Final Documentation

Although the software was not stable as of June 10th, 2009, both the video processing and hardware control was stable and successful. The video below shows the installation and viewers interacting with the space, as well as the 1:1 scale of silouhettes on the rear projection screen – the right hand wall of the space.

Negative Space Installation from fierceosity on Vimeo.

Language of Praise

Negative Space is an abstract exploration of the relationship between light and time. As the viewer allows themselves to be immersed in the negative space contained in by the work, their silhouette is co-opted and remade within the virtual space of the screen. By stretching and blurring the silhouette left by the viewer, their time is in turn blurred and they are made part of the piece. The play of time and light that happens within the space stretches the viewers perception of self and creates a lasting impression which persists after the viewer has left the space.

Revisions

The original concept for the piece focused on virtual depth perceived behind the screen, and was working to implement video processing effects to create a sense of depth and texture on the muslin screen. Through rear projection and the abstraction of the viewers silhouette, the viewer would be drawn into the piece by the illusion of depth and motion, the opportunity to see themselves reflected in the piece. This exploration of light and opportunities to place the viewer within the work is the central focus of the piece.

Having completed the installation and experienced the space, the work has evolved into a dialog having to do more with illusions of time rather than depth. The experience of walking into a corridor with a dead end, beside a screen built on a cinematic scale, inherently refers to time. As such, the piece now attempts to draw out that experience of time as the viewer passes down the corridor. When the viewer is still, or barely moving, the LEDs are on in the space creating an inviting environment that does not initially reveal its content. As the viewer passes down the corridor, the LEDs dim, and the projection brightens. The quicker the viewer moves through the space, the brighter the projection should come on, and the more their silhouette should blur. Additionally, the contrast between the complimentary colors of the LEDs and the projection will help burn-in the image of the space on the viewers retina, creating a ghost of the experience that continues to exist outside of the time and space of the work.

Code/Programming Issues

Selecting colors based on users clothing, motion tracking to control brightness.

Since the lighting in the space is changing, and not ever white, the color picker is near impossible. Additionally, reliable computer vision relies on a static image, especially stable lighting. Using pix_background rather than pix_blob may eventually help with this, although it needs to be told to set a new background image every time the lighting changes. There is the possibility for too much recursion here, as the lighting should be changing quite often.

Real time video processing (rotating, remapping, blurring, & changing RGB values) works okay, crashes when combined with Arduino. Pduino seems highly unstable, each works okay on their own, asking pduino to take input from sliders controlled by computer vision is not happening. Turning down the resolution on the camera input seems to help, but does not resolve the issue.

Circuit and Equipment

Equipment List

Screen Frame

• Microlam Joist: 216”
• Two 2 x 4’s – 10′
• One 2 x 4 – 8′
• Miscellaneous 2′-4′ 2 x 4’s – weight for bottom of screen

Screen

• Muslin Screen: 120” X 228”

Camera Mount

• Custom Wall Mount
• Canon GL-2

Lighting

• RGB Leds – 197” From SuperbrightLEDs.com
• 2′ x 2′ Prismatic Fluorescent Light Lens
• 20′ White PVC pipe, 1 & 1/2” diameter
• Panasonic HD Projector – 1280 X 720 Resolution

Electronics

• Arduino Decemillia
• 40′ RGB Rainbow Wire
• Wire Wrap
• 3 N-Channel Mosfets
• 12V Power Supply
• 200 Ohms Resistor
• 50′ DVI Cable
• 25′ 6-Pin female to 6-Pin Male amplified Firewire Cable

Fabrication and Installation Issues

Here the narrow space created by the installation is visible. The transparent screen which is in gray here will be reverse projected on to. The hd projector produces 2000 lumens, or approximately 121 lux on the 17 square meter area on the projector (exterior to the space) side of the screen. Assuming 50% of the lumens pass through the screen, the lux on the interior of the space is 60. This reduction in lux will be created and modulated through use of materials for the reverse projection screen,

The goal of the installation is to be immersive. One of the characteristics of immersive installations working with light, is the absence of shadows projected by the user, except beneath themselves. Because the light in this installation is entering from the side, which is unusual for light in a space. The human brain is used to light coming from above, and as such in order for this space to be percieved as immersive – filling in shadows that viewers will create on the back wall is important.

So then the lighting on the back wall must have at least as much lux as the lighting coming through the screen. Calculations for the LED strips from superbrightleds.com are more complex and for the purposes of this piece, make more assumptions. Each LED on the strips produces 2 lumens, and there are 150 LEDs across the 16.4 feet of linear space in the installation. This produces 300 lumens, or approximately 18 lux across the entire back wall of the installation. However, because the LEDs will be installed in a wall washer fixture, this lux will be brightest at the top of the wall, and dimmest at the bottom, filling in most of the shadow created but letting the silouhette of the viewer appear at the bottom of the space.

Other issues considered in the layout and construction of the piece.

1) The presence of the small column in the corner, breaking up the space slightly.
This will be compensated for in the frame of the screen – the width of the 2X4s needed to construct the screen will use up that extra space and not cast the projection or light into the end cap of the space. Additionally the camera will be aimed in such a way that this end space will not be visible in the projected image.

2) Camera vision
How high does the camera need to be in order to see 17′ of linear space? The projected image can be stretched in such a way that the angle of view is not an issue for the projection, but it is important that almost all of the space is in view of the camera.

3) Aspect ratio and height
The size of the space is dictated by the concept, or the idea of the fuzzy line between being present and absent in a virtual space, beyond the screen, behind the wall of the installation. Because the wall in the studio is 10′ a 16:9 aspect ratio demands a 17′10” installation, a 4:3 aspect ratio demands a 13′4” installation. In order to achieve these dimensions with at 2:1 lens (as is the lens in the projector I will be using) – it will need to be the full 32′ across the room from the installation.

Background and Bibliography

Works and artists that have influenced this work, or are being referenced by this project.

James Turrell

A Frontal Passage

Bruce Nauman

Yayoi Kusama

The Gleaming Lights of Souls

Olafur Eliasson

Sun installation

Takeshi Murata

Technical and Academic references:

Immersive Computer Art and the Making of Conciousness

Deep Screen: Art in Digital Culture

Color Rendering Index

Sodium Light

History of Datamoshing

Rhizome: Pixel Bleed

Timeline

Week 2
+ Research and Locate Lighting
+ Research Video Feedback

Week 3
+ Background and Bibliography
+ Get lighting?
+ Video testing
- White balance for low CRI lighting and white lighting scenarios
- Height and frame of view for camera

Week 4
+ Begin Coding
- color recognition
- inverse motion tracking
- RGB response and lighting control

Week 5
+Continue Coding
- Image capture and compositing
- Color states
+Begin Fabrication

Week 6
+Continue Fabrication
+Continue Coding

Week 7
+Debugging Phase 1

Week 8
+Complete room

Week 9
+Debugging Phase 2

Week 10
+Debugging Phase 3

Concept

Negative space (working title) creates an ever evolving landscape of bodies camouflaged onto a membrane of video. It is an investigation of the boundaries between physical and virtual space, and what it is to be present in an experience. In order to cross the border into the screen space in the work, the viewer must allow the system to adjust to and immerse them. Movement tears the membrane of the video, destroying the space beyond the screen. Until the viewer has the patience to be absorbed by the system the screen space can never achieve its full resolution and the viewer is denied presence in the work. By allowing themselves to be made part of the piece their perfect moment will be retained and transformed into the video membrane, being made textural, temporal, and spatial.

Before entering the space the projection and space are both blank and white. Upon entering the space the light begins to change to match the dominant colors added by the viewers presence. As the viewer moves across the canvas of the space, the video projection, which has been changing in color as well, is torn and textured with video artefacts. Once the viewer allows the system to camouflage them in light, desaturating everything but the dominant color selected, their image is retained by the system and added to the other red, or blue, or green (etc.) images and moments and viewers who have crossed the border and been made part of the video space.