Its morning – and have just got in. Connor, the student – he is here again – now helping natacha build parts of the pixy screen. I think he is enjoying himself.
I feel tired this morning. My baby has a cold and was having trouble breathing last night. He has croup again. It made for a night of not much sleep and a bit of worry. I think I have now caught his cold. I feel so tired this morning, but my baby is happy this morning, I got a lot of kisses. I think his cold will be over tonight. We move a lot as a family due to my work…and last night I was laying in bed thinking – what if something goes wrong, what if he stops breathing – who do you call? where is the doctors in Brighton, where is an ambulance? how do you call one. What if you need something like this in a hurry? Its rare that we are in Australia anymore, but these thoughts about the everyday things – how to find doctors, hospitals, etc, if anything goes wrong – how do you cope when you travel so much and each destination is so new.
Tina Gonsalves –
I digitized all of last nights footage. I edited helen’s in and out points – making them longer. I feel I am going to have ot deal with it another way – meaning – less talking – longer edit points. – edits driven by changes in emotional expression and not edit points…? The problem is is that if we don’t have key in and out points – it could just corrupt everything. As in – sort of become quite flippant. I need Jeff to start working on the next version of this. jeff Mann is building the video engine. He is still in Berlin, but I have a feeling things will be able to work with out him being here.
Kim Byers, from UCL interaction Center who was doing todays evaluation mentioned that the ‘best ‘ response were the portraits that didn’t talk much at all. the ambiguity gave a lot more room for interpretation. Editing, shooting wise, obviously someone who doesn’t talk is easier to deal with. Again, more space, more quietness, potentially more reflectiveness.
On the other hand, to elicit different emotional states, I often begin by talking to each of the participants. They mostly talk a lot – its amazing where the conversations lead to. Its such an interesting process.
Kim noticed that the characters got moody. She said by the end of the day – they were unresponsive. This was interesting, as I hadn’t quite told her about how the coding of the work has memory and overtime a mood and temperament for each character would build. I need to get the mood /temperament figures for kim to guide her evaluation. I also need to spend some time playing with them myself. I am not sure how to access them, but have asked jeff how we go about it.
Jane McGrath – MA DIGITAL MEDIA ARTS
Arrived today feeling a little unsure of what to expect, came down the stairs turned the corner and arrived…. a room full of activity, a large green tarpaulin laid out on the floor, painted white diagonal stripes from a previous incarnation. Now a collection of fresh batons lay horizontally and three people sit and work.
Connor and Hayley make up two thirds of this team. Both are working as part of a placement scheme for a project called “Loops” that aims to give young people interested in working in the arts some hands on experience. They seemed very capable – as they utilise the glue gun, coiled plastic and batons with great ease. They were really involved in building a project that seems so complex but as with anything in life – small simple steps make up the most complicated of designs.. .
Natasha is at the other end applying some small plastic looking squares (which I am sure are actually more than this) to even more batons….Michael is setting up a series of what he calls ‘pixy boards’ which are like to my inexperienced eye a collection of more complicated multi storey mother boards. It looks like a miniature suburban office building structure – prior to the cladding being put on.
Tina runs in and starts getting things organised to set up the screens and computers for the software. She needs to digitise and transcibe and its all hands on deck.
How do I feel? Nervous, a little shy ..but welcomed, also a little unsure of how to make my self useful. Carl, who is also assisting helps me to relax as we chat about his current project relating to shyness.
I think as i write that maybe this blog will be more helpful if its subjective rather than simply reporting what happens . Im an MA student and my back ground is fashion public relations, working for 5 years for Jean Paul Gaultier, teaching at London College of Fashion and film-making… I say this to qualify the following… i came to the course with a bare minimum of technical skills outside of film making and event organising and have been grasping and flailing around trying to catch up with my peers ever since. But in my defence I can now program..
So its an understanding of the technical that fascinates me about this project as well as an exploration of liminal spaces . I guess then that this blog will be an account of what I see, learn and think, which may be as surprising to me as it is to readers of this blog..
A very interesting energy, buzzing, chatting and the odd “bang bang” … infact as I type the bang bang has become BANG BANG..
Tina Gonsalves – The screen is starting to take shape now – hayley and connor have left for the day – Karl has gone back to London. I have set up the studio next door for tonights shoot. I am getting a bit tired but also know its rare that you have access to such space, help and technology – I need to make the most use of it we can. Gen and Jamie from Lighthouse have been great as always. – helpful. nothing is a problem. Natacha and Michael have been given keys to Lighthouse now – I have a feeling Michael will be here all night – working away – he seems a bit panicked – he is building the ‘guts’ behind the pixy screen – he is an amazing artist/thinker/technologist who makes pretty hi-tech stuff with lo-tech.
We had some great talks today – about space – as in gaps, about stillness, about interventions, about connectedness, sharing. karl’s back ground as an anthropologist is incredibly interesting. He discussed a lot of books and philosophers. Its been great to have him about. I discussed a few future ideas I am trying to get off the ground. Jane has an interest in ‘Liminal spaces’ – she is doing her MA at Brighton and is here to help out for a few weeks. She wants to know more about the project/process and is thinking about writing about it for her dissertation. Natacha talked about a project natacha talked about an artist working with hexagram that embeds the screen into the mirror.
These thoughts are interesting – Michael mentioned a french company that makes video screens that are mirrors. Then It would be nice to explore all of this further. Gordon Brand is here on Thursday, so it will be interesting to discuss things further. I want to see this project shift into something beautiful – more aesthetic, more seductive. More realized than past iterations of the work.
Natacha has found my process of work interesting. She says that the way that I work is very built into the concept of Chameleon. She says I should discuss it more – but its hard to be objective about it when you are in it, and its part of your everyday. I have asked everyone who is taking part in the next two weeks to write about their experience, and hopefully post it to this blog. I hope they do. I want to know what they get out of it. Natacha calls it an iterative process. I am not sure what I call it.
the hammers have started. lots of banging, lots of people. lots of noise. we have been told to quieten down. I have a feeling the screen will be hanging tomorrow. I am starting to digitize last nights shoot. I have installed the new Pixy patch to work with the Chameleon Project.
