The SIGGRAPH 2010 juried art gallery showcases work by artists who physically engage technology in their creative process. Beyond the sense of sight, TouchPoint brings together creative works that investigate, celebrate, and critique the polysensory nature of human experience in a digitally enhanced environment. It investigates the permeable membrane of the digital interface, where we use an array of tools to materialize and visualize future artifacts of creative expression. The work integrates human haptic connections in computer-based artwork, involving the “viewer” and/or the artist through a unique physical interface.

Now in its 37th year, the SIGGRAPH conference is the premier international event on computer graphics and interactive techniques. SIGGRAPH 2010 is expected to draw an estimated 25,000 professionals from five continents to Los Angeles, California. The SIGGRAPH conference and exhibition is a five-day interdisciplinary educational experience including a three-day commercial exhibition that attracts hundreds of exhibitors from around the world. SIGGRAPH is widely recognized as the most prestigious forum for the publication of computer graphics research. In addition to SIGGRAPH’s leading-edge technical program, the conference’s installations provide close-up views of the latest in digital art, emerging technologies, and hands-on opportunities for creative collaboration.

In the Line of Sight is featured in CyberArts 2009, Prix Ars Electronica Exhibition

September 4 - October 4, 2009

OK Center for Contemporary Art, Linz, AUSTRIA

http://www.ok-centrum.at/ausstellungen/cyberarts_09/cyberarts_09.html

See images and video of In the Line of Sight at Elaine L. Jacob Gallery in Detroit.

The picture above shows one of the flashlights in a microphone stand and clip. The microphone clip still needs to be slightly modified, so that it also allows the flashlight to sit exactly horizontally. This can be done with a little cut near the clip’s hinge (see picture below):

The microphone stand is approx 6 feet tall (fully extended) with an adjustable height from 3 feet to 6 feet. It comes with a cable strap (which is a little too big for the BNC cable but still can be used). The BNC cable does not pull at all on the flashlight, so changing the flashlight’s orientation due to cable strain is no issue.

Finally, by chance I stumbled over this old William Shatner live album from 1977 which has relevant cover art (see a picture of the cover here)

We continued our work with Rebecca and Don on Dec. 6th with a full day video shooting of individual movement sequences for a database of clips that are fed to the flashlight matrix. We are currently working on editing the clips and arranginging them in a database for a generative/emerging dance choreography in video (Quicktime .mov, H.264, 720×480, cropped from 16:9 HDV to 4:3 DV).

We have started to work with Rebecca Bryant and Don Nichols of past)(modern performance duo on movement studies for the source video portion of In the Line of Sight. The first videos recorded on November 21, 2008 feature improvisations and experiments toward a database of suspicious and ambiguous movements in space - related to current technological developments in surveillance technologies that are less focused on the comparison of facial features and more on the analysis of movement patterns. Below is an example of our first experiments (Quicktime video format, MPEG4):

HDV_longshot_02.mp4 (20.2MB)

These are the first digital sketches of a possible spatial arrangement of the flashlights. This sketch is modeled after the early visualization posted here. The top picture shows a perspective of the curved flashlight matrix, the smaller pictures underneath illustrate close-up, top and side views.

More sketches of different spatial organization possibilities will follow. The digital models were built by Micah Bowers (graduate student in Electronic and Time-Based Art at Purdue University).

Side view:

and top view (we aimed to arrange the flashlights in a way magnetic field lines behave):

This is the conceptual framework for a dance performance in which the performers develop an abstract choreography based on the afore mentioned technological concept of suspicious movements. The choreography is designed in a non-linear fashion, individual parts will be recombined by computer software (click on the image below to see a higher resolution diagram):

We will tape the performers with surveillance cameras to create a high contrast between the background (black) and performer (white). This footage is the main source for the 10×10 flashlight matrix. At the same time, using pattern matching algorithms, certain movements in the recorded dance performance trigger related videos in a database of prerecorded film excerpts. After the film excerpt is played back, the video switches back to the dance performance.

We are deliberately taking into consideration the subtle glitches and errors of our pattern matching algorithm that will create new and unexpected combinations of the combined materials.