Message-ID: <alpine.NEB.2.00.1102170227250.8551@panix3.panix.com>
From: Alan Sondheim <sondheim@panix.com>
To: Cyb <cybermind@listserv.wvu.edu>, Wryting-L <WRYTING-L@listserv.wvu.edu>
Subject: Day 3 (last), Columbia College mocap research examples -
Date: Thu, 17 Feb 2011 02:29:36 -0500 (EST)
Day 3 (last), Columbia College mocap research examples - http://www.alansondheim.org/edge6.mp4 http://www.alansondheim.org/harness.mp4 http://www.alansondheim.org/322harness.mp4 1st, 1 dancer working the edge drawn into poser triplets 2nd and 3rd, 2 flight harness dancers, 1 ground (head, root) dancer 2nd drawn with poser singlet, third drawn with poser triplet notes from the accompanying talk My avatar behavior is governed by animation files originating with mocap equipment. Almost all professional current mocap uses nodes - information coming in from specific body areas, assigned body areas, and so forth. I remap the mocap body, by distributing nodes among several human bodies; by collapsing nodes, by node reassignment on a geometric or random basis, by 'heaping' nodes and so forth. I see 'the body' as: a. An already inscribed, already virtual body. b. A distributed or social body: Who speaks 'within' 'us' and who answers for us, etc. My avatars are social, their movements produced by groups instead of individuals: up to four performers for one animation file, one animation file expanded into multiple conforming avatars. c. A dying body: Our bodies are always on the way out and our work, if it doesn't revolve around love, sexual arousal, and hatred, is bounded by, revolves within, the horizon of death and despair. d. An absent body (Drew Leder); we rarely track everything. It is the privilege of the camera in Second Life to reveal the avatar as simultan- eous object and subject, confined and open, teetering. e. A present body and an abject body - in and out of virtual worlds. (political bodies, in the face of mass extinctions, social degradation) I'm interested in errors, leaks, and resistance, and in the recuperation/ re-presentation of flesh. My work always begins and ends with the flesh, with the flesh-mind, with embodied mind. (Among other tools, exploring the limits of mocap.) NEW WORK 3RD DAY: 1 RANDOM NODE ASSIGNMENT AMONG 2-3 DANCERS (FAILED, MAPPING IMPOSSIBLE) 2 TELEOLOGICAL BEHAVIOR: DANCERS 'TAKING' AVATAR THRU SPECIFIC TASKS 3 FLIGHT AVATAR W/ VIDEO CAMERA 4 FLIGHT AVATAR: TORSION IN RELATION TO GROUND AVATAR 5 FLIGHT AVATAR: LEG/ARM REASSIGNMENT WITH TWIST Thanks to: Patrick, Andrew, Steven, Morgan, Myah, Lianne, Katie, Deborah, Jeff, Brian, Terence. Final result: 90 bvh, 50 approx. .avi rendered, 300 stills, 2 hrs. video (including flight video).