I worked with Calli Higgins, and we decided to camouflage the camera by gluing a USB webcam into a milk carton. We snaked a USB extender out of the bottom of the refrigerator, and it still closed.

 

Fridgecam

Our first test was making the fridge responsive to the opening. We taped off a small part of the door and used that area as the sampling for motion detection. In addition, we added sounds such as a creaky old door, farm noises, and a computerized reminder of the time left in the semester.

One great feature of Evocam is its built in web server (sans audio. I sent the link to the live view to the student list. Although our primary focus was the fridge, students loved spying on each other thru the view of the fridge. ITPers took screenshots of each other and sent them to the list, where others speculated about what was really going on in the picture. Some performed for the camera when they knew others were watching. The fridgecam and the associated list post turned the lounge into a remote conversational space.

Only a few  hours after I sent the link out, a first year student created a chat room about the ITP fridge, while broadcasting his own fridge. Others soon joined in.

Fridge Chat Room

Due to its popularity, I transferred the Fridgecam to its own domain where students continue to watch it. This is a video Calli and I compiled of a day in the life of  ITP Fridgecam.

We-Flashy.com

We- Flashy is Mindy Tchieu and my final project in Despina Papadopoulos & Zach Eveland’s Personal Expression and Wearable Technologies class. Mindy and I wanted to design fun apparel to increase the visibility of cyclists and pedestrians by seamlessly merging reflective elements with casual-looking clothing.

Replica was performed twice on December 3rd, 2010.

Special thanks to dancer Claire Westby, pictured above.

A collaboration with Jeff Howard for the Big Screens class at ITP. Presented at the IAC building’s 120 foot video wall on Friday December 3rd, 2010.

Replica is a performance using live image processing to explore how the awareness of time affects the perception of self-image. Patterns unfold creating a dialogue between the performer and her representation, bringing the contrast of control and authenticity into question.

The project was developed in Processing using the Most Pixels Ever library. Video was pulled from a Canon 5D Mark ii camera using Canon’s EOS utility and CamTwist to communicate with Processing. To broadcast to each of the three machines powering the video wall, Daniel Shiffman helped us figure out a way to send and receive the images using UDP. To control each of the different modes and parameters of the sketch we used a MIDI controller. The code for the project will be available on GitHub soon.

The project was performed by Claire Westby with the song “Lost in the World” by Kanye West.

A huge thanks is due to our instructor, Associate Arts Professor Daniel Shiffman and also to Rune Madsen, Nien Lam, and Lucas Zavala for all the help along the way. Another big thanks to our Big Screens classmates and the camera crew for documenting the night for us.

Press: Featured on the Wooster Collective.

Currently there is a Big Screens ITP 2010 Channel on Vimeo and a Big Screens 2010 set on Flickr.

“On the Ledge,” is a site-specific installation that Sarah Dahnke and I created for the four windows in student lounge of NYU’s Interactive Telecommunications Program.

Concept:
Looking at the fourth floor of 721 Broadway from the street below, it’s nearly impossible to imagine the wildly diverse students, and frenetic energy that exists within its confines.

We wanted to find a way to incorporate the building’s inhabitants into its architecture.

The scene opens with one dancer in each window. Their energy is low but increases as the music changes. As the party ramps up, the dancers go crazier and crazier, change spaces, double up in windows, headbang as a big group and finally fall over from exhaustion.

The dancers are projected life-sized and viewable from the inside and outside of the building.

Process:
Using projection mapping in Max/MSP, we created a composition that exists exclusively on the shades of each window and nothing in between.

We measured each window and spiked our filming stage to allow the dancers to move in a space the exact size of each window. Filming simultaneously with two Canon 5D cameras, we captured the approximately 9.5-minute dance party in real time before translating it into projection.

For our Video Sculpture midterm, the assignment was to reinterpret traditional sculpture into a sculpture using video.

Sarah Dahnke showed me Erwin Wurm’s “Confessional” and it looked very interesting. I had recently seen photographs of his One-Minute Sculpture series, but I had missed Confessional somehow.

We both loved the way that the body was the integral part of the sculpture. Wurm’s original piece used a doghouse. We wanted the users to see themselves as part of the  body sculpture when they entered the structure.

Process:

After going back and forth of what the structure would be, we decided on something like a big metal drum.  The closest we could find were classic metal trashcans. The structure was nice, but which had a lovely structure but were a tad bit too narrow for the original monitors we we wanted to use.

So we had to do some rerouting, try using TV monitors (but fail to get a signal), and finally decide to do a pathway that involved a Sony Handycam to a laptop running Isadora to a VGA splitter to two monitors. Inside, the monitor displays what the external camera sees.

We laid them on their side, installed video screens in each of the cans that showed a live feed wide enough to see the structure and the body at once.

We also put cameras in each can, and projected the images of the user on the wall above the cans. We wanted other people in the room to experience the intimate space, but translated through the camera.

Photo Documentation:

Update: A screen test with Claire Westby.

For the 2010 Big Screens show at the IAC building, Jeff Howard and I are working on a live video piece that extends time one frame at a time along the video wall.

The video wall at the Frank Gehry-designed space, is a unique event space where the 120 feet wide x 12 feet tall screen is visible from the West Side Highway.

Some of the concepts that we are exploring in our piece are:  distortion of identity through representation, patterns that emerge through repetitive representation, and the way that telepresence can collectively disconnect us from the spaces we inhabit.

At the show, we will use a dancer to perform our piece live.

The Big Screens 2010 show is 12/3/2010, 6:30PM at the IAC building (18th street at the West Side Highway).

Photos shows are early tests using our classmates, Jeff, and I as subjects.

Testing Self-Continuum

Power.

For my wearables final, I want to do a project based on ailments and stress caused by using the computer too much in this digital age. When we are on our laptops, why do we slump and surrender our power to technology?

I was inspired by Linda Stone’s presentation to our Applications class last year when she said that we have surrendered our power to the computer. I think about that all of the time when I find myself slumping, deep in a gaze while using my machine.

While the prevalence of personal computers and devices has certainly made our life more convenient, it has made it more sedentary.

There have been countless articles and studies recently about how terrible sitting still at desk is for us. And offices go to ridiculous lengths to have ergonomic chairs and devices to promote health.

walking treadmill desk

So, I want to create ornamental objects that should be worn in the office either as a costume-like element of fashion, that a user could wear to feel in control of the technology. I was thinking like a football player’s shoulder pad for a man, or a ornate hat for a woman with an embedded accelerometer. When the user is not in control, and is surrendering posture to technology, the screen would dim.

Shoulder pad

Carrie Bradshaw hat

Tech:

Self-Portrait, October 2010 from Alex Vessels on Vimeo.

Self-Portrait was the third project for Gabe Barcia-Columbo‘s Video Sculpture class at ITP.

Special thanks: Sarah Dahnke and Minette Mangahas who for shooting and driving my truck, respectively.

This was created with Patricia Adler, and Rune Madsen. We wanted to make an abstract visualization about journey, the subconscious, and introspection. Here is what we came up with.

Video Sculpture – Week 2 – Abstract video painting from Alex Vessels on Vimeo.

Created with Patricia Adler and Rune Madsen.

I am very flatfooted and have always had a little trouble buying shoes, due to the width of my feet. As a kid, my sister teased me, calling my feet “flappers.” They are certainly wide, and they do cause pain without proper footwear. But, they also have carried me thru many situations, even to the finish line of the 2008 NYC Marathon.

So, I wanted to play with something that was whimsical looking, but also served an alternate use. After seeing fresh loaves of ciabatta bread at the bakery, I knew I wanted to make some shoes out of them.

They were squarish like my feet and  had the width and softness that I required. So, I cut the loaves in such a way that it created a tongue, and then added white shoelaces.

And then I wore them to class – and for the next three-and-a-half hours.