Tag Archive for Projects

fluid updated

August 12, 2009 Projects 3 comments

I’ve spent a bit more time cleaning up the fluid blobs examples I made last week, this time limiting the Region of Interest and fiddling with the fluid interaction.  Also newly included is a smarter way to interact with the blobs (in the code, i mean), pulling out more precise locational data.  I’ll be looking to mine this one a bit more extensively than I did with the filtration fields installation – and since I seem to be getting better now at things I was attempting before – this should be a lot more fun.In the mix still is some video over network action, as well as potentially a database record of the motion over time.  I’d like to develop this as an interactive (from the visualisation point of view) interface where you could select a day, week or month and view the fluid ripples as they occur, like a fluid time-lapse of the actual motion from the courtyard.  We’ll see.

Fluid Blobs v2 from Jason McDermott on Vimeo.

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fluid blobs

August 8, 2009 Projects 2 comments

Linked below are some early results from a new series of sketches I’ve been working on using Processing.  These sketches continue in a long line of projects I’ve completed recently using simple camera tracking algorithms to infer interesting patterns of movement in urban spaces.The first example is a calibrated blob tracking experiment, using the excellent and very well documented OpenCV library for processing.  A few simple modifications to the setup parameters allow for a very customisable tool, able to withstand many of the constraints live webcam installs can throw up.  I’ve tested this in a number of places (my bedroom wall, lit by a single lamp tends to be the best contrast) and will have more to say on the nature of live webcam video in the future.

OpenCV blob tracking – calibrated from Jason McDermott on Vimeo.

The second example is a first attempt at combining the live blob tracking with the wonderfully funky and playful MSA Fluid library also for processing.  This lib is geared towards touch screen interfaces and screen based mouse interactivity – but I immediately thought it would be the perfect partner for my webcam based projects (or even accelerometer/phidget/slider/midi sensor data).  It wasn’t very difficult to swap out the mousex/pmousex variables for centroid x/y data, so the first test has been deemed a success.  I showed this yesterday to Frank/Ale/Amy/george/anyone who would stop for more than 2 minutes in the interactivation studio and it was a big hit :)

OpenCV + MSA Fluid (Processing) from Jason McDermott on Vimeo.

The third example is significant for a couple of reasons – it is another combination this time using recorded video of an actual installation space (filtration fields / DAB courtyard) thus requiring another version of the calibration – but also my first experiments in putting together an arrayed interface between the blobs and the fluid.To explain further; Firstly it’s easy to switch out the mouse for ‘something else’ and inferring movement velocity for a single object/blob is simple.  Secondly I wasn’t so sure about the way to apply this singular blob mousex/pmousex-esque technique to many objects at once.  Thirdly I wasn’t sure if it would all explode in one big fluorescent, particle mess!

OpenCV + MSA Fluid (processing) test 3 from Jason McDermott on Vimeo.

[Update]< <note, v3 will be embedded when vimeo uploads my video. since when does a new video have to wait in a queue for 30 minutes??>>In the end I’d say it’s mission accomplished, certainly with calibration tweaks to occur before I’m happy to unleash this on an unsuspecting public.  I’d be interested to see how this could influence peoples’ behaviour in the space – whether or not we would see people dancing/swimming/painting the space of the courtyard.  I’m curious also to see how this kind of new interaction with the space of the DAB could filter into a new perception of the building as not merely a space to move through but one which is open to new forms of physical conversation.

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Worlds Collide

January 27, 2009 Thoughts No comments

IMG_8477.CR2, originally uploaded by jason.mcdermott.Worlds Collide happened on Sunday night at the Wall in Kings Cross, along with an updated installation of my pixeltag project. The night was a lot of fun and pixeltag was very well received, so all’s well that ends well!Tony Curran was kind enough to invite me to exhibit on the night and I was more than happy to oblige.  I’d been looking to make some changes to the pixeltag project after Real Perspective closed at Tap Gallery in mid-January. Whilst being pleased that pixeltag got off the ground for Tap, I wanted to take it further – adding things like transparency, gravity and higher resolution.  Previously all the programming had lived inside a Max/MSP patch, but lately I’ve been seriously considering some changes to my virtual repertoire.With this in mind, I made the rather ambitious plan to re-program pixeltag for Worlds Collide using Processing (which I had only briefly touched before), all within the space of a week!  I’ve posted previously about my baby steps and early processing sketches that were forming the basis of my knowledge of how Processing works, and I’ll be blogging in more depth regarding the helping hands I had in putting the project together again from scratch, but suffice it to say after a couple of solid days learning and reprogramming, pixeltag came together better than I expected it to!The project saw a large audience at the Wall, with many people having the chance to play with the system.  The updated pixeltag had additional features such as object-specific gravity and opacity parameters, all of which lead to a far greater dynamic in creating drawings on the fly.More images from the night are to come, as well as perhaps another installation in the near future.

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pixelTag Revisited

January 23, 2009 Thoughts No comments

Here are a few screenshots of the latest and greatest for the pixelTag project.I’ve taken the time to port some of the interaction and visualisation out of Max/MSP into Processing.  So far the button presses are working fine as well as the r/g/b/a colour selection options and the size choice.pixelTag will be unleashed on an unsuspecting public on Sunday night as part of Worlds Collide at the Wall in Darlinghurst.img_3064pixelTag, as exhibited at Tap Gallery, 2008.picture-1picture-1-2pixelTag, using input from wii remote in Max/MSP + output from Processing.

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Baby Steps

January 20, 2009 Thoughts No comments

pic-smallerI’ve started from scratch, learning Processing using Dan Shiffman’s handy book Learning Processing.Above is the first little creation from the book, a little creature called Zoog, which I’ll be wiring up to respond to mouse clicks and all kinds of computer interactivity.  It’s not much to start with, but it’s fun to get my hands dirty with Processing and learn some coding fundamentals.Anybody who’s interested in meeting Zoog can make him too, just copy + paste the following into a Processing sketch; 

void setup() {size(593,225); // this is for image size considerations, nothing else!smooth();}void draw() {background(255);// set moderectMode(CENTER);ellipseMode(CENTER);// Body// rect(x1,y1,width,height);stroke(0);fill(135,181,209);rect(100,100,20,100);// Head// ellipse(x1,y1,width,height);fill(255);ellipse(100,70,60,60);// Eyesstroke(0);fill(0);ellipse(85,70,10,20);ellipse(115,70,10,20);// Legs// line(x1,y1,x2,y2);line(90, 150, 80, 160);line(110, 150, 120, 160);// Armsline(90, 110, 70, 120);line(110, 110, 130, 120);}

I’m looking to take Processing as far as possible, whilst being fully aware of it’s live performance abilities.  So far Max/MSP owns the live performance aspects of my work, but I’d like to take things a little bit further and combine realtime interaction with some more considered string/array logging/analysing capabilities.  I’ll be posting future updates on my baby steps into Processing, so watch this space.

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The Street as Platform

November 22, 2008 Projects One comment

The Street as platform – a street rendered in data.

November has been a busy month! Along with Anthony Burke, Dan Hill and Mitchell Whitelaw, I’ve been running an intensive masterclass studio in the Master of Digital Architecture program at UTS.  The masterclass is based on one of Dan’s earlier posts called The Street as Platform, in which the notion of the static street in contemporary urban planning and architecture is discussed as an anachronistic idea and one in dire need of reform.  The street as platform talks about the dynamically linked nature of the modern street, where mobile communication, ubiquitous computing and traditional number crunching merge as a new kind of informational street ecology that exists just outside of our normal consciousness.As students and teachers of architecture, it could well be said that the dynamism of the street in it’s inhabitation and occupation is implicitly known and explored, but never clearly articulated as a driver – in it’s own right – of architectural decision making regarding form/content.

With this in mind, we set out to investigate the lived inhabitation of the street in an attempt to visualise and understand the hidden seams of activity, an attempt to make the invisible visible.Along with Dan, Anthony and Mitchell, we had a selection of super keen students and a handful of sensor equipment with we set about taming the data beast of Harris St.  Our aim was to produce some meaningful information, based on corellated data sets gleaned and generated from our surrounds.  The students searched for data on Harris st from a number of sources relative to Harris St (google, flickr, youtube, newsrolls, blogs) and then used processing to scrape, munge and visualise the data.  Also included into the mix were a number of sensors we wired up to collect site specific data such as light/temperature/humidity/rainfall levels over the last week, Bluetooth devices in the vicinity, webcam images from the street as well as audio readings and a magnetic sensor.

All up the live data feeds were a bit of a mixed bag with plenty of teething problems, but over the next fortnight these issues will look to be sorted.The students presented their work on Friday to an invited panel including marcus trimble, andrew vande moere and kirsty beilharz, one of our new professors in Design at UTS.  The presentations went very well, showcasing some very good work and sparking much discussion amongst the invited guests.The students have diligently been updating a blog with images of the process workand sketch ideas throughout the last two weeks, which can be found at http://streetasplatform.wordpress.com.  The studio will be exhibiting some of the work at the upcoming UTS Architecture exhbition on the 4th December, so come see some of the live feeds being visualised on the night.

See also; http://offshorestudio.net/ http://cityofsound.com/ http://theteemingvoid.com/

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