relationally aware peer enactments. It is a living art, exploiting contemporary forms of digital and physical networks as a mode of open praxis, as in the Greek word for doing, and as in, doing it with others.”

You can find the extract written by both R.Packer & S.Vaidhyanathan here and here.

 

cr: https://dai-global-digital.com/uploads/bart-simpson-generator-86e40a.gif

 

 

Resources:

https://papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers.cfm?abstract_id=713044

https://opensource.com/resources/what-open-source

https://oss.adm.ntu.edu.sg/17s2-dn1010-tut-g05/wp-content/uploads/sites/2251/2018/01/OpenSourceCulture_reduced.pdf

https://oss.adm.ntu.edu.sg/17s2-dn1010-tut-g05/wp-content/uploads/sites/2251/2018/01/Open-Source-Studio_Randall-Packer.pdf

Experiment in Social Broadcasting

don’t press play.

Posted by Felicia Chua on Thursday, 18 January 2018

Hello people.

This is me documenting my very first Facebook live. Basically, we walked around school for a bit and alsoooooo, here are some of my new friends HAHAHA. Alright, I’ll wrap up here. Hope y’all like it.

Ciaos!

For more live videos, click here.