Admiration: Les Objets Impossibles

Les Objects Impossibles is a live audiovisual concert in two parts, created by Pedro Mari and Natan Sinigaglia (also known as Abstract Birds) in collaboration with Arcadi, Cité de la musique and IRCAM. Les Objects Impossibles visualizes two pieces of music composed by Dmitri Kourliandski in real time as they are performed by Ensemble Intercontemporain. Max-MSP is used to analyze the sound, while vvvv creates the visuals.

I’m fascinated by the use of music to manipulate a semi-realistic 3D-space. I’d be quite interested to see the debugging environment for this impossible object. How was it decided what sounds modify which parameters? How was this impossible object envisioned in the first place?

For more about Les Objects Impossibles, click here. For more about Abstract Birds, click here.

Surprise: City Symphonies

City Symphonies is  a traffic simulator created by Mark McKeague that uses the motion of traffic to create synthesized soundscapes. Processing powers the movement of the traffic, while Max-MSP takes the simulation and turns it into music.

I was pleasantly surprised by the elegant simplicity of this soundscape. As someone who has lived in a city all of their life, it’s refreshingly disorienting to have the familiar vroom of a vehicle replaced with classically synthetic sound.

For more about City Symphonies, click here. For more about Mark McKeague, click here.

What Could Have Been (Or Once Was): Talking Tree

Talking Tree is a project created by Happiness Brussels where a hundred-year-old tree was hooked up to various equipment which measured the tree’s living circumstances. A custom bit of MaxMSP software was written to translate the tree’s sensing information into social media content, which can be found on Twitter, Flickr, and SoundCloud.

Unfortunately, the Talking Tree website is no longer active, so there in no nexus for the tree’s sensing information. I’m a bit dubious of how the MaxMSP program “translates this information into human language.” (See first link) While I enjoy the quirkiness of turning a tree into a social media presence, this project seems too much in the vein of something like a dog with Facebook. (However, if the tree’s custom website was still active, I would consider this project two notches up from the aforementioned Facebook dogs. From what little of it is seen in the video, the website looked quite well designed.)

More information about Happiness Brussels can be found here.

Looking Outwards — Generative Software, BioPoetics, Materials

SCIgen

Each time SCIgen runs, it generates fake natural language in the form of a new computer science research papers. It has both utilitarian and critical uses, in that it can be used specifically to test the submission standards of journals and its existence as an open tool represents a broader critique of  It was developed in 2005 as a source of “amusement” by a group of graduate students in the PDOS (Parallel and Distributed Operating Systems) group in MIT’s computer science department. Generate your own paper here! You can customize the authors’ names as well.

The Xenotext

Poet & bioartist Christian Bök’s Xenotext is the first example of a poem and system for generating poetics being implanted in a non-human biological substrate. It’s worth quoting his own explanation in full, as it explains the process more succinctly than I could:

“When translated into a gene and then integrated into the cell, my poem [in the form of a sequence of engineered DNA]  is going to constitute a set of instructions, all of which cause [sic] [an extremophile bacterium] to manufacture a viable, benign protein in response—a protein that, according to my original, chemical alphabet, is itself yet another text. I am, in effect, engineering a life-form so that it becomes not only a durable archive for storing a poem, but also an operant machine for writing a poem” – Christian Bök

4D Printing

A collaboration between MIT (Skylar Tibbits of MIT’s SJET lab gave the TED talk), Autodesk, and Stratsys , 4D Printing is a project in which 3D printed structures are designed to autonomously change their conformations in specific ways over time. Though rudimentary at this point in time, the biomimetic possibilities of 4D printing are fascinating. Below is a video that demonstrates one such structure, which self-folds much like proteins do. The morphogenetic process that gives rise to the tertiary structure of proteins is both complex and crucial to the proper functioning of proteins, the structures they make up, and the organism at large. For instance, the conversion of healthy proteins into prions or mis-folded proteins, is thought to cause transmissible spongiform encephalopathies including “Mad Cow Disease.”

4D Printing: Self-Folding Protein from Skylar Tibbits on Vimeo.

depth-10 quadtree + depth-3 voronoi tree from postspectacular on Vimeo.

This render was created by merging together two algorithmic structures. It was created algorithmically, nothing was done by hand. I thought it was incredible how knowledge and mastery of these data structures made it possible for them to be used as a medium to create visuals like these.

This excerpt from Artist and Computer contains many great examples of Manfred Mohr’s generative artwork, and discusses Mohr’s ideas about art and machines. Mohr’s work is interesting to me because there is a distinct aesthetic of Mohr’s work. Mohr works in a very abstracted way (using code to make rules) where the ‘artist’s hand’ is not necessarily seen in the work, but he is still able to create these stylized algorithms unique only to him.

Big-Eye Trevally from flight404 on Vimeo.

Big-Eye Trevally simulates the physics of thousands of fish in a group. I found this project very interesting because it’s a good example of playing around with algorithms directly from nature. With most generative art, the algorithm is created by the artist. In simulations such as those in Big-Eye Trevally, the algorithm is appropriated from nature itself.
This project made me very curious about algorithms and simulation. An artist can create an algorithm, and the computer can act as the simulator. In nature, the algorithms are the basic laws of physics, but what is the simulator? What makes these laws “go”? Generative art may be able to explore such ideas.

Here are the three i found most interesting:

Generative ROCK AND ROLL

So, Erik Natzke is a generative artist that used code to create this video, set to a rock and roll tune, that regenerates then degenerates photographs into this glittering, flickering artwork. I like it because it sorta reminds me of pixelation as everything comes to focus and goes out of focus again with pixels, but in this case each piece that flickers is made of a texture made up of the image and in the end it looks really cool. Made for Hard Rock Cafes to display the video.

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These are images computationally generated by mitchell whitelaw using a modified code by Murrey Eden’s 2D growth model. These images represent the global economy and predicted growth/decay/fluctuation in the economies from countries worldwide. I’m not sure how to read it but i’m sure others who are more adept at this can.

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This artwork, made by the artist simply known as “LIA” was designed using a code for Processing and it inputs and manipulates the numbers given to it, in this case “18” and “5”. The result is then projected onto the side of a building, in this case, the VROM, parlement building for Dutch infrastructure. 

Her description: “The numbers 18 and 5 were given by the grid of the buildings projections surface and were implemented in the image generating code in various ways.”

I found it to be an exciting and lively design that also has a pleasant and simple color palette (red, white, black) with varying shapes, opacity and more.

William Latham’s “Mutator 1” and “Mutator 2” have created 3-dimensional evolving images since the late 1980’s. I was skimming through Latham’s Website and noticed this small treasure trove of mutated images. The fact that these were all (with a hum push) evolved out of previous generations of images is fascinating to me because it requires user interaction in order to generate more and more possibilities. Here is one of Latham’s “favorite” (so I read) mutations:

If it is not obvious by my last few posts, evolutionary generative imagery which requires viewer interaction to succeed is one of my favorite areas I have come across. Karl Sims’ “Genetic Images” is an installation which allows viewers to help guide the evolutionary process of an image creation software in order to actually dictate future generations of still imagery. This combination of interactivity and artist’s vision is one of my favorite mixtures and I can’t get enough of projects similar to these. Here are a few “generations” which Sim’s program and it’s users produced:

When Looking for my third piece for this looking outwards I came across the website of Jared Tarbell. What struck me about his site was not the wealth of computationally generated art, but this small widget above his home screen. It begged to be played with. I couldn’t help but sit down and just screw around with it for five minutes.

I didn’t even have to know what this was or have it advertised to me for it to have such a strong effect on my desire to interact. Tarbell’s ability to just place a small widget on his website and incite interaction is fascinating to me and is a skill which I wish to obtain. After poking around his website I also found a few more projects which involve these little interactive balls.

Sound Activated

Touch Activated

They kept me quite entertained.

Admiration: Stardust

Stardust is a series of generative portraits by Sergio Albiac. According to Albiac, Stardust is an experiment based around the idea of modeling artistic decisions into software. Over 15,000 portraits were created as a result of this project.

I think Albiac was incredibly successful in creating an system that outputs distinctive and aesthetically pleasing content. I’d be interested to know how the program takes samples from space photos, as well as the logic behind the circle size and placement, which seems to be using some sort of face detection algorithm to specify the size and density of circles.

More information about Sergio Albiac can be found here. For more Stardust photos, click here.

Surprise: Elevated

Elevated is a PC 4k demo by RGBA and TBC, which was entered at Breakpoint 2009.

Iñigo Quílez, one of the coders for this project, and has a general presentation  of how Elevated was constructed here.

As someone with an incredibly basic knowledge of shaders and absolutely no experience coding them, I was pleasantly surprised with Quilez’s ability to explain how he built a complex program from relatively simple components. It helps that Elevated looks pretty darn cool in motion.

Additionally, Quilez breaks down his terminology even more in his 2008 presentation regarding the project Slisesix, which can be found here.

What May Soon Be But Is Not Yet: Future Unfolding

Liked: The Human Printer – Louise Naunton Morgan

I really enjoyed watching this video. This project displays printing as executed in an analog format. The artist tediously copies an image, dot-by-dot, using CMYK format. I think this subject matter is particularly interesting in an age where automated processes are a substantial component of society. This project allows the viewer to visualize the amount of time technology saves for imaging purposes.

Surprised: “All Streets” – Ben Fry

This is a really cool project that depicts the united states through its road systems. I think it’s really interesting to think of roadways as circuits, or veins. This project allowed me to visualize this concept in a literal and relatable way. I want to see it in person.

Disappointed:  “abstrakt Abstrakt” – Zimoun

This artist created dynamic, kinetic sound sculptures with combinations of ventilators, wires, and motors. I think this project is really cool, however it’s insanely boring to look at. I feel like there’s a more aesthetically pleasing way to exhibit this installation, other than a blank white wall.

Roots by Memo Akten

This project generates root structures based on a random algorithm that takes several parameters that are customizable by the user. It also reacts to user input. I was surprised by it because with further inspection it appears to just used a motion blur technique like what was demonstrated in class on Monday to make the roots. But due to the sporadic movements of the roots, it is much more. I liked that it is capable of being customized and reacts to objects placed onto its surface and touches from users. Moreover, it also generates the sound based on the movement of the roots. The audio and visuals are purely generated according to his program. It runs on the Brkick Table made by Jordan Hochenbaum and Owen Vallis and was premiered at the Minitek Music + Innovation Festival September 12-14 2008  in New York.

Landscape Prints by Erik Natzke

In this work Erik Natzke wanted to create large prints according to the description on vimeo. However, I liked them because I think they are explosive, but somehow graceful in their colors. I would be interested in seeing what the code that generated these images looked like. Or for that matter how it worked. The delivery of the project as prints would be more appealing than viewing them through vimeo. It could have been more effectively displayed on the web via a different site. It would be interesting to see these animated, and in that I think he missed an opportunity.

Crystalline by Robert Hodgin

This project starts with randomly charged particles and results in a simulation of magnetics and crystal growth. I found it interesting because it uses an actual physics simulation to create art. It uses impressive lighting and effects with light emission in OpenGL. This is an impressive task. I would like to be able to create shaders for my projects that allow for such impressive imagery to be created in realtime.

So Musicovery by Frederic Vavrille is pretty much amazing.

(musicovery.com)

Essentially it’s Pandora.com, but with a really cool visual aspect to it. It generates radio for you based on music genres and songs/artists that you’ve favorited, and then it uses  your favorite songs to generate a visual map of your musical interests.

I think from a synesthetic viewpoint this is really fascinating, because ways of visualizing music with relationships based on genre and sound and color has always interested me. It’s more visually interesting than any music visualizing system I’ve seen yet, also.

Another piece I found interesting is called StarryNight, by Alex Galloway, Mark Tribe, Martin Wattenberg.

http://archive.rhizome.org/starrynight/

Essentially what it does is that it turns every text and article on Rhizome.com into a star on the map, and every time one of those texts is read on the site, its corresponding star gets a little brighter. Over time, this uses people’s interaction with the site to build a star map out of all the articles on the site, and it makes it easy to tell which ones are most-read. When a user of the star map hovers over any particular star, they can view keywords relating to the article that star represents, and by choosing one it will generate a constellation connecting all the other stars that share that keyword. It’s a really endearing way of visualizing a lot of information at once.

Finally, we have the Grand Taxonomy of Rap Names.

http://blog.kobayashi.eu/wp-content/uploads/2010/09/poster_rappers_1300.jpg

Mostly I find this interesting because it’s a very frivolous subject matter, but also because I like these sorts of bubble graphs with all the lines sprouting off the bubbles and I think they’re a really fun way of looking at information. The use of color to me is what makes this an artistic piece as opposed to just a really nice way of viewing information, even if the subject matter is a little silly.