IDAT 101: the aftermath of the intervention

Following on from the presentation and the premiere of the intervention, I've noticed that the amount of views had increased from 50 on the first day to a 3-figured 136 views, which meant that my intervention was successful. Many reasons can be put down to the usage of memes and tags, and also the critique of Justin Bieber, in which the intervention is partially aimed towards. However, a point about the North Korean clip was raised during the presentation, but for definite, they wouldn't know of the clip (or the 4chan meme), but if all the hype about Bieber touring North Korea were to be true, and if something unfortunate were to happen to him before the tour, the reaction would pretty much correlate with the intervention, in a similar way to the loss of their Dear Leader, and also of that of Michael Jackson worldwide.

The biggest lesson learned from the intervention is that if you do know the formula, then your intervention would be very successful and could even go viral itself.

IDAT 108: Last week's meeting, progress and this week's filming

Last week's meeting managed to get everything sorted for the following week, which included getting the work schedule together and getting the storyboard onto a flowchart, in order to get an idea of what scenes are to be filmed and how they are going to be linked into the Facebook element before the multiple-choice endings, which involved various scenarios. This meeting gave me a much better picture of what will be expected out of the movie project, and how long we are going to take on the movie, as well as putting the foundations in place for preparation, ready for the filming, which was my part.

The work schedule included the filming schedule, which started from about 6pm on the 28th to the party at approximately 10pm, which then formed a central part of the character meeting the new partner, before then starting to reach the decision points where the viewer decides which ending is going to be used for the end scenario.

This week, filming has already commenced on the first and the last scenes, but due to time constraints (and the fact that the USB cable for the camera had been left at the director's house by accident owing to two bottles of cider on the first day of filming!), an extra day has been added to the schedule for the next 3 last scenes before filming is all wrapped-up and then the clips editing will be done before the premiere is due on Thursday, and also before the interactive movie is due to go live. Progress, on the other hand, is going very well, and despite the short timeframe that the project was given, it looks very good and when the premiere comes, it will all be polished up ready for it's debut.

IDAT 102: Arch-OS bouncing ball visualisation

For my visualisation, I have decided to do a bouncing ball, which is influenced by the values of the first digit of the data captured from Arch-OS's Atrium A Heat Flow sensor in the Portland Square Building of the University. Because I wanted the illustration to represent the flow of the heat (hence the name of the sensor that I chose to use in my visualisation), I looked into pre-existing examples of data visualisations (http://vimeo.com/15088939) before deciding to go down the simpler route for my visualisation.

The data is first taken from the RSS feed using XMLElement in Processing, then the value of the data is taken from the 'description' child of the RSS using "value = xml.getChildren("channel/item/description");". The term 'child' in this context refers to a subsection within a 'parent', which in turn refers to the root of the RSS. The colour also varies according to the values of the RSS data, which varies between darker shades of red and grey depending on how high or how low either values are in each of the RGB attributes of the circle colour property.

The values are then parsed as floating-point integers, which is then used to create values which will be used for the random positioning and the colour properties by getting the content from value and then using charAt to obtain the indexes of the digits:

    float v = int(value[i].getContent().charAt(1));
    float v2 = int(value[i].getContent().charAt(2));
    float v3 = int(value[i].getContent().charAt(3));
    float v4 = int(value[i].getContent().charAt(4));

Then, the values are added to the attributes:

   fill(v,v2,v3);

   ellipse(ceil(random(0,v)) * 8, height/2 + 20, 50,50);

Note that the ellipse uses 'ceil' to round up a random number and the number obtained from the first index of the value (v) to the nearest whole integer, then it is multiplied by 8 to create the X value, and then the Y value is created by dividing the height by 2 and adding that by 20. The result, depending on the RSS value on a given day, is a ball that bounces left and right in rapid motions.

This is the entire source code of the project:


import processing.xml.*;

XMLElement xml;
XMLElement[] title;
XMLElement[] pubDate;
XMLElement[] value;

void setup(){
  size(600,100);
  background(0);
  smooth();
  String url = "http://x2.i-dat.org/archos/archive.rss?source=.AtriumA_heating_flow";
  XMLElement xml = new XMLElement(this, url);
  title = xml.getChildren("channel/item/title");
  pubDate = xml.getChildren("channel/item/pubDate");
  value = xml.getChildren("channel/item/description");

}

void draw(){
  background(255);
  for(int i=1; i<value.length; i++){
    float v = int(value[i].getContent().charAt(1));
    float v2 = int(value[i].getContent().charAt(2));
    float v3 = int(value[i].getContent().charAt(3));
    float v4 = int(value[i].getContent().charAt(4));
    fill(v,v2,v3);
   ellipse(ceil(random(0,v)) * 8, height/2 + 20, 50,50);
 }
}

IDAT 101: My intervention

For my intervention, I have decided to juxtapose a video of Justin Bieber playing a character on CSI who gets shot dead with a video of the public mourning of Kim Il-Sung in North Korea, in reference to a 4chan campaign to vote for Justin to perform in North Korea, with fake subtitles added to change the subject to it being Justin Bieber's death rather than the Dear Leader's. The reason why I've decided to do this as an intervention is because I wanted to address the rivalries between fans and critics, the latter of which had made him subject to a vote in favour of a tour in North Korea, and also because an episode of CSI, where he gets shot dead, and the recent events on YouTube relating to a 4chan campaign last year inspired me to construct such an intervention.

The intervention is a satire of several memes, which include the aforementioned ones, but also incorporating an idea that has been used for the Downfall meme, where fake subtitles are added to make something in a foreign language sound like it was about something different to the actual, original topic. This time, the fake subtitles are used to give an illusion that Justin Bieber was going to perform in North Korea, but since his demise in the intervention, the whole public are extremely melancholic about his loss, and even mentioned the great effort that has been put to get him to North Korea, including building monuments, mass-purchasing tickets and even donning t-shirts. The intervention also covers the issue about rivalries between 'beliebers' (loyal fans of Justin Bieber, particularly hardcore ones) and Justin's critics, in which this intervention is designed to target. Often, the criticism is criticised by 'beliebers', who often use the excuse of jealousy to defend him, whilst critics would fight back and even take extreme measures to shock them, like for example, YouTube was hacked with messages against him, and even a fake banner informing of his 'death'. The intervention is designed to provide entertainment and irony, whilst at the same time shocks the most naïve of 'beliebers', until the most educated ones realise that it is just a spoof. The so-called reaction, depending on what angle it is taken depends on these aforementioned factors, whether or not it will be just a humourous response or an excuse to pontificate defences, which would be most likely be seen in hardcore fans, especially younger ones.

See here for the intervention: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3LtVa0MR2g0

IDAT 108: Film project with Skyzon Studios: Social Killer

As part of our project in IDAT108, we have decided to do an interactive film, which, under a fake-and-non-existant NDA (non-disclosure agreement), I can't say much to spoil the storyline (and the anticipation people are probably expecting for the film!) apart from the fact that the film features Facebook and a storyline that is decided via interactivity using Flash.

The experience of the meeting was very good as I've had a taste of what will be coming in the project, and how film projects in general work. Since then, I have been assigned the role of cameraman, and many things are starting to take shape: we now have a schedule set for preparing scripts, filming, editing, and the premiere that will take place after the film has been complete. All of that is within a given timeframe that has been set just in time for the last day of modules before the spring break, and before the SOFT131 exam and the workshops that are going to take place during May. We have also organised a party as a tie-in with the filming, and to create scenes that will be used with the film project.

IDAT 101: Juxtaposition as an intervention

What I noticed about existing art interventions were the fact that most of them relied on juxtaposing the environment, the context, or an actual action of an intervention with existing installations, real-life objects, public property, or anything that exists, like for instance, Pirates of the Amazon used the idea of incorporating a plug-in that displayed relevant links to torrents to a very popular online store.

One idea that I had for an intervention is a 'what-if' scenario that uses two clips juxtaposed to create a faux news report, which I did, by taking a clip of Justin Bieber getting shot whilst he played a character in an episode of CSI and placing it next to an edited clip of a North Korean news report about the entire country mourning the loss of the Dear Leader. I then added fake subtitles to the clip so then it was about Justin Bieber getting killed and the country mourning his loss, in reference to a 4chan campaign to rig votes for the next country that Justin Bieber is to perform in, and imagining if it were true, and if he (well, it will never happen in reality) was ever to be shot dead, the hysteria would have struck to almost the same extent when the King of Pop died, and that of Kim Il-Sung.

IDAT 106: Plymopoly - Environmental & Contextual Aspects

In our current group work, the game is based on the Monopoly idea, but adapted to suit commerce in a real-life environment, with a vision to boost commerce in the area, and to increase the use of QR codes for delivering promotions. As our project takes place in the city, ideas pulled from the original game had to be adapted to suit retail so then delivery of promotions can be delivered effectively, and also to add an aspect to the game where both gameplay and specially-created offers are used.

Most of the time, the Plymopoly game takes place in shopping and commercial areas, which is a mixed environment because the main areas in the city are indoors and outdoors, and also have varying degrees of footfall, which depends on many factors such as weather, economic and other events that take place at the same time, such as student nights that take place occasionally in Drake Circus.

Drake Circus has an estimated 74 stores, whilst the main shopping districts of New George Street, Armada Way and side street Cornwall Street have an estimated 150 stores and businesses. Together, they make up about 224 shops and businesses inside the main city centre districts. Drake Circus is inside, whilst New George Street and Armada Way are mostly outside, with the latter having an inside section below Sainsbury's.

The online environment depends on how the connectivity is affected, and how reliable it is. Because of the mobile nature of the game, connectivity is required, and the game would not work if connectivity is not available, so 3G and available Wi-fi is a major pre-requisite for participation as it needs to access the internet to read QR codes, update the status of properties and register leader board statistics. Also, a working camera built-in to the device is also required because the project relies on QR codes and applications that support QR code capturing. The websites that are going to be used in the project are optimised for smaller screens and will use less bandwidth, so then the project will be accessible to all, especially those that don't have an extensive mobile internet plan.

The game will take place in an environment where the amount of people movement is expected to be high, particularly in central areas. As nothing but QR codes and handheld devices (i.e. smartphones) are involved, there are no obstacles in regards to equipment placement that will occur in the project. The most tech-savvy are likely to be the biggest users of the project, although it will be expected that casual smartphone users would also take part as well.

(Main group blog about the project is at http://www.thelockwood.co.uk/idat209/. This posting will also be cross-posted there for collation with related postings.)